11 ms·

Google is not just a platform – It frames, shapes and distorts how we see

125 points by CarolineW 10y ago

hkxkgxjgxj 10y ago
Won't someone think of the children!?
blakesterz 10y ago
I always wonder if an open search algorithm would be better or worse? If Google let everyone see the magic, would outsiders be able to make it better so things like this don't happen? Would the white hats wing against the black hats if it was open to all?
- praptak 10y ago
  Why would that matter? Do you think Stormfront are somehow at advantage when it comes to gaming unpublished algorithms?
  - gaius 10y ago
    Given the Santorum thing, nope...
    - wutbrodo 10y ago
      I thought I knew what the Santorum thing being referenced here is, but maybe I'm wrong: how was Stormfront related in any way?
      - gaius 10y ago
        The question was, do Stormfront have an advantage here, and the answer I gave was, no, because left-wingers have previously successfully manipulated Google's algorithm to a much greater extent.
- FT_intern 10y ago
  no one would understand the algorithm
  - placeybordeaux 10y ago
    We analyze and compare things that we don't understand all the time.
  - placeybordeaux 10y ago
    We analyze and compare things that we don't understand all the time.
- jdietrich 10y ago
  Almost certainly worse. As it stands, SEOs fear Google and the webspam team like they're the Wizard of Oz. You have a strong incentive to follow the letter and the spirit of the webmaster guidelines, because you don't know exactly what's going on behind the curtain. Once you start bending the rules, you're living in fear of being banned. If the algorithm was completely transparent, it would give a home-field advantage to spammy SEOs, who could operate at the absolute limit of what is permissible. Legitimate sites that lack the resources to aggressively manipulate their SEO would be at a substantial disadvantage. To give a real-world analogy, imagine a department store that decides not to prosecute shoplifters caught with less than $20 worth of stolen goods. If the rule is kept secret, then it's a perfectly reasonable tradeoff between security and the cost of enforcement. If the rule is publicly known, then shoplifters can spend all day stealing $19.99 products with total impunity.
mattnewton 10y ago
This is a problem that needs to be addressed, and google is working on it. I can't see regulators doing a better job than they are, honestly.
- draugadrotten 10y ago
  > I can't see regulators doing a better job than they are, honestly. The idea isn't that regulators should do a better job and be closer to the truth, but rather that regulators want full control. The narrative is that there are "bad search results" and it is also assumed that there are Good(TM) search results that only a select group of Good(TM) individuals appointed by the True Power can ensure you get them. The "False news" narrative is another example of this direction, where the narrative also assumes that there are "True news" and that a select group of prie...aum, Good(TM) people can guarantee that you get the Truth and nothing but the Truth.
chrispeel 10y ago
The world is full of conflicting information. Part of one's implicit Internet education is that the first link you get when searching is not always the best. The second link shown in the article (Wikipedia) is likely a good source of info. Perhaps a better approach would be to register didtheholocausthappen.com and put a big sign that says "Yes" on it. Then put a link to that in your article, and get others to link to it.
- mtgx 10y ago
  The problems start to appear when Google (or Apple, or Microsoft) start showing people the "One True Answer" when asking G. Assistant/Siri/Cortana. Google has also been increasingly emphasizing a "main answer" in its search results.
  - wutbrodo 10y ago
    That's why Google has been so incremental about only surfacing "uncontroversial" facts. It's very much not in their best interests to spend all day arguing with half the world about _literally every single issue the human race is interested in_.
sisndhdhriro 10y ago
Give me a more asked answer to the question 'did the holocaust...' and I will...
MustrumRidcully 10y ago
Google is a search engine of indexed webpages. Not a universal delivery machine of the TRUTH (tm) nor an annex of your brain. Besides, this kind of debate is one step away from lyssenkism where only google-friendly opinions will be displayed. If you fight for freedom of speech only in the case of opinions that you like, then it's not freedom of speech.
- adevine 10y ago
  > If you fight for freedom of speech only in the case of opinions that you like, then it's not freedom of speech. The fact that the Holocaust happened is not an opinion.
  - prodigal_erik 10y ago
    If we let society keep a list of facts that may not be questioned, it will inevitably have crap like "the sun orbits the earth" and "a god named zeus created the universe" that need to be questioned.
    - daveFNbuck 10y ago
      There's a difference between not allowing dissent and promoting wrong answers.
      - prodigal_erik 10y ago
        When you declare an answer to be wrong and suppress it, the only difference is whether you go on to murder/imprison/exile the heretic or merely silence them.
        daveFNbuck 10y ago
        I think the difference between murdering someone and not putting their website at the top of a search result page is pretty significant. That the Holocaust happened is a fact. Giving correct responses to factual queries should not be a controversial goal. When I type 5 + 6 into Google search, are people being oppressed when the top result is 11? Would this be similar to murdering ideological opponents if my page declaring the answer to be 13 wasn't at or near the top of the results?
snadal 10y ago
This is an awful result, but it raises a difficult question: should the SERP be moderated or they should be fully automatic and allow this kind of results to be in the top of the result pages? Because a human moderated results could be even worst in the short them (who decides the ideology). IMO, what must be addressed is our and our children ability to discern, analyse and put in doubt everything that we read, and this kind of results does more good than bad on this sense.
- empath75 10y ago
  It seems like the alt right network of sites that are gaming the results should be pretty easily discoverable and their weighting adjusted downwards until legitimate sites are at the top.
  - landryraccoon 10y ago
    This is putting the cart ahead of the horse. What's needed is a standard by which you can say "alt right is fake" while "CNN (or insert other site that fits your world view) is real".
    - snadal 10y ago
      In fact, there are very few subjects where reality is a matter of fact and there is an absolute truth. Even knowing this specific case is very clear to all of us, cherry picking which side is true and which one is false on ideological matters can be tricky. The line between truth and censorship is very thin. Why don't just all of us learn to put everything in doubt? We've passed from "this is true because it's written on a book" to "this is truth because some jerk wrote it on Facebook"
      - jayajay 10y ago
        This. There's a point even in academic fields where you find a particular community divided by subjectivity (strings vs. quantum gravity). I think the scientific attitude of "remaining skeptical" has served us pretty well in the past. But when it comes to emotional stuff, people just have a really hard time.
yongjik 10y ago
I think the author is missing an important point: people who are genuinely curious about Holocaust usually don't type "did the holocaust happen". Instead, they will more likely type "holocaust statistics", "holocaust wikipedia", "what is holocaust", or simply "holocaust". Each of these queries brings up a "clean" result page. On the other hand, it is those people who already think/suspect Holocaust isn't real that disproportionately type in "did the holocaust happen", they find the stormfront website, and they click on it because it matches their preconception. Google learns that users typing this particular query likes this result, and acts accordingly. To Google's algorithm, this is exactly like learning that people typing "introduction to algorithms" love to go to the Amazon page selling the venerable CLRS. Nothing inherently nefarious. In other words, I think it's not StormFront that's "gaming" the system. The system is made of people, some of whom really really like StormFront, and Google's results (for better or worse) just reflect that reality.
- saurik 10y ago
  > ...they click on it because it [...]. Google learns that users typing this particular query likes this result, and acts accordingly. This is a horrifying way of deciding users "like" something and if they are actually doing that it would very rapidly lead to the rise of click bait in all search terms.
  - landryraccoon 10y ago
    Can you propose an alternative? Maximizing clicks is straightforward; a local minimum is increasing ad revenue and serving things that users will click on serves that purpose.
    - jdietrich 10y ago
      Google also measure bounce rates and dwell time. If a user follows a link but navigates back to the search engine results page within a few seconds, that's a strong negative relevance signal.
    - saurik 10y ago
mojuba 10y ago
I think what the article misses with this particular search is that Google's function most of the time is to get you pages that contain the phrase, and not necessarily the answer to the question. In some cases it does "feature" an answer (e.g. 2+2, or What is the capital of Australia?) sometimes it doesn't. Similarly, if you ask "Is the Earth flat?" you will see some results from the flat Earth conspiracy theorists. One other aspect of this problem is that Google absolutely can and it does manipulate the results. At least a lot of work is done to eliminate spam, SEO abuse, or what Google thinks is spam and abuse. They are not a media outlet and are totally free to tweak their algorithms in any way they want or in any way that makes sense within their business model. So if they do deliberately lower StormFront's ranking, nobody can blame them for that.
dep_b 10y ago
Google is a search engine not a truth engine. I would say "here it is: if you don't like it, complain to the site owners". Otherwise if you start editing things then you will be asked sooner or later why you didn't X and Y as well. And before you know it you're responsible for the pool of vomit with some nice chunks in it called the internet. If you arrive at stormfront.org and you're greeted with white power signs, of course you don't think "this seems like a really unbiased website". If you are attracted to this shit already it's already too late. For Google, your parents.
- throwaway729 10y ago
  > Google is a search engine not a truth engine IMO "truth engine"s of various forms are the future of search. Think e.g. Wolfram Alpha or any of the newfangled chat bots. Or even, increasingly, Google itself. I don't want a link to some guy's page; I want a definitive answer. Maybe the answer I want is the truth (probably more often than not). Maybe the answer I want is my truth (probably more often than not for political topics). But in any case, this sort of curation is going to happen, so at some point search engines are going to have to wrestle with this reality -- will you be the truth engine people want, or will you be the truth engine the people need? ;-)
  - jayajay 10y ago
    You're right -- it seems to me that search engines right now are really great at self-validation and confirming almost any opinion, or any point of view. It's a double-edged sword. Like you can look up "why it's ok to kill a citizen" and you'll almost certainly find something that agrees with you and seems reputable. But hey, I guess we can't blame the gun because of the people that decide use it.
  - wutbrodo 10y ago
    This is the direction Google has been moving in for uncontroversial facts for years: the barriers to them doing this completely are mostly technical, not product-based. For questions where there's any sort of controversy, this broad a solution is by definition unsolvable. It requires taking an explicit side on _literally every controversial issue the human race is talking about_, which means they'd spend roughly 100% of their time fending off mobs demanding to know why they said X. Since we're on the topic, let's use history as an example. There are TONS of things in history that "everyone knew" where the "cranks" turned out to be right and overturned our entire understanding of a given time and part of the world. The scientific and academic methods are messy and iterative and (for the soft sciences) often subjective, attempting to provide a "best guess" for what the human race knows. To ask one entity to explicitly answer questions, stamp out unsupported theories but somehow magically spare contrarian theories that ultimately end up being correct is simply insane.
Animats 10y ago
Wikipedia comes up as the second site. Google is doing OK. If the holocaust industry doesn't like their SERPs, they can mobilize their chain of holocaust museums to get better ranking. In fact, they've already done this; the Washington holocaust museum is now in the third result position. Stormfront ("White Pride World Wide") has been around for years, and kind of a joke. Post-Trump, they're more mainstream. Stormfront gets a high ranking because they've been saying this for decades and they're now getting traffic from the alt-right. So they have both popularity and stability, which Google's algorithm likes. They're not gaming the algorithm. They just lucked out on a political trend. If you want to see gaming of Google's algorithm, search "binary option". Binary options are basically a scam.[1] There are a vast number of binary option web sites and companies, mostly affiliates of two back-end companies in Tel Aviv. They plug binary options and each other endlessly, disseminate recent financial news to get traffic, and appear as an entire ecosystem of bogus info. That's gaming the algorithm. Wikipedia is in the top position at the moment, with a rather negative article on binary options. (This despite massive efforts by the binary option industry to get favorable Wikipedia coverage, including offers of $10,000 for anyone who could "fix" certain articles.) [1] http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-wolves-of-tel-aviv-israels-vast-amoral-binary-options-scam-exposed/ http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-wolves-of-tel-aviv-israels-...
- adrianm 10y ago
  The "holocaust industry"? It may just be because I lost family in the holocaust, but this can't be an acceptable thing to say here.
  - Animats 10y ago
    Norman Finkelstein, author of "The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering"[1] coined that phrase. He lost ancestors to the Nazis. [1] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008GZ4J76/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008GZ4J76/
    - fjdlwlv 10y ago
      A book arguing that the Holocaust has been exploited is not justification for denying the Holocaust happened, and it's insidious to insinuate such. Its disgusting to say that if Google is leading people to believe that the Holocaust didn't happen, the people who profit from it happening should just invest in better SEO.
Tempest1981 10y ago
The Guardian also ran this article where Google would suggest "Are women evil" if you typed "are women". A day later, that suggestion was gone (removed by Google). https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/04/google-democracy-truth-internet-search-facebook https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/04/google-de... (The HN comments on this story became political, so it was flagged.)
- iiiggglll 10y ago
  Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13103774 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13103774
jayajay 10y ago
The author wonders why shit like this appears on google, but then you see her first paragraph: "Did the Holocaust really happen? No. The Holocaust did not really happen. Six million Jews did not die. It is a Jewish conspiracy theory spread by vested interests to obscure the truth. The truth is that there is no evidence any people were gassed in any camp. The Holocaust did not happen." What Google sees with this paragraph is a highly ranked page asking a legitimate question. This woman seems to be reputable, so let's just take her word for it. Pretty ironic -- last time I checked sentiment analysis wasn't even close to figuring out what sarcasm is. Her joking actually exacerbates any problem she thinks there is. And honestly, me quoting her is just making the problem a tiny bit worse!
- brobinson 10y ago
  That keyword-laden first paragraph is probably what will show up in the blurb for that page in a SERP, too.
  - ojosilva 10y ago
    Which in turn reafirms, recursevely, the author's assertion of gamed Google algorithms. I think web search is still flawed, like it was 15 years ago when Google came along. The problem is that now the flaws are more subtle, hence more dangerous since search (and feed) ordering, interactions and suggestions are capable of influencing people in an almost subconscious level. It will take years to understand its implications.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
lyjackal 10y ago
There's a really big ethical question about automation. These kinds of news results remind me of Microsoft's racist Tay bot fiasco on twitter. It seems like Machine Learning automation of anything "intelligent" (giving the "best" answer to a question as in Google's results, or creating a humanlike bot personality), needs metrics for some kind of quality, or feedback loops of accountability, according to some kind of set of ethical limits. Otherwise your algorithm is just a slave or a mirror to your data set and your business interests. Company's really need ethical motivations defined, especially company's with automation and no accountable human to point the finger at if things get out of hand.
zython 10y ago
shame on you for putting that clickbait title, for a split second I actually thought that google's algorithm was broken
contextfree 10y ago
bing has the stormfront link at the bottom of the first page, and the Wikipedia holocaust denial page at the top (with a special Wikipedia nav bar that tends to make it look more visually prominent). It has fairly different results overall, though they do contain a couple of denialist links and suggest a "10 Reasons The Holocaust Never Happened" 'related search'. it's interesting to think about why, possibilities that come to mind are 1. bing's system just naturally doesn't favor the stormfront link as much? 2. there's a deliberate effort on the part of microsoft/bing to specifically suppress stormfront or some class of sites it's in? 3. stormfront is at the top of the google results due to a deliberate effort by some group to game this and they just haven't put the effort into gaming bing?
getpost 10y ago
Carole Cadwalladr's points are well taken. I tried the queries myself when I saw these articles and got the same results she did. Apparently Google is listening, since some of these results have been changed. Was it a manual fix? So, Google's results are the output of an algorithm, except when they're not? Who decides which results will be manually fixed? And fixed how? I think many, if not most, Internet users do treat search results as authoritative, even though the cognoscendi know they're not intended to be. The real question is, can this situation ever be fixed in the general case? Reporting what is "true," and not just popular. I doubt it. Some things are clearly not true, but what is true? That's the biggest AI problem ever.
rrggrr 10y ago
I think this is inseparable from the current fake news controversy. The US Government to the rescue, in the same manner as the 1950's Red Scare, and the 1790's. H.R. 5181, which passed Congress and awaits the President, gives the USGOV $20 million to allocate to companies, NGO's and other institutions to correct anything it deems misinformation on the internet. H.R. 6393, not yet passed will Give the USGOV additional authorities to choose which news it deems to be misinformation and to take action. I can't recommend enough Richard Rosenfeld's "American Aurora", or because its over 900 pages long this mixed review: http://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1600&context=fac_articles http://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?ar... Striking is the similarity in vitriol, personal smears and false allegations among papers in the 1790's and the internet today. We're doomed to repeat past mistakes and learn over again past lessons. This manufactured crisis will be no different.
gorer 10y ago
What would be the the only right result in your opinion Carole Cadwalladr? Please post 10 links which Google should show to everyone to make your day.
EugeneOZ 10y ago
It's all interesting theory, but Sergey Brin is Jew. So it's all bullshit, sorry.
- sctb 10y ago
  This account's history is full of uncivil and unsubstantive comments, and we ban users that continue to post like this. Please stop. https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - EugeneOZ 10y ago
    Ban me right now, I will write what I want, I don't accept censorship in any kind.
  - morgante 10y ago
    How is "but Sergey Brin is Jew. So it's all bullshit" not an instaban? That's blatant and unabashed antisemitism. There shoud;n't be any place for it on HN.
inlined 10y ago
I wonder if the solution could just be removing the answer box for questions with very conflicting answers. The system is harder to game if the user is stuck doing a bit of research.
aikah 10y ago
So basically another guardian journalist that only wants to see results on google he/she agrees with. And google should then manipulate results to fit the guardian's political line ... making Google yet another echo chamber. The fact is, echo chambers always fail to draw a clear picture of the real world. Shouldn't journalists be interested in the truth rather than validating their own bias on every possible medium ? or are so called journalists activists ? i.e. reporting the facts that support their agenda ?
xupybd 10y ago
"The right is on the rise" So now "The right" means racist? Just because these horrible people fall into the general category of the right, I don't think it's fair to paint this as typical of people who also fall on the right. Some of us just want small government and have conservative social views. But are just as revolted by the Holocaust deniers as any one else.
bsaul 10y ago
Maybe a solution would be to also suggest "opposite" popular search, or simply "around the same subject". That would be fun, and show what are the broad topics around a subject. You may think of it of phase 2 of search engine role. Now that it's almost perfect at finding things you're looking for, it could start showing things that you should be looking for ?
Joeboy 10y ago
Also Googling "Did the Gulf War take place" brings up links about Baudrillard's The Gulf War Did Not Take Place.
aarbor989 10y ago
Lol at the author saying a leading expert on Google search is someone who doesn't even work at Google.
ievahanordah 10y ago
The whole internet is gamed. Should have taken advantage of the open internet while you still could, morons.
hanswang2013 10y ago
After spend 10 mins reading, I still dont understand why do people have to put political hats on to a search engine. Search engine dont (or at least shouldn't) have an opinion of presenting information. Having said that, questions like "Holocaust or not" should be dependent on the source of opinionated information provider. Futhermore, if you think the other party provide misleading information, counter it with your views. After all, all the information should be gathered/filtered/valued under same rules.
phozy 10y ago
I'm still distracted at why she thinks the world is getting worse? I know the populist movement started around 2014 is picking up momentum, but we are solving more problems. The world is moving forward connecting people online, feeding more people than ever, and supplying a larger quantity of goods and services, than previously.
phozy 10y ago
I'm still distracted at why she thinks the world is getting worse? I know the populist movement started around 2014 is picking up momentum, but we are solving more problems. The world is moving forward connecting people online, feeding more people than ever, and supplying a larger quantity of goods and services, than previously.

125 points by CarolineW 10y ago

Won't someone think of the children!?

I always wonder if an open search algorithm would be better or worse? If Google let everyone see the magic, would outsiders be able to make it better so things like this don't happen? Would the white hats wing against the black hats if it was open to all?

praptak 10y ago
Why would that matter? Do you think Stormfront are somehow at advantage when it comes to gaming unpublished algorithms?
- gaius 10y ago
  Given the Santorum thing, nope...
  - wutbrodo 10y ago
    I thought I knew what the Santorum thing being referenced here is, but maybe I'm wrong: how was Stormfront related in any way?
    - gaius 10y ago
      The question was, do Stormfront have an advantage here, and the answer I gave was, no, because left-wingers have previously successfully manipulated Google's algorithm to a much greater extent.
FT_intern 10y ago
no one would understand the algorithm
- placeybordeaux 10y ago
  We analyze and compare things that we don't understand all the time.
- placeybordeaux 10y ago
  We analyze and compare things that we don't understand all the time.
jdietrich 10y ago
Almost certainly worse. As it stands, SEOs fear Google and the webspam team like they're the Wizard of Oz. You have a strong incentive to follow the letter and the spirit of the webmaster guidelines, because you don't know exactly what's going on behind the curtain. Once you start bending the rules, you're living in fear of being banned. If the algorithm was completely transparent, it would give a home-field advantage to spammy SEOs, who could operate at the absolute limit of what is permissible. Legitimate sites that lack the resources to aggressively manipulate their SEO would be at a substantial disadvantage. To give a real-world analogy, imagine a department store that decides not to prosecute shoplifters caught with less than $20 worth of stolen goods. If the rule is kept secret, then it's a perfectly reasonable tradeoff between security and the cost of enforcement. If the rule is publicly known, then shoplifters can spend all day stealing $19.99 products with total impunity.

mattnewton 10y ago

This is a problem that needs to be addressed, and google is working on it. I can't see regulators doing a better job than they are, honestly.

draugadrotten 10y ago
> I can't see regulators doing a better job than they are, honestly. The idea isn't that regulators should do a better job and be closer to the truth, but rather that regulators want full control. The narrative is that there are "bad search results" and it is also assumed that there are Good(TM) search results that only a select group of Good(TM) individuals appointed by the True Power can ensure you get them. The "False news" narrative is another example of this direction, where the narrative also assumes that there are "True news" and that a select group of prie...aum, Good(TM) people can guarantee that you get the Truth and nothing but the Truth.

chrispeel 10y ago

The world is full of conflicting information. Part of one's implicit Internet education is that the first link you get when searching is not always the best. The second link shown in the article (Wikipedia) is likely a good source of info. Perhaps a better approach would be to register didtheholocausthappen.com and put a big sign that says "Yes" on it. Then put a link to that in your article, and get others to link to it.

mtgx 10y ago
The problems start to appear when Google (or Apple, or Microsoft) start showing people the "One True Answer" when asking G. Assistant/Siri/Cortana. Google has also been increasingly emphasizing a "main answer" in its search results.
- wutbrodo 10y ago
  That's why Google has been so incremental about only surfacing "uncontroversial" facts. It's very much not in their best interests to spend all day arguing with half the world about _literally every single issue the human race is interested in_.

sisndhdhriro 10y ago

Give me a more asked answer to the question 'did the holocaust...' and I will...

MustrumRidcully 10y ago

Google is a search engine of indexed webpages. Not a universal delivery machine of the TRUTH (tm) nor an annex of your brain. Besides, this kind of debate is one step away from lyssenkism where only google-friendly opinions will be displayed. If you fight for freedom of speech only in the case of opinions that you like, then it's not freedom of speech.

adevine 10y ago
> If you fight for freedom of speech only in the case of opinions that you like, then it's not freedom of speech. The fact that the Holocaust happened is not an opinion.
- prodigal_erik 10y ago
  If we let society keep a list of facts that may not be questioned, it will inevitably have crap like "the sun orbits the earth" and "a god named zeus created the universe" that need to be questioned.
  - daveFNbuck 10y ago
    There's a difference between not allowing dissent and promoting wrong answers.
    - prodigal_erik 10y ago
      When you declare an answer to be wrong and suppress it, the only difference is whether you go on to murder/imprison/exile the heretic or merely silence them.
      - daveFNbuck 10y ago
        I think the difference between murdering someone and not putting their website at the top of a search result page is pretty significant. That the Holocaust happened is a fact. Giving correct responses to factual queries should not be a controversial goal. When I type 5 + 6 into Google search, are people being oppressed when the top result is 11? Would this be similar to murdering ideological opponents if my page declaring the answer to be 13 wasn't at or near the top of the results?

snadal 10y ago

This is an awful result, but it raises a difficult question: should the SERP be moderated or they should be fully automatic and allow this kind of results to be in the top of the result pages? Because a human moderated results could be even worst in the short them (who decides the ideology). IMO, what must be addressed is our and our children ability to discern, analyse and put in doubt everything that we read, and this kind of results does more good than bad on this sense.

empath75 10y ago
It seems like the alt right network of sites that are gaming the results should be pretty easily discoverable and their weighting adjusted downwards until legitimate sites are at the top.
- landryraccoon 10y ago
  This is putting the cart ahead of the horse. What's needed is a standard by which you can say "alt right is fake" while "CNN (or insert other site that fits your world view) is real".
  - snadal 10y ago
    In fact, there are very few subjects where reality is a matter of fact and there is an absolute truth. Even knowing this specific case is very clear to all of us, cherry picking which side is true and which one is false on ideological matters can be tricky. The line between truth and censorship is very thin. Why don't just all of us learn to put everything in doubt? We've passed from "this is true because it's written on a book" to "this is truth because some jerk wrote it on Facebook"
    - jayajay 10y ago
      This. There's a point even in academic fields where you find a particular community divided by subjectivity (strings vs. quantum gravity). I think the scientific attitude of "remaining skeptical" has served us pretty well in the past. But when it comes to emotional stuff, people just have a really hard time.

yongjik 10y ago

I think the author is missing an important point: people who are genuinely curious about Holocaust usually don't type "did the holocaust happen". Instead, they will more likely type "holocaust statistics", "holocaust wikipedia", "what is holocaust", or simply "holocaust". Each of these queries brings up a "clean" result page. On the other hand, it is those people who already think/suspect Holocaust isn't real that disproportionately type in "did the holocaust happen", they find the stormfront website, and they click on it because it matches their preconception. Google learns that users typing this particular query likes this result, and acts accordingly. To Google's algorithm, this is exactly like learning that people typing "introduction to algorithms" love to go to the Amazon page selling the venerable CLRS. Nothing inherently nefarious. In other words, I think it's not StormFront that's "gaming" the system. The system is made of people, some of whom really really like StormFront, and Google's results (for better or worse) just reflect that reality.

saurik 10y ago
> ...they click on it because it [...]. Google learns that users typing this particular query likes this result, and acts accordingly. This is a horrifying way of deciding users "like" something and if they are actually doing that it would very rapidly lead to the rise of click bait in all search terms.
- landryraccoon 10y ago
  Can you propose an alternative? Maximizing clicks is straightforward; a local minimum is increasing ad revenue and serving things that users will click on serves that purpose.
  - jdietrich 10y ago
    Google also measure bounce rates and dwell time. If a user follows a link but navigates back to the search engine results page within a few seconds, that's a strong negative relevance signal.
  - saurik 10y ago

mojuba 10y ago

I think what the article misses with this particular search is that Google's function most of the time is to get you pages that contain the phrase, and not necessarily the answer to the question. In some cases it does "feature" an answer (e.g. 2+2, or What is the capital of Australia?) sometimes it doesn't. Similarly, if you ask "Is the Earth flat?" you will see some results from the flat Earth conspiracy theorists. One other aspect of this problem is that Google absolutely can and it does manipulate the results. At least a lot of work is done to eliminate spam, SEO abuse, or what Google thinks is spam and abuse. They are not a media outlet and are totally free to tweak their algorithms in any way they want or in any way that makes sense within their business model. So if they do deliberately lower StormFront's ranking, nobody can blame them for that.

dep_b 10y ago

Google is a search engine not a truth engine. I would say "here it is: if you don't like it, complain to the site owners". Otherwise if you start editing things then you will be asked sooner or later why you didn't X and Y as well. And before you know it you're responsible for the pool of vomit with some nice chunks in it called the internet. If you arrive at stormfront.org and you're greeted with white power signs, of course you don't think "this seems like a really unbiased website". If you are attracted to this shit already it's already too late. For Google, your parents.

throwaway729 10y ago
> Google is a search engine not a truth engine IMO "truth engine"s of various forms are the future of search. Think e.g. Wolfram Alpha or any of the newfangled chat bots. Or even, increasingly, Google itself. I don't want a link to some guy's page; I want a definitive answer. Maybe the answer I want is the truth (probably more often than not). Maybe the answer I want is my truth (probably more often than not for political topics). But in any case, this sort of curation is going to happen, so at some point search engines are going to have to wrestle with this reality -- will you be the truth engine people want, or will you be the truth engine the people need? ;-)
- jayajay 10y ago
  You're right -- it seems to me that search engines right now are really great at self-validation and confirming almost any opinion, or any point of view. It's a double-edged sword. Like you can look up "why it's ok to kill a citizen" and you'll almost certainly find something that agrees with you and seems reputable. But hey, I guess we can't blame the gun because of the people that decide use it.
- wutbrodo 10y ago
  This is the direction Google has been moving in for uncontroversial facts for years: the barriers to them doing this completely are mostly technical, not product-based. For questions where there's any sort of controversy, this broad a solution is by definition unsolvable. It requires taking an explicit side on _literally every controversial issue the human race is talking about_, which means they'd spend roughly 100% of their time fending off mobs demanding to know why they said X. Since we're on the topic, let's use history as an example. There are TONS of things in history that "everyone knew" where the "cranks" turned out to be right and overturned our entire understanding of a given time and part of the world. The scientific and academic methods are messy and iterative and (for the soft sciences) often subjective, attempting to provide a "best guess" for what the human race knows. To ask one entity to explicitly answer questions, stamp out unsupported theories but somehow magically spare contrarian theories that ultimately end up being correct is simply insane.

Animats 10y ago

Wikipedia comes up as the second site. Google is doing OK. If the holocaust industry doesn't like their SERPs, they can mobilize their chain of holocaust museums to get better ranking. In fact, they've already done this; the Washington holocaust museum is now in the third result position. Stormfront ("White Pride World Wide") has been around for years, and kind of a joke. Post-Trump, they're more mainstream. Stormfront gets a high ranking because they've been saying this for decades and they're now getting traffic from the alt-right. So they have both popularity and stability, which Google's algorithm likes. They're not gaming the algorithm. They just lucked out on a political trend. If you want to see gaming of Google's algorithm, search "binary option". Binary options are basically a scam.[1] There are a vast number of binary option web sites and companies, mostly affiliates of two back-end companies in Tel Aviv. They plug binary options and each other endlessly, disseminate recent financial news to get traffic, and appear as an entire ecosystem of bogus info. That's gaming the algorithm. Wikipedia is in the top position at the moment, with a rather negative article on binary options. (This despite massive efforts by the binary option industry to get favorable Wikipedia coverage, including offers of $10,000 for anyone who could "fix" certain articles.) [1] http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-wolves-of-tel-aviv-israels-vast-amoral-binary-options-scam-exposed/ http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-wolves-of-tel-aviv-israels-...

adrianm 10y ago
The "holocaust industry"? It may just be because I lost family in the holocaust, but this can't be an acceptable thing to say here.
- Animats 10y ago
  Norman Finkelstein, author of "The Holocaust Industry: Reflections on the Exploitation of Jewish Suffering"[1] coined that phrase. He lost ancestors to the Nazis. [1] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008GZ4J76/ https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008GZ4J76/
  - fjdlwlv 10y ago
    A book arguing that the Holocaust has been exploited is not justification for denying the Holocaust happened, and it's insidious to insinuate such. Its disgusting to say that if Google is leading people to believe that the Holocaust didn't happen, the people who profit from it happening should just invest in better SEO.

Tempest1981 10y ago

The Guardian also ran this article where Google would suggest "Are women evil" if you typed "are women". A day later, that suggestion was gone (removed by Google). https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/04/google-democracy-truth-internet-search-facebook https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/dec/04/google-de... (The HN comments on this story became political, so it was flagged.)

iiiggglll 10y ago
Previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13103774 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13103774

jayajay 10y ago

The author wonders why shit like this appears on google, but then you see her first paragraph: "Did the Holocaust really happen? No. The Holocaust did not really happen. Six million Jews did not die. It is a Jewish conspiracy theory spread by vested interests to obscure the truth. The truth is that there is no evidence any people were gassed in any camp. The Holocaust did not happen." What Google sees with this paragraph is a highly ranked page asking a legitimate question. This woman seems to be reputable, so let's just take her word for it. Pretty ironic -- last time I checked sentiment analysis wasn't even close to figuring out what sarcasm is. Her joking actually exacerbates any problem she thinks there is. And honestly, me quoting her is just making the problem a tiny bit worse!

brobinson 10y ago
That keyword-laden first paragraph is probably what will show up in the blurb for that page in a SERP, too.
- ojosilva 10y ago
  Which in turn reafirms, recursevely, the author's assertion of gamed Google algorithms. I think web search is still flawed, like it was 15 years ago when Google came along. The problem is that now the flaws are more subtle, hence more dangerous since search (and feed) ordering, interactions and suggestions are capable of influencing people in an almost subconscious level. It will take years to understand its implications.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]

lyjackal 10y ago

There's a really big ethical question about automation. These kinds of news results remind me of Microsoft's racist Tay bot fiasco on twitter. It seems like Machine Learning automation of anything "intelligent" (giving the "best" answer to a question as in Google's results, or creating a humanlike bot personality), needs metrics for some kind of quality, or feedback loops of accountability, according to some kind of set of ethical limits. Otherwise your algorithm is just a slave or a mirror to your data set and your business interests. Company's really need ethical motivations defined, especially company's with automation and no accountable human to point the finger at if things get out of hand.

zython 10y ago

shame on you for putting that clickbait title, for a split second I actually thought that google's algorithm was broken

contextfree 10y ago

bing has the stormfront link at the bottom of the first page, and the Wikipedia holocaust denial page at the top (with a special Wikipedia nav bar that tends to make it look more visually prominent). It has fairly different results overall, though they do contain a couple of denialist links and suggest a "10 Reasons The Holocaust Never Happened" 'related search'. it's interesting to think about why, possibilities that come to mind are 1. bing's system just naturally doesn't favor the stormfront link as much? 2. there's a deliberate effort on the part of microsoft/bing to specifically suppress stormfront or some class of sites it's in? 3. stormfront is at the top of the google results due to a deliberate effort by some group to game this and they just haven't put the effort into gaming bing?

getpost 10y ago

Carole Cadwalladr's points are well taken. I tried the queries myself when I saw these articles and got the same results she did. Apparently Google is listening, since some of these results have been changed. Was it a manual fix? So, Google's results are the output of an algorithm, except when they're not? Who decides which results will be manually fixed? And fixed how? I think many, if not most, Internet users do treat search results as authoritative, even though the cognoscendi know they're not intended to be. The real question is, can this situation ever be fixed in the general case? Reporting what is "true," and not just popular. I doubt it. Some things are clearly not true, but what is true? That's the biggest AI problem ever.

rrggrr 10y ago

I think this is inseparable from the current fake news controversy. The US Government to the rescue, in the same manner as the 1950's Red Scare, and the 1790's. H.R. 5181, which passed Congress and awaits the President, gives the USGOV $20 million to allocate to companies, NGO's and other institutions to correct anything it deems misinformation on the internet. H.R. 6393, not yet passed will Give the USGOV additional authorities to choose which news it deems to be misinformation and to take action. I can't recommend enough Richard Rosenfeld's "American Aurora", or because its over 900 pages long this mixed review: http://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1600&context=fac_articles http://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?ar... Striking is the similarity in vitriol, personal smears and false allegations among papers in the 1790's and the internet today. We're doomed to repeat past mistakes and learn over again past lessons. This manufactured crisis will be no different.

gorer 10y ago

What would be the the only right result in your opinion Carole Cadwalladr? Please post 10 links which Google should show to everyone to make your day.

EugeneOZ 10y ago

It's all interesting theory, but Sergey Brin is Jew. So it's all bullshit, sorry.

sctb 10y ago
This account's history is full of uncivil and unsubstantive comments, and we ban users that continue to post like this. Please stop. https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- EugeneOZ 10y ago
  Ban me right now, I will write what I want, I don't accept censorship in any kind.
- morgante 10y ago
  How is "but Sergey Brin is Jew. So it's all bullshit" not an instaban? That's blatant and unabashed antisemitism. There shoud;n't be any place for it on HN.

inlined 10y ago

I wonder if the solution could just be removing the answer box for questions with very conflicting answers. The system is harder to game if the user is stuck doing a bit of research.

aikah 10y ago

So basically another guardian journalist that only wants to see results on google he/she agrees with. And google should then manipulate results to fit the guardian's political line ... making Google yet another echo chamber. The fact is, echo chambers always fail to draw a clear picture of the real world. Shouldn't journalists be interested in the truth rather than validating their own bias on every possible medium ? or are so called journalists activists ? i.e. reporting the facts that support their agenda ?

xupybd 10y ago

"The right is on the rise" So now "The right" means racist? Just because these horrible people fall into the general category of the right, I don't think it's fair to paint this as typical of people who also fall on the right. Some of us just want small government and have conservative social views. But are just as revolted by the Holocaust deniers as any one else.

bsaul 10y ago

Maybe a solution would be to also suggest "opposite" popular search, or simply "around the same subject". That would be fun, and show what are the broad topics around a subject. You may think of it of phase 2 of search engine role. Now that it's almost perfect at finding things you're looking for, it could start showing things that you should be looking for ?

Joeboy 10y ago

Also Googling "Did the Gulf War take place" brings up links about Baudrillard's The Gulf War Did Not Take Place.

aarbor989 10y ago

Lol at the author saying a leading expert on Google search is someone who doesn't even work at Google.

ievahanordah 10y ago

The whole internet is gamed. Should have taken advantage of the open internet while you still could, morons.

hanswang2013 10y ago

After spend 10 mins reading, I still dont understand why do people have to put political hats on to a search engine. Search engine dont (or at least shouldn't) have an opinion of presenting information. Having said that, questions like "Holocaust or not" should be dependent on the source of opinionated information provider. Futhermore, if you think the other party provide misleading information, counter it with your views. After all, all the information should be gathered/filtered/valued under same rules.

phozy 10y ago

I'm still distracted at why she thinks the world is getting worse? I know the populist movement started around 2014 is picking up momentum, but we are solving more problems. The world is moving forward connecting people online, feeding more people than ever, and supplying a larger quantity of goods and services, than previously.

phozy 10y ago