6 ms·

I think strip mining is a good analogy. Like google has strip mined the internet and left a toxic pit behind, if companies have their way they'll do the same to

I think strip mining is a good analogy. Like google has strip mined the internet and left a toxic pit behind, if companies have their way they'll do the same to any captive open source project, turing any public parts into nothing but minimum viable bait to try and get people to pay for something.

infogulch 3y ago
> left a toxic pit behind Nonsense. If google scrapes your site, your site is not affected. Where is the toxic pit, exactly?
- _bohm 3y ago
  By becoming the de facto entry point into the internet, Google's existence has spawned a horde of SEO spam sites that dilute and push down real content on the internet.
  - throwaway290 3y ago
    You only see it if you use Google, and you are always free to not use it. They may be evil etc but this logic is like "I can't stop punching myself".
    - version_five 3y ago
      Not remotely true, you see it every time you go to a SEO optimized site, however you get there.
      - throwaway290 3y ago
        And how, may I ask, do you end up on all those SEO optimized sites?
  - orangeoxidation 3y ago
    > Google's existence has spawned a horde of SEO spam sites that dilute and push down real content on the internet They don't push real content "down the internet" they push it down the google rankings. And while Google search is not as great as it was, it remains a strong contender for the best way to find stuff on the internet. I don't think the internet would be better off without it. You can however make good arguments for Google News, "Instant Answers" in Search, and other products, taking (impressions) from the internet.(And Chrome, Chrome worries me.)
    - majewsky 3y ago
      > They don't push real content "down the internet" they push it down the google rankings. From experience, many people can truly not tell the difference.
abeppu 3y ago
> Like google has strip mines the internet and left a toxic pit behind Can you clarify what you mean? I think there's a sense in which sometimes people say that google ruined the internet b/c (a) their prominence and their algorithm induced the creation of awful content farms, and (b) they pulled ad revenue away from some businesses that create content leaving us with a more impoverished web experience. If you're making a different kind of assertion, please elaborate on it. Wrt (a), I think site owners that had useful content weren't for the most part pushed to remove it, but were often pushed to pad it to the point that it feels less valuable to users (like recipe sites where every recipe is 12 paragraphs of prose before the actual recipe, IIUC), so I think this still fits in with the "dilution" framing, rather than removing valuable material in a way that excludes others from its use. Wrt (b) I do think that when google displays content on the search page in a way that stops most users from continuing on to the page from which the information was sourced, that does seem effectively extractive. But I think that's distinct from the OSS project-capture problem. > if companies have their way they'll do the same to any captive open source project, turing any public parts into nothing but minimum viable bait to try and get people to pay for something. I actually think google is a good illustration of the full spectrum of OSS projects. They're definitely "getting their way" but: - gson, guice, protobuf, snappy, the go language are all examples of projects that are very useful and pretty separate from any revenue-generating google product - kubernetes, istio, etc are projects that can easily be used without touching any google revenue-generating project, but if you're using some of their revenue-generating projects, you may likely want something like this. Perhaps this is OSS but writing for your paying customer-base as a target audience? - android, chrome, tensorflow are all about building little googleverse of customers in their orbit
- freedomben 3y ago
  I'm not GP and I personally think the strip-mining analogy is bad. But attempting to steelman GP's position based on other things I've read that I've pieced together: I think an example is LLMs like ChatGPT. Basically consider a website that has good info on it. The LLM scrapes the site and regurgitates it's content to their user, and the original site never get a visit or recognition. The end result is the death of the site (much like strip mining results in).
- 3y ago
dasil003 3y ago
I disagree, the analogy is weak. Strip mining is about harvesting naturally occurring resources in the most invasive way. The internet is not a natural resource. It was created by and for humans, from zero to unfathomable scale in thirty quick years. It is a reflection of ourselves, our systems, and our social and financial incentives. Google definitely deserves some blame as they certainly have helped shape those incentives, but it's not like they came in and started dynamiting some pristine wilderness, do you remember what search was like before Google came along?
dtaht 3y ago
I think strip mining is a decent analogy as well, so long as you include the fate of the participants. Take diamond mining as an example. The miners themselves tend to be dirt poor, and searched for stuff of value on exiting the mine, yet the outcome is big money for the corp controlling the mine.
throwaway290 3y ago
> Like google has strip mined the internet and left a toxic pit behind Sorry, what?
- Arrath 3y ago
  For a certain use-case, I'd say I agree. I would argue that the basic web browsing experience for the less technically minded is worse than it was in the past. For example, I am still working with my partner to get her to recognize and ignore the top level garbage: sponsored links and obvious SEO bait* when she blasts off a "Best <kitchen widget> 2023" search. *You know, those listicles offered up from a handful of different sites that tend to be a 'top ten' list of a selection of 15 or so different products that are mostly just 7 actual different products white labeled by some brand and sold on amazon through a referral link in the listicle.
  - charcircuit 3y ago
    SEO existed before Google.
    - jehb 3y ago
      Yeah, but back then we were all just cramming "Britney Spears" into our Meta Keywords tags; we weren't actually eroding the quality of our entire web properties to court a live-or-die relationship with a single traffic vendor.
  - throwaway290 3y ago
    Web is not limited like physical real estate and SEO spam does not take away some virtual land from useful content. If you think Google is useless and full of spam the best way to deal with it is to simply not use Google
- paulddraper 3y ago
  Seriously, if there any organization that has done more to advance the web, IDK who it is.
- 3y ago

infogulch 3y ago

> left a toxic pit behind Nonsense. If google scrapes your site, your site is not affected. Where is the toxic pit, exactly?

_bohm 3y ago
By becoming the de facto entry point into the internet, Google's existence has spawned a horde of SEO spam sites that dilute and push down real content on the internet.
- throwaway290 3y ago
  You only see it if you use Google, and you are always free to not use it. They may be evil etc but this logic is like "I can't stop punching myself".
  - version_five 3y ago
    Not remotely true, you see it every time you go to a SEO optimized site, however you get there.
    - throwaway290 3y ago
      And how, may I ask, do you end up on all those SEO optimized sites?
- orangeoxidation 3y ago
  > Google's existence has spawned a horde of SEO spam sites that dilute and push down real content on the internet They don't push real content "down the internet" they push it down the google rankings. And while Google search is not as great as it was, it remains a strong contender for the best way to find stuff on the internet. I don't think the internet would be better off without it. You can however make good arguments for Google News, "Instant Answers" in Search, and other products, taking (impressions) from the internet.(And Chrome, Chrome worries me.)
  - majewsky 3y ago
    > They don't push real content "down the internet" they push it down the google rankings. From experience, many people can truly not tell the difference.

abeppu 3y ago

> Like google has strip mines the internet and left a toxic pit behind Can you clarify what you mean? I think there's a sense in which sometimes people say that google ruined the internet b/c (a) their prominence and their algorithm induced the creation of awful content farms, and (b) they pulled ad revenue away from some businesses that create content leaving us with a more impoverished web experience. If you're making a different kind of assertion, please elaborate on it. Wrt (a), I think site owners that had useful content weren't for the most part pushed to remove it, but were often pushed to pad it to the point that it feels less valuable to users (like recipe sites where every recipe is 12 paragraphs of prose before the actual recipe, IIUC), so I think this still fits in with the "dilution" framing, rather than removing valuable material in a way that excludes others from its use. Wrt (b) I do think that when google displays content on the search page in a way that stops most users from continuing on to the page from which the information was sourced, that does seem effectively extractive. But I think that's distinct from the OSS project-capture problem. > if companies have their way they'll do the same to any captive open source project, turing any public parts into nothing but minimum viable bait to try and get people to pay for something. I actually think google is a good illustration of the full spectrum of OSS projects. They're definitely "getting their way" but: - gson, guice, protobuf, snappy, the go language are all examples of projects that are very useful and pretty separate from any revenue-generating google product - kubernetes, istio, etc are projects that can easily be used without touching any google revenue-generating project, but if you're using some of their revenue-generating projects, you may likely want something like this. Perhaps this is OSS but writing for your paying customer-base as a target audience? - android, chrome, tensorflow are all about building little googleverse of customers in their orbit

freedomben 3y ago
I'm not GP and I personally think the strip-mining analogy is bad. But attempting to steelman GP's position based on other things I've read that I've pieced together: I think an example is LLMs like ChatGPT. Basically consider a website that has good info on it. The LLM scrapes the site and regurgitates it's content to their user, and the original site never get a visit or recognition. The end result is the death of the site (much like strip mining results in).
3y ago

dasil003 3y ago

I disagree, the analogy is weak. Strip mining is about harvesting naturally occurring resources in the most invasive way. The internet is not a natural resource. It was created by and for humans, from zero to unfathomable scale in thirty quick years. It is a reflection of ourselves, our systems, and our social and financial incentives. Google definitely deserves some blame as they certainly have helped shape those incentives, but it's not like they came in and started dynamiting some pristine wilderness, do you remember what search was like before Google came along?

dtaht 3y ago

I think strip mining is a decent analogy as well, so long as you include the fate of the participants. Take diamond mining as an example. The miners themselves tend to be dirt poor, and searched for stuff of value on exiting the mine, yet the outcome is big money for the corp controlling the mine.

throwaway290 3y ago

> Like google has strip mined the internet and left a toxic pit behind Sorry, what?

Arrath 3y ago
For a certain use-case, I'd say I agree. I would argue that the basic web browsing experience for the less technically minded is worse than it was in the past. For example, I am still working with my partner to get her to recognize and ignore the top level garbage: sponsored links and obvious SEO bait* when she blasts off a "Best <kitchen widget> 2023" search. *You know, those listicles offered up from a handful of different sites that tend to be a 'top ten' list of a selection of 15 or so different products that are mostly just 7 actual different products white labeled by some brand and sold on amazon through a referral link in the listicle.
- charcircuit 3y ago
  SEO existed before Google.
  - jehb 3y ago
    Yeah, but back then we were all just cramming "Britney Spears" into our Meta Keywords tags; we weren't actually eroding the quality of our entire web properties to court a live-or-die relationship with a single traffic vendor.
- throwaway290 3y ago
  Web is not limited like physical real estate and SEO spam does not take away some virtual land from useful content. If you think Google is useless and full of spam the best way to deal with it is to simply not use Google
paulddraper 3y ago
Seriously, if there any organization that has done more to advance the web, IDK who it is.
3y ago