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> This means that tweaking Google's algorithm, or filtering fake news from Facebook, will backfire and appear to be censorship. It will drive the people who are
by justinph 10y ago
> This means that tweaking Google's algorithm, or filtering fake news from Facebook, will backfire and appear to be censorship. It will drive the people who are interested in reading fake news to work harder to find it, and it will erode their trust in mainstream media. In other words, such a solution would worsen the problem it intends to solve.
Good. Make it hard to find. Make people have to dig into the vile corners of the internet to find it.
Google isn't a public utility that is obligated to serve these hate groups. Stormfront doesn't have to be blocked from having their packets routed. Google just doesn't have to take any part in helping them surface their beliefs.
- halflings 10y agoWhether explicit or implicit, that would still be targeting certain opinion groups... because yes, antisemitism and many types of racism and hate speech are still just opinions until acted upon. If somebody is looking for hate speech, they should find hate speech. I understand that search engines should avoid promoting hate speech when it is not needed, but like the parent comment showed that is currently the case for Google.
- fjdlwlv 10y agoStorefront is an interesting case because Southern Poverty Law Center has counted 100 murders committed by their users (or registered members, I forget which). I don't know stormfront's usage numbers, by I bet that's a pretty high ratio for a web site.
- prodigal_erik 10y agoSuppressing an idea gives it legitimacy. It looks like liberals don't believe their own arguments so they went with dirty tricks.
- twblalock 10y agoIf Google does what you suggest, the far-right's claims about censorship and the mainstream media being out to get them will become true.