4 ms·

As they describe in the paper, "at least the choice will be a conscious one". If someone wants a wide variety of sources and opposing ideas, there will be a go

As they describe in the paper, "at least the choice will be a conscious one". If someone wants a wide variety of sources and opposing ideas, there will be a goggle for that. If someone wants only anti-vax articles, there will probably be one for that too. This is probably much better than what currently happens, where search engines become personalized but users don't realize it. That anti-vax person might think they are searching the whole web when google has quietly flagged them as a user who enjoys anti-vax articles and continues suggesting those sites, taking them further down the rabbit hole.

KennyBlanken 5y ago
> This is probably much better than what currently happens, where search engines become personalized but users don't realize it. That anti-vax person might think they are searching the whole web when google has quietly flagged them as a user who enjoys anti-vax articles and continues suggesting those sites, taking them further down the rabbit hole. ...what the what. Did you just casually declare that Google is feeding people search results tailored to their political worldview? Because if so, you need to actually come up with something to support that sort of claim.
- kwhitefoot 5y ago
  No, they suggested that Google tailors results to the things related to the hits that you follow. His example was political but it was just that, an example.
- hetspookjee 5y ago
  How could you possibly differentiate an extremely personalized profile, and a political worldview for that matter?
- jgilias 5y ago
  You're one of today's lucky 10000! [1] Look up Google personalized search [2]. I guess only Google insiders know for sure what's the extent to which your search results get personalized, but it's common knowledge that this happens. It'd be also interesting to find out if they somehow try to reduce the personalization when it comes to 'political' interests. I'd wager that the answer is no. And of course it's not just Google. Facebook and Twitter too. And probably every site with some kind of a feed trying to keep you engaged. 1. https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/ 2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Personalized_Search https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Personalized_Search
- southerntofu 5y ago
  So there's two things to consider: 1) Everything is political, and so are search results and suggestions 2) Personalized results/suggestions, moreover, tend to fit the perceived political views of the user (from the algorithm's perspective) Google and Youtube (like many others) are well-known to have pushed neo-fascist and conspirationist propaganda to random bystanders (Alex Jones or Trump in the USA, Dieudonné or Soral in France) because their "controversial" viewpoints generate more user engagement. Likewise, Google search often promotes white/christian-supremacist "news" websites like FDeSouche in the top5 results for random queries. Then, there's personalized recommendations. Once you've clicked one of these results, Google's algos will deem you interested in that kind of content, and suddenly it's impossible to avoid that bubble. It will keep recommending the same sites/channels everywhere you go, for months. That's why clicking "critically" on a link because you're curious what an "opposite side" has to say is a dangerous enterprise with recommendation algos: you'll be subtly yet persistently exposed to their propaganda ecosystem as a result. I would personally welcome "Goggles" as a positive change. I often know precisely what i'm looking for (an article i saw a few years back), but stupid ranking algorithms make it impossible to find in the stream of information. There's not a one-size-fits-all algo that's going to please everyone: decentralizing this power is the only suitable way, in my humble opinion.
  - cpr 5y ago
    Google and Youtube (like many others) are well-known to have pushed neo-fascist and conspirationist propaganda to random bystanders (Alex Jones or Trump in the USA, Dieudonné or Soral in France) because their "controversial" viewpoints generate more user engagement. Right up until they ban them entirely.
    - NoraCodes 5y ago
      I wonder what the intended tone is here. I would argue that you're exactly right. Google wants to have their cake and eat it too - they want engagement through rage and unreality, but they don't want to be seen as enabling that kind of thing, so they do performative and largely useless measures like banning people who have large following elsewhere and putting Wikipedia links under Flat Earth articles, but don't actually address the core problem: that they make more money when people get angry for no reason, and thus they have to incentivize that kind of art and "journalism" on their platform. We see this from the other side every year come Pride; companies put rainbow shit all over their sites while maintaining LGBTQ+ exclusive practices because they don't want to lose their bigoted customers.

KennyBlanken 5y ago

> This is probably much better than what currently happens, where search engines become personalized but users don't realize it. That anti-vax person might think they are searching the whole web when google has quietly flagged them as a user who enjoys anti-vax articles and continues suggesting those sites, taking them further down the rabbit hole. ...what the what. Did you just casually declare that Google is feeding people search results tailored to their political worldview? Because if so, you need to actually come up with something to support that sort of claim.

kwhitefoot 5y ago
No, they suggested that Google tailors results to the things related to the hits that you follow. His example was political but it was just that, an example.
hetspookjee 5y ago
How could you possibly differentiate an extremely personalized profile, and a political worldview for that matter?
jgilias 5y ago
You're one of today's lucky 10000! [1] Look up Google personalized search [2]. I guess only Google insiders know for sure what's the extent to which your search results get personalized, but it's common knowledge that this happens. It'd be also interesting to find out if they somehow try to reduce the personalization when it comes to 'political' interests. I'd wager that the answer is no. And of course it's not just Google. Facebook and Twitter too. And probably every site with some kind of a feed trying to keep you engaged. 1. https://xkcd.com/1053/ https://xkcd.com/1053/ 2. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Personalized_Search https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Personalized_Search
southerntofu 5y ago
So there's two things to consider: 1) Everything is political, and so are search results and suggestions 2) Personalized results/suggestions, moreover, tend to fit the perceived political views of the user (from the algorithm's perspective) Google and Youtube (like many others) are well-known to have pushed neo-fascist and conspirationist propaganda to random bystanders (Alex Jones or Trump in the USA, Dieudonné or Soral in France) because their "controversial" viewpoints generate more user engagement. Likewise, Google search often promotes white/christian-supremacist "news" websites like FDeSouche in the top5 results for random queries. Then, there's personalized recommendations. Once you've clicked one of these results, Google's algos will deem you interested in that kind of content, and suddenly it's impossible to avoid that bubble. It will keep recommending the same sites/channels everywhere you go, for months. That's why clicking "critically" on a link because you're curious what an "opposite side" has to say is a dangerous enterprise with recommendation algos: you'll be subtly yet persistently exposed to their propaganda ecosystem as a result. I would personally welcome "Goggles" as a positive change. I often know precisely what i'm looking for (an article i saw a few years back), but stupid ranking algorithms make it impossible to find in the stream of information. There's not a one-size-fits-all algo that's going to please everyone: decentralizing this power is the only suitable way, in my humble opinion.
- cpr 5y ago
  Google and Youtube (like many others) are well-known to have pushed neo-fascist and conspirationist propaganda to random bystanders (Alex Jones or Trump in the USA, Dieudonné or Soral in France) because their "controversial" viewpoints generate more user engagement. Right up until they ban them entirely.
  - NoraCodes 5y ago
    I wonder what the intended tone is here. I would argue that you're exactly right. Google wants to have their cake and eat it too - they want engagement through rage and unreality, but they don't want to be seen as enabling that kind of thing, so they do performative and largely useless measures like banning people who have large following elsewhere and putting Wikipedia links under Flat Earth articles, but don't actually address the core problem: that they make more money when people get angry for no reason, and thus they have to incentivize that kind of art and "journalism" on their platform. We see this from the other side every year come Pride; companies put rainbow shit all over their sites while maintaining LGBTQ+ exclusive practices because they don't want to lose their bigoted customers.