4 ms·

I wonder if you would be ok if Bing did the same thing to amazon. That is, imagine they used toolbar/IE logs to infer that people went to amazon, searched for L

I wonder if you would be ok if Bing did the same thing to amazon. That is, imagine they used toolbar/IE logs to infer that people went to amazon, searched for LCD TVs and then purchased model X. Then they could boost pages about X in search, or implement a "bestselling" feature. After all, they are "just" using clickstream data here. Similarly, they could track Netflix, and so on. IMHO, there's a loophole in Bing's argument that the user click data is free for them to use. What about the site - do they have no ability to consent/dissent to being tracked? Maybe robots.txt needs to be updated for the toolbar.

kenjackson 16y ago
Absolutely on all of those sites. And Wikipedia. Why would I not want them to? The only reason I could think of that I would not want them to is if I thought it would create worse search links as a result. Although being able to personallize the search queries would be incredible. So when I search for "Movie XYZ" -- it can also look at my clickstream and see that I spend a lot of time in Netflix and Netflix has that movie, and they can point me to that movie directly in my search results ("You can stream Movie XYZ now!") -- kind of like a built in Clicker -- I'd love it. But the problem is search relevance sucks. I'm in my freakin web browser all day, yet it contributes nothing to my search relevance. WTF!? But again, key to me is opt-in. If anything, the one takeaway I would take if I were MS is to make it more apparent. But besides that. Everything you said, and more, please. And from Google too -- Bing shouldn't be the only one to benefit.
- pessimist 16y ago
  I'm not talking about using just visits to improve search though, I'm talking about using the pattern of interaction on a site to basically replicate a site's data. That is, imagine netflix recommends movie X to you, now Bing infers that Netflix has done so using custom code to parse their IE logs, and then recommend movie X to you. IMHO, this would be completely unethical. That's exactly what Bing has admitted to doing with google: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704124504576118510340787364.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870412450457611... "Stefan Weitz, director of the Bing search engine at Microsoft, said in an interview the company studies how certain users interact with Google in order to improve Bing. ..."
  - kenjackson 16y ago
    I'm not sure I get your example (not clear when Bing would recommend a movie to me). So let me give that I do understand. I go to Netflix and search for the move "Network". I end up clicking on "The Social Network". Later on Bing, if I search for "movie Network" -- I'd hope that one of the movies that comes back is "The Social Network", based on that clickthrough data from Netflix.. In my mind the only thing that is borderline unethical is that we've artificially limited this clickstream data to one company. I'd like to give it out more broadly. It's my data right?
    - pessimist 16y ago
      I was considering the case when you go to NetFlix, and they recomment the movie "Social Network" to you, and you click on it. Surely the url will have sufficient info to claim that its a recommendation. Now bing implements a movie recommendation service, which also magically recommends for you "Social Network", based on clicktracking of Netflix. IMHO, what Bing is doing with Google is exactly the same scenario as above (extract click data from a competitor's service, and surface the exact same data in their own product).
      - kenjackson 16y ago
        OK, you're talking about a new service. Gotcha. Why wouldn't I want Bing to recommend the movie? The first thing Bing should do is use Netflix's APIs to suck down all of my ratings of movies. Then it should use my clickstream data for Netflix, IMDB, Hulu, Amazon, Facebook etc... And if I'm using Media Center or SageTV, I want those things to also get consolidated together. Are you saying you want your Netflix data in one silo, your Hulu data elsewhere, your TV data elsewhere? Don't get me wrong, I want this to all be opt-in, but when I opt-in on MY behavior, I want them to use it.
- qeorge 16y ago
  Well put. Further, I think Google has made a mistake drawing such a line in the sand here, and potentially missing out on a cool feature.
ugh 16y ago
I would argue that users own their clickstream data and are free to give it away. (The question then becomes whether Microsoft makes sufficiently clear exactly which data users are giving to them.) Clickstream data is basically a list of URLs, I don’t think (parts of) such lists should controlled by website owners. I’m not sure, though, whether I have overseen something that would make it useful or fair to give website owners control over clickstream data. I’m honestly open for suggestions. But that’s only part of the problem. Even if everyone were to agree that collecting clickstream data from users with their consent is ok, we still don’t know how those who collect the data are allowed to use it. That’s certainly not an easy question.
contextfree 16y ago
I'd be surprised if they're not currently doing this in Amazon.
landhar 16y ago
You're right. There seems to be a gray area around whom owns the "click data": - "Are users entitled to give away for free their navigation history ?" - "To what extend are search engines allowed to implement specificities based on that data ?"

kenjackson 16y ago

Absolutely on all of those sites. And Wikipedia. Why would I not want them to? The only reason I could think of that I would not want them to is if I thought it would create worse search links as a result. Although being able to personallize the search queries would be incredible. So when I search for "Movie XYZ" -- it can also look at my clickstream and see that I spend a lot of time in Netflix and Netflix has that movie, and they can point me to that movie directly in my search results ("You can stream Movie XYZ now!") -- kind of like a built in Clicker -- I'd love it. But the problem is search relevance sucks. I'm in my freakin web browser all day, yet it contributes nothing to my search relevance. WTF!? But again, key to me is opt-in. If anything, the one takeaway I would take if I were MS is to make it more apparent. But besides that. Everything you said, and more, please. And from Google too -- Bing shouldn't be the only one to benefit.

pessimist 16y ago
I'm not talking about using just visits to improve search though, I'm talking about using the pattern of interaction on a site to basically replicate a site's data. That is, imagine netflix recommends movie X to you, now Bing infers that Netflix has done so using custom code to parse their IE logs, and then recommend movie X to you. IMHO, this would be completely unethical. That's exactly what Bing has admitted to doing with google: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704124504576118510340787364.html http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870412450457611... "Stefan Weitz, director of the Bing search engine at Microsoft, said in an interview the company studies how certain users interact with Google in order to improve Bing. ..."
- kenjackson 16y ago
  I'm not sure I get your example (not clear when Bing would recommend a movie to me). So let me give that I do understand. I go to Netflix and search for the move "Network". I end up clicking on "The Social Network". Later on Bing, if I search for "movie Network" -- I'd hope that one of the movies that comes back is "The Social Network", based on that clickthrough data from Netflix.. In my mind the only thing that is borderline unethical is that we've artificially limited this clickstream data to one company. I'd like to give it out more broadly. It's my data right?
  - pessimist 16y ago
    I was considering the case when you go to NetFlix, and they recomment the movie "Social Network" to you, and you click on it. Surely the url will have sufficient info to claim that its a recommendation. Now bing implements a movie recommendation service, which also magically recommends for you "Social Network", based on clicktracking of Netflix. IMHO, what Bing is doing with Google is exactly the same scenario as above (extract click data from a competitor's service, and surface the exact same data in their own product).
    - kenjackson 16y ago
      OK, you're talking about a new service. Gotcha. Why wouldn't I want Bing to recommend the movie? The first thing Bing should do is use Netflix's APIs to suck down all of my ratings of movies. Then it should use my clickstream data for Netflix, IMDB, Hulu, Amazon, Facebook etc... And if I'm using Media Center or SageTV, I want those things to also get consolidated together. Are you saying you want your Netflix data in one silo, your Hulu data elsewhere, your TV data elsewhere? Don't get me wrong, I want this to all be opt-in, but when I opt-in on MY behavior, I want them to use it.
qeorge 16y ago
Well put. Further, I think Google has made a mistake drawing such a line in the sand here, and potentially missing out on a cool feature.

ugh 16y ago

I would argue that users own their clickstream data and are free to give it away. (The question then becomes whether Microsoft makes sufficiently clear exactly which data users are giving to them.) Clickstream data is basically a list of URLs, I don’t think (parts of) such lists should controlled by website owners. I’m not sure, though, whether I have overseen something that would make it useful or fair to give website owners control over clickstream data. I’m honestly open for suggestions. But that’s only part of the problem. Even if everyone were to agree that collecting clickstream data from users with their consent is ok, we still don’t know how those who collect the data are allowed to use it. That’s certainly not an easy question.

contextfree 16y ago

I'd be surprised if they're not currently doing this in Amazon.

landhar 16y ago

You're right. There seems to be a gray area around whom owns the "click data": - "Are users entitled to give away for free their navigation history ?" - "To what extend are search engines allowed to implement specificities based on that data ?"