Slashdot Mirror
A Peek Into the Google
A number of people sent in the most recent story from the NYTimes (reg yada yada) from a reporter
who visited the Google-land. Interesting story, no real information though, but the ability to see what people are thinking about and interested in is pretty cool.
On request whether Google gets subpoenas for giving out personal information:
"Google does not comment on the details of legal matters involving Google," Mr. Brin responded.
This is most interesting, and one can only assume that since they're US based, at some point they will/can be forced to give out data for crossreferencing Gov't databases. Imagine [insert gov't agency here] gets hold of the IP-address of [insert (suspected unamerican/criminal/terrorist) person here] they can easily extract profiling information on the individual.
Scary
Bodø community site
Its amazing that most people of the world search for similar things, irrespective of language! Good they put filters.... otherwise a normal visitor would be shocked that most of the world wants naked ladies.
How about an E2 zeitgeist? Cream of the cool is close, but it would be interesting to see what people are searching for as well as what they are contributing. I sometimes even check E2 before Google, because at least there is some active quality control on E2 nodes, unlike the web at large.
It is amazing how many of the searches that are described in the article I have executed myself.
I guess that you can really find out what is going on in the world by looking at the logs of Google.
I'm curious how long it can take to write a meaningful query and how long it takes to execute.
How many query do they get per hour?
It looks like it's a pretty interesting job at any rate: tap into the conciousness of the global brain...
Director of Operations. He said they use Linux because it's cheap and because they get better support.
When asked how they can get better support for Linux, he answered, "We're Google, if we need to know something about the Linux we are running, we can usually find the guy who wrote the code and ask him."
Must be nice...
Metacrawler's Metaspy. Check out what people are searching for on Metacrawler. Choosing the "Metaspy Exposed" option allows you to see unfiltered queries; a surprising number of them are quite shady. ;)
I'm constantly amazed at the lengths people go to in the states to avoid offending people.
Wouldnt it be better to let people know the true extent of peoples e-desires rather than filtering them out for fear of suprising some prudes?
Jan.
I've often wondered if it were possible to get the live display to say something shocking, or possibly display an ASCII image, just by submitting a carefully timed stream of queries.
Hey, that GeoDisplay sounds pretty cool, why don't they put that on the web?
Skiing? Check out The Independant Skiers Portal
Another iteresting google search trick. Search for "http" and you will get a list of the top page-ranked sites on the internet.
It's an interesting unbasied "who's who" list with a few surprises.
-- Virtual Windows Project
Over at Webmaster World there's some great discussions ongoing about how search engines like Google work. There's even a tiny bit of inside information, thanks to the regular posts in their Google forum from forum member Google Guy.
ancarett, historian and zombie gamer
fireball.de, a German web search engine, has a live query (aptly named "voyeur-queries"). Most queries are in German, of course, but it doesn't take too much mastery of the language to grok what "+livecam +s*x +studentin", "bl**jobs" or "illuminati" is supposed to return. Hours of fun guaranteed, especially on a Friday night.
"There are already a million monkeys on a million typewriters, and Usenet is NOTHING like Shakespeare." - Blair Houghton
Curiously, a Google News search does not currently turn up the NYT article on Google, but does turn up this Slashdot thread on the NYT article on Google. I mention this because when you follow a Google news link to the NYT, you don't need to register (partner site).
Sigs are bad for your health.
I know of one case in Australia where someone tried that. Instead of reading out the question, he first read out keywords to be used on google. Oh and the phone was on speaker phone so it could be heard at the computer.
Didn't work though. They ran out of time before they could get an answer.
"Mr. Poindexter is pursuing a scheme he thought up right after 9/11 and then sold to the Bush administration. Total Information Awareness, or T.I.A., aims to use the vast networking powers of the computer to 'mine' huge amounts of information about people and thus help investigative agencies identify potential terrorists and anticipate terrorist activities. All the transactions of everyday life -- credit card purchases, travel and telephone records, even Internet traffic like e-mail -- would be grist for the electronic mill." -- New York Times editorial, 18 November 2002
"Google currently does not allow outsiders to gain access to raw data because of privacy concerns. Searches are logged by time of day, originating I.P. address (information that can be used to link searches to a specific computer), and the sites on which the user clicked. People tell things to search engines that they would never talk about publicly -- Viagra, pregnancy scares, fraud, face lifts. What is interesting in the aggregate can seem an invasion of privacy if narrowed to an individual.
"So, does Google ever get subpoenas for its information? 'Google does not comment on the details of legal matters involving Google,' Mr. Brin responded." -- New York Times, 28 November 2002
Question: What would be the fastest, most efficient, and most revealing approach to data mining the Internet?
Answer: Pay Google for a back-door feed on who's searching for what.
Question: Has Google ever, in their entire existence, issued any sort of statement suggesting that their sense of public responsibility would preclude being used in this way, or that the information they collect would never be sold for a price?
Answer: No.
Question: If Google decided to sell out, could they be held liable for privacy violations? Would we even find out about it?
Answer: No. The Homeland Security Act exempts companies from lawsuits or government prosecution after they turn over information to the new agency. Such information is exempt from the Freedom of Information Act. Officials who release this information can get up to six months in prison and a $5,000 fine.