Slashdot Mirror

Grandparent is referencing two sorts of fallacious arguments. See http://www.geekpress.com/2006/09/excellent-list-of -logical-fallaciesad.html for an entertaining list of fallacies and associated examples.

It's titled Celebrating Pornography Awareness Week.

One political example is worth mentioning here. Dan's Data did a test of Pornsweeper, which is supposed to filter images. This picture of George and Laura Bush was blocked. Filthy porno indeed!

-- Diana Hsieh

It's titled Celebrating Pornography Awareness Week.

One political example is worth mentioning here. Dan's Data did a test of Pornsweeper, which is supposed to filter images. This picture of George and Laura Bush was blocked. Filthy porno indeed!

-- Diana Hsieh

In particuar, it addresses two claims:

1. There are no good results to a search for Liv Tyler nude. (Google)

2. The scam doesn't yield good Google results on popular actresses. (Slashdot)

You can find the response, titled Still Scamming Google at GeekPress. For the sake of my Slashdotted server, I'm reprinting it below:

***

Still Scamming Google

The Case of Liv Tyler

My article on Scamming Google has some unexpected results. The most interesting is that the folks over at Google deny that the scam has any significant impact on the accuracy and usefulness of Google search results.

Slashdot, for example, quotes Google's CTO Craig Silverstein as saying that the Liv Tyler nude search doesn't, "as far as we can tell, have any good results -- in our spot check, for instance, we couldn't actually find any Web sites that show Liv Tyler in the nude. When there are no good results out there, Google's results can be somewhat arbitrary, so it's not particularly surprising this site was first."

As much as I love Google, I must disagree. I scoured through the first 30 results of the Liv Tyler Google to prove my point. Here are the results:

Index Pages: Most of the returned links were to the index page of a porn site, such as link #3 and link #6, both of which take you to the same JavaScript popup hell site. (I didn't bother checking the rest of these pages, because they obviously didn't have Liv Tyler nude on them.) These links are obviously not good Google results.

Scam Pages: Then there were the scam links, with fake discussions of Liv Tyler nude, such as link #1, link #2, link #4, and link #7. These links are also not good Google results.

Nude Liv: Google did, however, return some pages with Liv Tyler nude on them. The best page is probably link #5, which popped up after three scam pages and one index page. It has thumbnails of various movie shots of Liv Tyler in the buff. Link #25 and link #30 also has nude pictures of Liv. (I also noted two links somewhere between scam and the real thing, such as link #11 and link #21. These pages have non-nude pictures of Liv Tyler and a ton of links leading to various celebrity nude sites.

I also randomly checked a few of the low-ranked pages, with some unexpected results. For example, link #76 has a genuine discussion (!) of Liv Tyler's nude scene in Stealing Beauty. Link #116 has a nude picture along with a filmography. Link #174 is an Batman-ish erotic story with Liv Tyler playing "The Huntress." Link #192 and link #63 have fake nudes. Link #62 is a list of various Liv Tyler pages, some with a bundle of sexy images.

So, contrary to what the Google people say, there are good results for Liv Tyler nude. Google just isn't putting them at the top of the list.

Random Results?

But Google's problems do not end with the jumble of bad results for the Liv Tyler search. Google repeatedly puts the fake discussion pages of Nude Celebrity World News at the top of the search results in a huge number of searches for nude celebrities. But don't take my word for it. Google for yourself using the list of celebrities created by Nude Celebrity World News (modified to automatically search Google). You'll see the domains of www.jennifer-smith.com, www.news-in-review.com, www.find-thys.com, www.celebrity-locator.com, and www.celebrity-fans.com at the top of the list more often than "randomly."

Personally, I checked 50 of these searches, making sure to hit popular female celebrities like Meg Ryan and Heather Locklear. Here are my results:

3 searches yielded all top five search results (e.g. Kathy Bates).

9 searches yielded all top four search results (e.g. Bo Derrek).

16 searches yielded all top three search results (e.g. Linda Hamilton).

3 searches yielded both top two results (e.g. Lara Flynn Boyle).

1 search yielded the top result.

In all of the above searches, I just counted the set of top results, ignoring the matching results lower in the top ten.

Most importantly, however, is the fact that 16 searches for popular celebrities had at least one result in the top 10 (e.g. Toni Braxton, Janet Jackson, Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Heather Locklear, Alicia Silverstone, and Sandra Bullock).

Only 2 searches did not yield any results in the top ten: Demi Moore and Jennifer Lopez.

These results are not random, as Google claims. Clearly, the sham discussion pages created by Nude Celebrity World News have worked their magic on Google. The proof is in the pudding and the pudding is in the search results.

So I stand behind my the point in my original article: Google has been fooled into repeatedly returning, as highly-placed results, pages which any human can identify as search engine spam.

***

About the Author

Diana Hsieh is the owner and co-editor of GeekPress, an irreverent filter for the most unique and interesting technical news of the day. She also sporadically writes and lectures on philosophy, Objectivism in particular. She can be reached via e-mail to diana@geekpress.com.

© 2000 Diana Hsieh. Permission to reprint will be granted upon request.

-- Diana Hsieh

In particuar, it addresses two claims:

1. There are no good results to a search for Liv Tyler nude. (Google)

2. The scam doesn't yield good Google results on popular actresses. (Slashdot)

You can find the response, titled Still Scamming Google at GeekPress. For the sake of my Slashdotted server, I'm reprinting it below:

***

Still Scamming Google

The Case of Liv Tyler

My article on Scamming Google has some unexpected results. The most interesting is that the folks over at Google deny that the scam has any significant impact on the accuracy and usefulness of Google search results.

Slashdot, for example, quotes Google's CTO Craig Silverstein as saying that the Liv Tyler nude search doesn't, "as far as we can tell, have any good results -- in our spot check, for instance, we couldn't actually find any Web sites that show Liv Tyler in the nude. When there are no good results out there, Google's results can be somewhat arbitrary, so it's not particularly surprising this site was first."

As much as I love Google, I must disagree. I scoured through the first 30 results of the Liv Tyler Google to prove my point. Here are the results:

Index Pages: Most of the returned links were to the index page of a porn site, such as link #3 and link #6, both of which take you to the same JavaScript popup hell site. (I didn't bother checking the rest of these pages, because they obviously didn't have Liv Tyler nude on them.) These links are obviously not good Google results.

Scam Pages: Then there were the scam links, with fake discussions of Liv Tyler nude, such as link #1, link #2, link #4, and link #7. These links are also not good Google results.

Nude Liv: Google did, however, return some pages with Liv Tyler nude on them. The best page is probably link #5, which popped up after three scam pages and one index page. It has thumbnails of various movie shots of Liv Tyler in the buff. Link #25 and link #30 also has nude pictures of Liv. (I also noted two links somewhere between scam and the real thing, such as link #11 and link #21. These pages have non-nude pictures of Liv Tyler and a ton of links leading to various celebrity nude sites.

I also randomly checked a few of the low-ranked pages, with some unexpected results. For example, link #76 has a genuine discussion (!) of Liv Tyler's nude scene in Stealing Beauty. Link #116 has a nude picture along with a filmography. Link #174 is an Batman-ish erotic story with Liv Tyler playing "The Huntress." Link #192 and link #63 have fake nudes. Link #62 is a list of various Liv Tyler pages, some with a bundle of sexy images.

So, contrary to what the Google people say, there are good results for Liv Tyler nude. Google just isn't putting them at the top of the list.

Random Results?

But Google's problems do not end with the jumble of bad results for the Liv Tyler search. Google repeatedly puts the fake discussion pages of Nude Celebrity World News at the top of the search results in a huge number of searches for nude celebrities. But don't take my word for it. Google for yourself using the list of celebrities created by Nude Celebrity World News (modified to automatically search Google). You'll see the domains of www.jennifer-smith.com, www.news-in-review.com, www.find-thys.com, www.celebrity-locator.com, and www.celebrity-fans.com at the top of the list more often than "randomly."

Personally, I checked 50 of these searches, making sure to hit popular female celebrities like Meg Ryan and Heather Locklear. Here are my results:

3 searches yielded all top five search results (e.g. Kathy Bates).

9 searches yielded all top four search results (e.g. Bo Derrek).

16 searches yielded all top three search results (e.g. Linda Hamilton).

3 searches yielded both top two results (e.g. Lara Flynn Boyle).

1 search yielded the top result.

In all of the above searches, I just counted the set of top results, ignoring the matching results lower in the top ten.

Most importantly, however, is the fact that 16 searches for popular celebrities had at least one result in the top 10 (e.g. Toni Braxton, Janet Jackson, Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Heather Locklear, Alicia Silverstone, and Sandra Bullock).

Only 2 searches did not yield any results in the top ten: Demi Moore and Jennifer Lopez.

These results are not random, as Google claims. Clearly, the sham discussion pages created by Nude Celebrity World News have worked their magic on Google. The proof is in the pudding and the pudding is in the search results.

So I stand behind my the point in my original article: Google has been fooled into repeatedly returning, as highly-placed results, pages which any human can identify as search engine spam.

***

About the Author

Diana Hsieh is the owner and co-editor of GeekPress, an irreverent filter for the most unique and interesting technical news of the day. She also sporadically writes and lectures on philosophy, Objectivism in particular. She can be reached via e-mail to diana@geekpress.com.

© 2000 Diana Hsieh. Permission to reprint will be granted upon request.

-- Diana Hsieh

In particuar, it addresses two claims:

1. There are no good results to a search for Liv Tyler nude. (Google)

2. The scam doesn't yield good Google results on popular actresses. (Slashdot)

You can find the response, titled Still Scamming Google at GeekPress. For the sake of my Slashdotted server, I'm reprinting it below:

***

Still Scamming Google

The Case of Liv Tyler

My article on Scamming Google has some unexpected results. The most interesting is that the folks over at Google deny that the scam has any significant impact on the accuracy and usefulness of Google search results.

Slashdot, for example, quotes Google's CTO Craig Silverstein as saying that the Liv Tyler nude search doesn't, "as far as we can tell, have any good results -- in our spot check, for instance, we couldn't actually find any Web sites that show Liv Tyler in the nude. When there are no good results out there, Google's results can be somewhat arbitrary, so it's not particularly surprising this site was first."

As much as I love Google, I must disagree. I scoured through the first 30 results of the Liv Tyler Google to prove my point. Here are the results:

Index Pages: Most of the returned links were to the index page of a porn site, such as link #3 and link #6, both of which take you to the same JavaScript popup hell site. (I didn't bother checking the rest of these pages, because they obviously didn't have Liv Tyler nude on them.) These links are obviously not good Google results.

Scam Pages: Then there were the scam links, with fake discussions of Liv Tyler nude, such as link #1, link #2, link #4, and link #7. These links are also not good Google results.

Nude Liv: Google did, however, return some pages with Liv Tyler nude on them. The best page is probably link #5, which popped up after three scam pages and one index page. It has thumbnails of various movie shots of Liv Tyler in the buff. Link #25 and link #30 also has nude pictures of Liv. (I also noted two links somewhere between scam and the real thing, such as link #11 and link #21. These pages have non-nude pictures of Liv Tyler and a ton of links leading to various celebrity nude sites.

I also randomly checked a few of the low-ranked pages, with some unexpected results. For example, link #76 has a genuine discussion (!) of Liv Tyler's nude scene in Stealing Beauty. Link #116 has a nude picture along with a filmography. Link #174 is an Batman-ish erotic story with Liv Tyler playing "The Huntress." Link #192 and link #63 have fake nudes. Link #62 is a list of various Liv Tyler pages, some with a bundle of sexy images.

So, contrary to what the Google people say, there are good results for Liv Tyler nude. Google just isn't putting them at the top of the list.

Random Results?

But Google's problems do not end with the jumble of bad results for the Liv Tyler search. Google repeatedly puts the fake discussion pages of Nude Celebrity World News at the top of the search results in a huge number of searches for nude celebrities. But don't take my word for it. Google for yourself using the list of celebrities created by Nude Celebrity World News (modified to automatically search Google). You'll see the domains of www.jennifer-smith.com, www.news-in-review.com, www.find-thys.com, www.celebrity-locator.com, and www.celebrity-fans.com at the top of the list more often than "randomly."

Personally, I checked 50 of these searches, making sure to hit popular female celebrities like Meg Ryan and Heather Locklear. Here are my results:

3 searches yielded all top five search results (e.g. Kathy Bates).

9 searches yielded all top four search results (e.g. Bo Derrek).

16 searches yielded all top three search results (e.g. Linda Hamilton).

3 searches yielded both top two results (e.g. Lara Flynn Boyle).

1 search yielded the top result.

In all of the above searches, I just counted the set of top results, ignoring the matching results lower in the top ten.

Most importantly, however, is the fact that 16 searches for popular celebrities had at least one result in the top 10 (e.g. Toni Braxton, Janet Jackson, Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Heather Locklear, Alicia Silverstone, and Sandra Bullock).

Only 2 searches did not yield any results in the top ten: Demi Moore and Jennifer Lopez.

These results are not random, as Google claims. Clearly, the sham discussion pages created by Nude Celebrity World News have worked their magic on Google. The proof is in the pudding and the pudding is in the search results.

So I stand behind my the point in my original article: Google has been fooled into repeatedly returning, as highly-placed results, pages which any human can identify as search engine spam.

***

About the Author

Diana Hsieh is the owner and co-editor of GeekPress, an irreverent filter for the most unique and interesting technical news of the day. She also sporadically writes and lectures on philosophy, Objectivism in particular. She can be reached via e-mail to diana@geekpress.com.

© 2000 Diana Hsieh. Permission to reprint will be granted upon request.

-- Diana Hsieh

In particuar, it addresses two claims:

1. There are no good results to a search for Liv Tyler nude. (Google)

2. The scam doesn't yield good Google results on popular actresses. (Slashdot)

You can find the response, titled Still Scamming Google at GeekPress. For the sake of my Slashdotted server, I'm reprinting it below:

***

Still Scamming Google

The Case of Liv Tyler

My article on Scamming Google has some unexpected results. The most interesting is that the folks over at Google deny that the scam has any significant impact on the accuracy and usefulness of Google search results.

Slashdot, for example, quotes Google's CTO Craig Silverstein as saying that the Liv Tyler nude search doesn't, "as far as we can tell, have any good results -- in our spot check, for instance, we couldn't actually find any Web sites that show Liv Tyler in the nude. When there are no good results out there, Google's results can be somewhat arbitrary, so it's not particularly surprising this site was first."

As much as I love Google, I must disagree. I scoured through the first 30 results of the Liv Tyler Google to prove my point. Here are the results:

Index Pages: Most of the returned links were to the index page of a porn site, such as link #3 and link #6, both of which take you to the same JavaScript popup hell site. (I didn't bother checking the rest of these pages, because they obviously didn't have Liv Tyler nude on them.) These links are obviously not good Google results.

Scam Pages: Then there were the scam links, with fake discussions of Liv Tyler nude, such as link #1, link #2, link #4, and link #7. These links are also not good Google results.

Nude Liv: Google did, however, return some pages with Liv Tyler nude on them. The best page is probably link #5, which popped up after three scam pages and one index page. It has thumbnails of various movie shots of Liv Tyler in the buff. Link #25 and link #30 also has nude pictures of Liv. (I also noted two links somewhere between scam and the real thing, such as link #11 and link #21. These pages have non-nude pictures of Liv Tyler and a ton of links leading to various celebrity nude sites.

I also randomly checked a few of the low-ranked pages, with some unexpected results. For example, link #76 has a genuine discussion (!) of Liv Tyler's nude scene in Stealing Beauty. Link #116 has a nude picture along with a filmography. Link #174 is an Batman-ish erotic story with Liv Tyler playing "The Huntress." Link #192 and link #63 have fake nudes. Link #62 is a list of various Liv Tyler pages, some with a bundle of sexy images.

So, contrary to what the Google people say, there are good results for Liv Tyler nude. Google just isn't putting them at the top of the list.

Random Results?

But Google's problems do not end with the jumble of bad results for the Liv Tyler search. Google repeatedly puts the fake discussion pages of Nude Celebrity World News at the top of the search results in a huge number of searches for nude celebrities. But don't take my word for it. Google for yourself using the list of celebrities created by Nude Celebrity World News (modified to automatically search Google). You'll see the domains of www.jennifer-smith.com, www.news-in-review.com, www.find-thys.com, www.celebrity-locator.com, and www.celebrity-fans.com at the top of the list more often than "randomly."

Personally, I checked 50 of these searches, making sure to hit popular female celebrities like Meg Ryan and Heather Locklear. Here are my results:

3 searches yielded all top five search results (e.g. Kathy Bates).

9 searches yielded all top four search results (e.g. Bo Derrek).

16 searches yielded all top three search results (e.g. Linda Hamilton).

3 searches yielded both top two results (e.g. Lara Flynn Boyle).

1 search yielded the top result.

In all of the above searches, I just counted the set of top results, ignoring the matching results lower in the top ten.

Most importantly, however, is the fact that 16 searches for popular celebrities had at least one result in the top 10 (e.g. Toni Braxton, Janet Jackson, Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Heather Locklear, Alicia Silverstone, and Sandra Bullock).

Only 2 searches did not yield any results in the top ten: Demi Moore and Jennifer Lopez.

These results are not random, as Google claims. Clearly, the sham discussion pages created by Nude Celebrity World News have worked their magic on Google. The proof is in the pudding and the pudding is in the search results.

So I stand behind my the point in my original article: Google has been fooled into repeatedly returning, as highly-placed results, pages which any human can identify as search engine spam.

***

About the Author

Diana Hsieh is the owner and co-editor of GeekPress, an irreverent filter for the most unique and interesting technical news of the day. She also sporadically writes and lectures on philosophy, Objectivism in particular. She can be reached via e-mail to diana@geekpress.com.

© 2000 Diana Hsieh. Permission to reprint will be granted upon request.

-- Diana Hsieh

In particuar, it addresses two claims:

1. There are no good results to a search for Liv Tyler nude. (Google)

2. The scam doesn't yield good Google results on popular actresses. (Slashdot)

You can find the response, titled Still Scamming Google at GeekPress. For the sake of my Slashdotted server, I'm reprinting it below:

***

Still Scamming Google

The Case of Liv Tyler

My article on Scamming Google has some unexpected results. The most interesting is that the folks over at Google deny that the scam has any significant impact on the accuracy and usefulness of Google search results.

Slashdot, for example, quotes Google's CTO Craig Silverstein as saying that the Liv Tyler nude search doesn't, "as far as we can tell, have any good results -- in our spot check, for instance, we couldn't actually find any Web sites that show Liv Tyler in the nude. When there are no good results out there, Google's results can be somewhat arbitrary, so it's not particularly surprising this site was first."

As much as I love Google, I must disagree. I scoured through the first 30 results of the Liv Tyler Google to prove my point. Here are the results:

Index Pages: Most of the returned links were to the index page of a porn site, such as link #3 and link #6, both of which take you to the same JavaScript popup hell site. (I didn't bother checking the rest of these pages, because they obviously didn't have Liv Tyler nude on them.) These links are obviously not good Google results.

Scam Pages: Then there were the scam links, with fake discussions of Liv Tyler nude, such as link #1, link #2, link #4, and link #7. These links are also not good Google results.

Nude Liv: Google did, however, return some pages with Liv Tyler nude on them. The best page is probably link #5, which popped up after three scam pages and one index page. It has thumbnails of various movie shots of Liv Tyler in the buff. Link #25 and link #30 also has nude pictures of Liv. (I also noted two links somewhere between scam and the real thing, such as link #11 and link #21. These pages have non-nude pictures of Liv Tyler and a ton of links leading to various celebrity nude sites.

I also randomly checked a few of the low-ranked pages, with some unexpected results. For example, link #76 has a genuine discussion (!) of Liv Tyler's nude scene in Stealing Beauty. Link #116 has a nude picture along with a filmography. Link #174 is an Batman-ish erotic story with Liv Tyler playing "The Huntress." Link #192 and link #63 have fake nudes. Link #62 is a list of various Liv Tyler pages, some with a bundle of sexy images.

So, contrary to what the Google people say, there are good results for Liv Tyler nude. Google just isn't putting them at the top of the list.

Random Results?

But Google's problems do not end with the jumble of bad results for the Liv Tyler search. Google repeatedly puts the fake discussion pages of Nude Celebrity World News at the top of the search results in a huge number of searches for nude celebrities. But don't take my word for it. Google for yourself using the list of celebrities created by Nude Celebrity World News (modified to automatically search Google). You'll see the domains of www.jennifer-smith.com, www.news-in-review.com, www.find-thys.com, www.celebrity-locator.com, and www.celebrity-fans.com at the top of the list more often than "randomly."

Personally, I checked 50 of these searches, making sure to hit popular female celebrities like Meg Ryan and Heather Locklear. Here are my results:

3 searches yielded all top five search results (e.g. Kathy Bates).

9 searches yielded all top four search results (e.g. Bo Derrek).

16 searches yielded all top three search results (e.g. Linda Hamilton).

3 searches yielded both top two results (e.g. Lara Flynn Boyle).

1 search yielded the top result.

In all of the above searches, I just counted the set of top results, ignoring the matching results lower in the top ten.

Most importantly, however, is the fact that 16 searches for popular celebrities had at least one result in the top 10 (e.g. Toni Braxton, Janet Jackson, Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Heather Locklear, Alicia Silverstone, and Sandra Bullock).

Only 2 searches did not yield any results in the top ten: Demi Moore and Jennifer Lopez.

These results are not random, as Google claims. Clearly, the sham discussion pages created by Nude Celebrity World News have worked their magic on Google. The proof is in the pudding and the pudding is in the search results.

So I stand behind my the point in my original article: Google has been fooled into repeatedly returning, as highly-placed results, pages which any human can identify as search engine spam.

***

About the Author

Diana Hsieh is the owner and co-editor of GeekPress, an irreverent filter for the most unique and interesting technical news of the day. She also sporadically writes and lectures on philosophy, Objectivism in particular. She can be reached via e-mail to diana@geekpress.com.

© 2000 Diana Hsieh. Permission to reprint will be granted upon request.

-- Diana Hsieh

In particuar, it addresses two claims:

1. There are no good results to a search for Liv Tyler nude. (Google)

2. The scam doesn't yield good Google results on popular actresses. (Slashdot)

You can find the response, titled Still Scamming Google at GeekPress. For the sake of my Slashdotted server, I'm reprinting it below:

***

Still Scamming Google

The Case of Liv Tyler

My article on Scamming Google has some unexpected results. The most interesting is that the folks over at Google deny that the scam has any significant impact on the accuracy and usefulness of Google search results.

Slashdot, for example, quotes Google's CTO Craig Silverstein as saying that the Liv Tyler nude search doesn't, "as far as we can tell, have any good results -- in our spot check, for instance, we couldn't actually find any Web sites that show Liv Tyler in the nude. When there are no good results out there, Google's results can be somewhat arbitrary, so it's not particularly surprising this site was first."

As much as I love Google, I must disagree. I scoured through the first 30 results of the Liv Tyler Google to prove my point. Here are the results:

Index Pages: Most of the returned links were to the index page of a porn site, such as link #3 and link #6, both of which take you to the same JavaScript popup hell site. (I didn't bother checking the rest of these pages, because they obviously didn't have Liv Tyler nude on them.) These links are obviously not good Google results.

Scam Pages: Then there were the scam links, with fake discussions of Liv Tyler nude, such as link #1, link #2, link #4, and link #7. These links are also not good Google results.

Nude Liv: Google did, however, return some pages with Liv Tyler nude on them. The best page is probably link #5, which popped up after three scam pages and one index page. It has thumbnails of various movie shots of Liv Tyler in the buff. Link #25 and link #30 also has nude pictures of Liv. (I also noted two links somewhere between scam and the real thing, such as link #11 and link #21. These pages have non-nude pictures of Liv Tyler and a ton of links leading to various celebrity nude sites.

I also randomly checked a few of the low-ranked pages, with some unexpected results. For example, link #76 has a genuine discussion (!) of Liv Tyler's nude scene in Stealing Beauty. Link #116 has a nude picture along with a filmography. Link #174 is an Batman-ish erotic story with Liv Tyler playing "The Huntress." Link #192 and link #63 have fake nudes. Link #62 is a list of various Liv Tyler pages, some with a bundle of sexy images.

So, contrary to what the Google people say, there are good results for Liv Tyler nude. Google just isn't putting them at the top of the list.

Random Results?

But Google's problems do not end with the jumble of bad results for the Liv Tyler search. Google repeatedly puts the fake discussion pages of Nude Celebrity World News at the top of the search results in a huge number of searches for nude celebrities. But don't take my word for it. Google for yourself using the list of celebrities created by Nude Celebrity World News (modified to automatically search Google). You'll see the domains of www.jennifer-smith.com, www.news-in-review.com, www.find-thys.com, www.celebrity-locator.com, and www.celebrity-fans.com at the top of the list more often than "randomly."

Personally, I checked 50 of these searches, making sure to hit popular female celebrities like Meg Ryan and Heather Locklear. Here are my results:

3 searches yielded all top five search results (e.g. Kathy Bates).

9 searches yielded all top four search results (e.g. Bo Derrek).

16 searches yielded all top three search results (e.g. Linda Hamilton).

3 searches yielded both top two results (e.g. Lara Flynn Boyle).

1 search yielded the top result.

In all of the above searches, I just counted the set of top results, ignoring the matching results lower in the top ten.

Most importantly, however, is the fact that 16 searches for popular celebrities had at least one result in the top 10 (e.g. Toni Braxton, Janet Jackson, Nicole Kidman, Meg Ryan, Heather Locklear, Alicia Silverstone, and Sandra Bullock).

Only 2 searches did not yield any results in the top ten: Demi Moore and Jennifer Lopez.

These results are not random, as Google claims. Clearly, the sham discussion pages created by Nude Celebrity World News have worked their magic on Google. The proof is in the pudding and the pudding is in the search results.

So I stand behind my the point in my original article: Google has been fooled into repeatedly returning, as highly-placed results, pages which any human can identify as search engine spam.

***

About the Author

Diana Hsieh is the owner and co-editor of GeekPress, an irreverent filter for the most unique and interesting technical news of the day. She also sporadically writes and lectures on philosophy, Objectivism in particular. She can be reached via e-mail to diana@geekpress.com.

© 2000 Diana Hsieh. Permission to reprint will be granted upon request.

-- Diana Hsieh

I, personally, have lost all faith in Slashdot. Like so many sites now, it has sold out and reverted to producing mindless drivel for the sake of content. I just don't have the time anymore to waste on articles which are given fear-mongering headlines just to generate hits.

Anyone looking for a REAL news site might consider GeekPress (fairly technical) or NewsTrolls. (more socially oriented, but still relevant) These sites focus more on providing useful news with a objective point of view, and less on filling up space.

You keep reading the crap, they'll keep spewing it out.

First, there is olist.com, a site for people interested in Objectivism. I've been running some variant of this site since something like early 1995, without ever directly making a dime. But I did make money indirectly; I learned HTML in creating the site, which landed this poor philosophy major her first programming job.

In a month or so, I'm going to embark on a major project to create a new type of community-moderated "mailing list" through the olist.com site. I'm going to ask people for "donations" (non-tax-deductible) through PayPal, to compensate me somewhat for my time. I'm hoping that Objectivists, of all people, will be willing to pony up to have a high-quality discussion list again. (I might also be able to sell the software later, which would be great, as I'm sure donations won't even remotely cover the cost of creating the software.)

My other site is GeekPress, a tech news site. After creating the site, I realized that advertising and affiliate programs aren't going to cut it. Why? Banners suck. They suck up space and bandwidth. And their long-term viability as a source of revenue is doubtful. And affiliate programs just don't make enough revenue, unless the site is directly related to what's being sold (like my Nathaniel Branden site). So, I can ask for donations. Yeah, right.

But there is hope. Perhaps GeekPress can, as my Objectivism sites did, propel me into a related career. I have a strong background in analysis, writing, and public speaking from philosophy. I have, through maintaining GeekPress (or more precisely, by reading so much tech news that it makes my head spin), a pretty good grasp of where technology is headed, particularly given our legal and cultural climate. And I have noticed that people seem hungry, given the relentless speed of technology, to make sense of the changes happening as a result of new technology. So, if I can manage to spin out engaging and insightful analyses of tech news to be published elsewhere, I might be able to make some money. And that money will be, somewhat indirectly, the result of my work on GeekPress.

I'm sure that this "related career" model doesn't work for every free site out there. But it has surely made many a site developers a great deal of money, even if they don't quite realize it.

-- Diana Hsieh

First, there is olist.com, a site for people interested in Objectivism. I've been running some variant of this site since something like early 1995, without ever directly making a dime. But I did make money indirectly; I learned HTML in creating the site, which landed this poor philosophy major her first programming job.

In a month or so, I'm going to embark on a major project to create a new type of community-moderated "mailing list" through the olist.com site. I'm going to ask people for "donations" (non-tax-deductible) through PayPal, to compensate me somewhat for my time. I'm hoping that Objectivists, of all people, will be willing to pony up to have a high-quality discussion list again. (I might also be able to sell the software later, which would be great, as I'm sure donations won't even remotely cover the cost of creating the software.)

My other site is GeekPress, a tech news site. After creating the site, I realized that advertising and affiliate programs aren't going to cut it. Why? Banners suck. They suck up space and bandwidth. And their long-term viability as a source of revenue is doubtful. And affiliate programs just don't make enough revenue, unless the site is directly related to what's being sold (like my Nathaniel Branden site). So, I can ask for donations. Yeah, right.

But there is hope. Perhaps GeekPress can, as my Objectivism sites did, propel me into a related career. I have a strong background in analysis, writing, and public speaking from philosophy. I have, through maintaining GeekPress (or more precisely, by reading so much tech news that it makes my head spin), a pretty good grasp of where technology is headed, particularly given our legal and cultural climate. And I have noticed that people seem hungry, given the relentless speed of technology, to make sense of the changes happening as a result of new technology. So, if I can manage to spin out engaging and insightful analyses of tech news to be published elsewhere, I might be able to make some money. And that money will be, somewhat indirectly, the result of my work on GeekPress.

I'm sure that this "related career" model doesn't work for every free site out there. But it has surely made many a site developers a great deal of money, even if they don't quite realize it.

-- Diana Hsieh

First, there is olist.com, a site for people interested in Objectivism. I've been running some variant of this site since something like early 1995, without ever directly making a dime. But I did make money indirectly; I learned HTML in creating the site, which landed this poor philosophy major her first programming job.

In a month or so, I'm going to embark on a major project to create a new type of community-moderated "mailing list" through the olist.com site. I'm going to ask people for "donations" (non-tax-deductible) through PayPal, to compensate me somewhat for my time. I'm hoping that Objectivists, of all people, will be willing to pony up to have a high-quality discussion list again. (I might also be able to sell the software later, which would be great, as I'm sure donations won't even remotely cover the cost of creating the software.)

My other site is GeekPress, a tech news site. After creating the site, I realized that advertising and affiliate programs aren't going to cut it. Why? Banners suck. They suck up space and bandwidth. And their long-term viability as a source of revenue is doubtful. And affiliate programs just don't make enough revenue, unless the site is directly related to what's being sold (like my Nathaniel Branden site). So, I can ask for donations. Yeah, right.

But there is hope. Perhaps GeekPress can, as my Objectivism sites did, propel me into a related career. I have a strong background in analysis, writing, and public speaking from philosophy. I have, through maintaining GeekPress (or more precisely, by reading so much tech news that it makes my head spin), a pretty good grasp of where technology is headed, particularly given our legal and cultural climate. And I have noticed that people seem hungry, given the relentless speed of technology, to make sense of the changes happening as a result of new technology. So, if I can manage to spin out engaging and insightful analyses of tech news to be published elsewhere, I might be able to make some money. And that money will be, somewhat indirectly, the result of my work on GeekPress.

I'm sure that this "related career" model doesn't work for every free site out there. But it has surely made many a site developers a great deal of money, even if they don't quite realize it.

-- Diana Hsieh

First, there is olist.com, a site for people interested in Objectivism. I've been running some variant of this site since something like early 1995, without ever directly making a dime. But I did make money indirectly; I learned HTML in creating the site, which landed this poor philosophy major her first programming job.

In a month or so, I'm going to embark on a major project to create a new type of community-moderated "mailing list" through the olist.com site. I'm going to ask people for "donations" (non-tax-deductible) through PayPal, to compensate me somewhat for my time. I'm hoping that Objectivists, of all people, will be willing to pony up to have a high-quality discussion list again. (I might also be able to sell the software later, which would be great, as I'm sure donations won't even remotely cover the cost of creating the software.)

My other site is GeekPress, a tech news site. After creating the site, I realized that advertising and affiliate programs aren't going to cut it. Why? Banners suck. They suck up space and bandwidth. And their long-term viability as a source of revenue is doubtful. And affiliate programs just don't make enough revenue, unless the site is directly related to what's being sold (like my Nathaniel Branden site). So, I can ask for donations. Yeah, right.

But there is hope. Perhaps GeekPress can, as my Objectivism sites did, propel me into a related career. I have a strong background in analysis, writing, and public speaking from philosophy. I have, through maintaining GeekPress (or more precisely, by reading so much tech news that it makes my head spin), a pretty good grasp of where technology is headed, particularly given our legal and cultural climate. And I have noticed that people seem hungry, given the relentless speed of technology, to make sense of the changes happening as a result of new technology. So, if I can manage to spin out engaging and insightful analyses of tech news to be published elsewhere, I might be able to make some money. And that money will be, somewhat indirectly, the result of my work on GeekPress.

I'm sure that this "related career" model doesn't work for every free site out there. But it has surely made many a site developers a great deal of money, even if they don't quite realize it.

-- Diana Hsieh

One question: Will this get around the "where's the device driver?" problem that Linux faces? Or will every uPNP device still need a specifically developed Linux driver? (I suspect that later.)

-- Diana Hsieh

Nor are you, torpor.

No, I couldn't begin to tell you who their audience is these days. Certainly not the people they started out attracting.

For a good web news filter, try GeekPress and, less geeky by far, but more socially relevent, NewsTrolls.

--

-- Diana Hsieh

"Why doesn't Costa Rica do something cool like a rebel outpost on the fringes of cyberspace?"

Now that is interesting!

Although "Sealand" sounds suspiciously like "Sea World" ;-)

The problems with this proposal is that it will suffer the same problems as any free good provided by the government.

1. It is not actually free. People will pay for it through taxes. People will also have to pay for all that lovely government bureaucracy that goes along with it. (That, according to David Friedman, makes government-provided services cost about twice as much as those provided by the private sector.)
2. If there's no pricing, there's no incentive for individuals to limit their own usage. The government will have to start rationing. So hardworking entrepreneurs trying to sell their wares on the net will get as much time as the slackers surfing for porn and wacking off. Perhaps even more time depending on how rational the rationing scheme is.
3. And let's not even talk about how wonderful tech support will be from a government agency!

Also, I wonder how much benefit raw internet access brings to people in a third world country. Anyone have any direct experience with this?

Why doesn't Costa Rica do something cool like a rebel outpost on the fringes of cyberspace?

-- Diana Hsieh

It's really too bad that Madonna has come out against Napster. Surely she, if anyone, should be able to find some way to use it to further her own fame.

Also, I wonder how much the single was really a work-in-progress, as the video was being shot in April, according to the Official Madonna Fan Club.

If only Microsoft would move to Canada, we'd finally get the the "Windows, eh?" edition.

-- Diana Hsieh

As for the postings of AC, it's a real pain to have to register before testing something out. But, the trolling is also a big nuisance. So who do you want to piss off more: new users and trolls or your regular posters and readers?

-- Diana Hsieh

How are we supposed to waste time if Slashdot isn't up? All the more reason to go waste time at GeekPress, as was suggested during the DOS. After all, Slashdot doesn't have this rich story: Zero Gravity Sex Film Up For Award.

-- Diana Hsieh

How are we supposed to waste time if Slashdot isn't up? All the more reason to go waste time at GeekPress, as was suggested during the DOS. After all, Slashdot doesn't have this rich story: Zero Gravity Sex Film Up For Award.

-- Diana Hsieh

How are we supposed to waste time if Slashdot isn't up? All the more reason to go waste time at GeekPress, as was suggested during the DOS. After all, Slashdot doesn't have this rich story: Zero Gravity Sex Film Up For Award.

-- Diana Hsieh

Being a libertarian, I don't believe that anti-trust laws are a good thing at all. Most monopolies exist as a result of government mandate. In the case of other near-monopolies (such as Standard Oil), consumers didn't benefit at all by government intervention. (The price of oil rose, in fact.)

But really, MS has this absurd attitude of "I will do what I want, everyone but us be damned!" So really, waht Bill Gates needs is a good tuning up by Andy Sipowitz in some grungy interview room of the 15th squad.

Cool stuff on GeekPress: Chinese engineer wins site's jackpot, but collecting is tricky / How to Hack a Bank / Helmet o'Death, Almost

-- Diana Hsieh

Being a libertarian, I don't believe that anti-trust laws are a good thing at all. Most monopolies exist as a result of government mandate. In the case of other near-monopolies (such as Standard Oil), consumers didn't benefit at all by government intervention. (The price of oil rose, in fact.)

But really, MS has this absurd attitude of "I will do what I want, everyone but us be damned!" So really, waht Bill Gates needs is a good tuning up by Andy Sipowitz in some grungy interview room of the 15th squad.

Cool stuff on GeekPress: Chinese engineer wins site's jackpot, but collecting is tricky / How to Hack a Bank / Helmet o'Death, Almost

-- Diana Hsieh

Being a libertarian, I don't believe that anti-trust laws are a good thing at all. Most monopolies exist as a result of government mandate. In the case of other near-monopolies (such as Standard Oil), consumers didn't benefit at all by government intervention. (The price of oil rose, in fact.)

But really, MS has this absurd attitude of "I will do what I want, everyone but us be damned!" So really, waht Bill Gates needs is a good tuning up by Andy Sipowitz in some grungy interview room of the 15th squad.

Cool stuff on GeekPress: Chinese engineer wins site's jackpot, but collecting is tricky / How to Hack a Bank / Helmet o'Death, Almost

-- Diana Hsieh

Being a libertarian, I don't believe that anti-trust laws are a good thing at all. Most monopolies exist as a result of government mandate. In the case of other near-monopolies (such as Standard Oil), consumers didn't benefit at all by government intervention. (The price of oil rose, in fact.)

But really, MS has this absurd attitude of "I will do what I want, everyone but us be damned!" So really, waht Bill Gates needs is a good tuning up by Andy Sipowitz in some grungy interview room of the 15th squad.

Cool stuff on GeekPress: Chinese engineer wins site's jackpot, but collecting is tricky / How to Hack a Bank / Helmet o'Death, Almost

-- Diana Hsieh

Cool stuff on GeekPress: How to Hack a Bank / Helmet o'Death, Almost

-- Diana Hsieh

Cool stuff on GeekPress: How to Hack a Bank / Helmet o'Death, Almost

-- Diana Hsieh

Cool stuff on GeekPress: How to Hack a Bank / Helmet o'Death, Almost

-- Diana Hsieh

Neverthless, it is a kick-ass idea. Since I'm not into watching TV on my computer, I probably wouldn't be using it instead of my VCR, but it would come in handy often enough. What is preventing TV networks from rebroadcasting TV on the net right now? If you have to watch the commercials anyway, why not?

On an unrelated note, GeekPress has a story on how the Air Force had secret plans to nuke the moon.

-- Diana Hsieh

Neverthless, it is a kick-ass idea. Since I'm not into watching TV on my computer, I probably wouldn't be using it instead of my VCR, but it would come in handy often enough. What is preventing TV networks from rebroadcasting TV on the net right now? If you have to watch the commercials anyway, why not?

On an unrelated note, GeekPress has a story on how the Air Force had secret plans to nuke the moon.

-- Diana Hsieh

On an unrelated issue, anyone know what's up with the DOS attacks on /.? Are they over with? Wired has had a few stories on it that I've covered on geekpress. (There's been lots of news about Slashdot lately, including a profile of Malda and Bates.)

-- Diana Hsieh

On an unrelated issue, anyone know what's up with the DOS attacks on /.? Are they over with? Wired has had a few stories on it that I've covered on geekpress. (There's been lots of news about Slashdot lately, including a profile of Malda and Bates.)

-- Diana Hsieh

On an unrelated issue, anyone know what's up with the DOS attacks on /.? Are they over with? Wired has had a few stories on it that I've covered on geekpress. (There's been lots of news about Slashdot lately, including a profile of Malda and Bates.)

-- Diana Hsieh

There are, as Ayn Rand pointed out, some words that have two meanings illegitimately packed into one. People routinely, for example, equate ethic with altruism on a fairly regular basis, assuming that ethical behavior is necessesarily other-regarding.

"Hacker" may well be one of those terms, given the majority's use of it, but it's hard to fight a word that has been so entrenched. Perhaps the most that can be done is make people aware that hacker has other, more benevolent, meanings.

Recently on GeekPress:

Private eyes in the sky

When (not actually) in Rome

Switches Raise Prospects for Tiny Technology

Honey, the dot-com riches are all mine

Music can be brought to life by humming

Sleeping on the Job Earns Points and Kudos

-- Diana Hsieh

There are, as Ayn Rand pointed out, some words that have two meanings illegitimately packed into one. People routinely, for example, equate ethic with altruism on a fairly regular basis, assuming that ethical behavior is necessesarily other-regarding.

"Hacker" may well be one of those terms, given the majority's use of it, but it's hard to fight a word that has been so entrenched. Perhaps the most that can be done is make people aware that hacker has other, more benevolent, meanings.

Recently on GeekPress:

Private eyes in the sky

When (not actually) in Rome

Switches Raise Prospects for Tiny Technology

Honey, the dot-com riches are all mine

Music can be brought to life by humming

Sleeping on the Job Earns Points and Kudos

-- Diana Hsieh

There are, as Ayn Rand pointed out, some words that have two meanings illegitimately packed into one. People routinely, for example, equate ethic with altruism on a fairly regular basis, assuming that ethical behavior is necessesarily other-regarding.

"Hacker" may well be one of those terms, given the majority's use of it, but it's hard to fight a word that has been so entrenched. Perhaps the most that can be done is make people aware that hacker has other, more benevolent, meanings.

Recently on GeekPress:

Private eyes in the sky

When (not actually) in Rome

Switches Raise Prospects for Tiny Technology

Honey, the dot-com riches are all mine

Music can be brought to life by humming

Sleeping on the Job Earns Points and Kudos

-- Diana Hsieh

There are, as Ayn Rand pointed out, some words that have two meanings illegitimately packed into one. People routinely, for example, equate ethic with altruism on a fairly regular basis, assuming that ethical behavior is necessesarily other-regarding.

"Hacker" may well be one of those terms, given the majority's use of it, but it's hard to fight a word that has been so entrenched. Perhaps the most that can be done is make people aware that hacker has other, more benevolent, meanings.

Recently on GeekPress:

Private eyes in the sky

When (not actually) in Rome

Switches Raise Prospects for Tiny Technology

Honey, the dot-com riches are all mine

Music can be brought to life by humming

Sleeping on the Job Earns Points and Kudos

-- Diana Hsieh

There are, as Ayn Rand pointed out, some words that have two meanings illegitimately packed into one. People routinely, for example, equate ethic with altruism on a fairly regular basis, assuming that ethical behavior is necessesarily other-regarding.

"Hacker" may well be one of those terms, given the majority's use of it, but it's hard to fight a word that has been so entrenched. Perhaps the most that can be done is make people aware that hacker has other, more benevolent, meanings.

Recently on GeekPress:

Private eyes in the sky

When (not actually) in Rome

Switches Raise Prospects for Tiny Technology

Honey, the dot-com riches are all mine

Music can be brought to life by humming

Sleeping on the Job Earns Points and Kudos

-- Diana Hsieh

There are, as Ayn Rand pointed out, some words that have two meanings illegitimately packed into one. People routinely, for example, equate ethic with altruism on a fairly regular basis, assuming that ethical behavior is necessesarily other-regarding.

"Hacker" may well be one of those terms, given the majority's use of it, but it's hard to fight a word that has been so entrenched. Perhaps the most that can be done is make people aware that hacker has other, more benevolent, meanings.

Recently on GeekPress:

Private eyes in the sky

When (not actually) in Rome

Switches Raise Prospects for Tiny Technology

Honey, the dot-com riches are all mine

Music can be brought to life by humming

Sleeping on the Job Earns Points and Kudos

-- Diana Hsieh

There are, as Ayn Rand pointed out, some words that have two meanings illegitimately packed into one. People routinely, for example, equate ethic with altruism on a fairly regular basis, assuming that ethical behavior is necessesarily other-regarding.

"Hacker" may well be one of those terms, given the majority's use of it, but it's hard to fight a word that has been so entrenched. Perhaps the most that can be done is make people aware that hacker has other, more benevolent, meanings.

Recently on GeekPress:

Private eyes in the sky

When (not actually) in Rome

Switches Raise Prospects for Tiny Technology

Honey, the dot-com riches are all mine

Music can be brought to life by humming

Sleeping on the Job Earns Points and Kudos

-- Diana Hsieh

Recent GeekPress

Computers as Clothes

State Dept Missing Two More Laptops

I divorce thee, I divorce thee, I divorce thee

-- Diana Hsieh

Recent GeekPress

Computers as Clothes

State Dept Missing Two More Laptops

I divorce thee, I divorce thee, I divorce thee

-- Diana Hsieh

Recent GeekPress

Computers as Clothes

State Dept Missing Two More Laptops

I divorce thee, I divorce thee, I divorce thee

-- Diana Hsieh

Recent GeekPress

Computers as Clothes

State Dept Missing Two More Laptops

I divorce thee, I divorce thee, I divorce thee

-- Diana Hsieh

I do think that companies should have to tell employees that they are being monitored. There is no good reason that workers should have to give up all of their privacy -- perhaps without even knowing it -- because they step into an office.

Two related stories ran on GeekPress a few weeks ago:

Now your boss can read email you didn't send

KeyGhost Security Keyboard Records Keystrokes

-- Diana Hsieh

I do think that companies should have to tell employees that they are being monitored. There is no good reason that workers should have to give up all of their privacy -- perhaps without even knowing it -- because they step into an office.

Two related stories ran on GeekPress a few weeks ago:

Now your boss can read email you didn't send

KeyGhost Security Keyboard Records Keystrokes

-- Diana Hsieh

I do think that companies should have to tell employees that they are being monitored. There is no good reason that workers should have to give up all of their privacy -- perhaps without even knowing it -- because they step into an office.

Two related stories ran on GeekPress a few weeks ago:

Now your boss can read email you didn't send

KeyGhost Security Keyboard Records Keystrokes

-- Diana Hsieh