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Googling For Dates?
JAK writes "The New York Times' down-to-earth ethicist Randy Cohen writes on the moral implications of searching for a date's past on Google. He suggests that the practice is ok (even admitting to doing it himself) but warns against jumping to conclusions based on a quick search or confusing someone for others with the same name. He also writes that "the verb ''to Google'' is now a familiar neologism" (neologism: a new word, usage, or expression, I looked it up).
You can read about it The Times (free reg blah blah)"
Yeah I googled long and hard last night, it was my first time.
This could threaten the whole concept of this "internet" fad forever! =)
so me and this girl are totally googling and she's all like if you google me first i'll totally google you. so i get all set to google and she backs out grabs her google and googles the fuck out of there. something about my website. i don't know. google her and the horse she googled in on.
anyway, i would consider this along the same lines as asking around about a person's past and whatnot... it's not necessarily considered bad ethics, but it can get yourself into trouble if you don't take it for what it's worth.
"I have no special gift, I am only passionately curious." - Albert Einstein
I am sure everytime I apply for a job, employers scan through Google searching for my name. After all, it was what this article was about.
But then again, whether for dating purposes, or otherwise, why would I put up a page saying something that I may regret later? I am aware that search engines will pick up these pages. I suppose I would be a bit worried if something was out there against me that I had no full control over.
*can see it now*
new slogan for google search engine: learn all about your hoe with google at home!
Is Googling OK?
So doing this.... in theory.... a girl I'm dating now, could find out about a hooker I killed.. say last week?....
You never know when something as innocuous as a screen name can reveal some interesting facts about people.
Sometimes the people you associate with may even have entire second lives or hidden secrets online. Background checking people is a smart and healthy thing to do, in my opinion.
// -- http://www.BRAD-X.com/ --
Of a more general principle. It's not per se a bad thing to check up on people who you plan to share intimate time/contact/etc with. Just be careful that you don't let your imagination run away with you, or believe everything you hear. I'm sure I've seen the concept played out in many a movie/television show/etc.
It's just a general principle of being wary, both of walking blindly into relationships and blindly following the words of others. Google simply provides a new path to doing background research on people.
you can take the road that takes you to the stars...
In case I ever date a women who has done porn, I'll probably know.
A date? what is this thing of which you speak?
and found out she had lived in all 50 states of the USA, with about 60 different addresses in each one. Barbara, I would have loved you but you googled out to be really bloody sketchy.
remember, no matter where you go, there you are
I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but if you're going to use the net to search for info on anyone, I'd suggest using other things than just Google. For example, I used free memberships to a couple of online dating sites to not only find out more about my date, but I had naked pic's of her before we even decided on where to go to dinner! Now that's using the net to find useful information!
Friends help you move. Real friends help you move bodies.
If you haven't read every single google link about your Significant Other, you're just not in love.
But what do I know. I'm just looking for anonymous gay sex.
Good thing I have a common first and last name, there's at three people in my urban area with the same name and one famous author, too.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
This can be a new way of screwing with some one. Just imagine faking their names and then posting or doing business with some questionable sights. This Google report would seem to hold as much weight as an Equifax report, probably as damaging too!
This SIG pulled due to lack of funding. (This damn war is costing too much!)
Its supposed to be yadda yadda you insensitive clod!
-- All true wisdom is found on T-shirts.
I always wondered about the utility of the internet in doing survaillance (sp?). The possibilities are endless. You can find stuff from googling or from reading bios or whatever. Howe cool would it be if you could crack a web-cam?
Don't become a regular here, you will become retarded. -- Yoda the Retard
Maybe so, but in P.R. China you probably can't google any one you know who is Taiwanese.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
salt lake tribune's copy of the article.
A lot of folks I know use Google to check out resumes and otherwise see what sort of projects a job candidate has been up to. People used to use DejaNews (back before it was "Google Groups") to do the same thing.
I'll not comment on whether I consider this ethical or not, but it makes a certain practical sense. But it makes a bit less sense for a date, however, given that the person's online persona may be under a different name, or may be partly or wholly an invention. Still, if I'm dating a (presumed) professional who is likely to have formal or informal writings that may be on the web, it would make sense to "check." I'd personally feel icky doing so, but others wouldn't have qualms...
But there's already too much about me on my own web site to keep them busy. This goes way back before google. And there are other nastier tools. For example, I once dated a woman and used alta vista to find links to her page. It uncovered a page inside he own site, now disconnected from it, but still on the server, about her past boyfriend.
You can find similar things in the wayback machine at archive.org about people, things they may have thought erased. Takes the mystery out of it. Good thing I haven't dated for 5 years.
Has it been over a year since you last donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation
...just last week. It probably saved my life. I mean, Liz was really pretty and seemed to be very sincere, but typing "Liz Borden" into Google really gave me a shock. You just never know some poeple.
This really does sound like one of those "In Soviet Russia" jokes: First stalk her, THEN date her.
Seriously, is it going to become necessary for women to get preemptive restraining orders against guys they haven't dated yet, to keep from being stalked on line "as a precautionary measure?" And on the gripping hand, how can we condemn the Feds for doing this kind of thing wholesale, when we aren't above doing it on a piecemeal basis, with no oversight or regulatory structure to govern our actions?
Just a thought or two...
What about when you apply for an apartment? When you apply for a job?
This may become a standard practice for any type of quick and cheap backround check.
Will employers, credit grantors, unit renters be required to keep copy of webpages that they viewed in their investigations?
Fight Spammers!
there's a child molester in a neighboring state with the same name as me.
... just not against the 'victims' of it. the internet can be a useful tool, and a horrible device.
there was a warrent out for his arrest, long story short, the cop didn't believe that i wasn't him. fun night.
anyway, if someone was to look me up on google, they would find a sexual predator? great. gotta love free information.
i'm all for megan's law
Runnin' On Empty
Why not trust the other person to tell you about themselves and their past? Seems to me this is a way to look for any faults you can find in someone. Sounds like a sure fire way to end a relationship to me.
You: "Honey, I was just on google. Says on there that you once did (insert stupid mistake or whatever).
SO:"Oh really? So, how long have you been checking up on me?"
You: "Oh, I just wanted to see..."
SO: "Well, how about you see the door as it hits your butt on the way out?"
Sent from your iPad.
I ask, once again, for a google icon. fourth story in less than a week.
-----
Score 3? For what? Being wrong, at length? - smirkleton
Sign of the impending apocalypse:
Slashdot editor looks up word in dictionary.
Film at 11.
Do you realize how much work it would be to add a new icon!? I mean, jeez, that's almost as hard as removing the radio section which hasn't had an update since June 29th... 2001!
He suggests the practice is ok?
Does that mean its like maybe sort of alright?
Also, I would recommend against it. Finding out things about your girlfriend that she din't want to tell you is liek opening up old wounds. Somethings are best left in the past. It also indicates a lack of trust in a relationship taht you feel you have to go behind the other persons back.
Then there is the age old porno problem: You will start thinking about your girlfriend differently after you see her amateur nude photos on the web. It's like discovering your girlfriend posed for playboy: the moment she finds out you know, your relationship will fall apart.
There's a growing sense that even if The Future comes,
most of us won't be able to afford it.
-- Lemmy
What would you think if you're date went on Google and started looking for information on you?
Female Prison Rape in NY
In the dim recesses of Internet memory, AltaVista was king. I was working for Amazon.com, and a mutual friend suggested that the woman who is now my wife give me a ring to talk about working for a dotcom.
We met, hit it off, started dating, and five years later (this last Labor Day), got married.
Some dates after we met, she told me that she looked me up on AltaVista after she'd met me, and found 40,000 matches. (I was moderating the Internet Marketing Discussion List, www.i-m.com, and my name appeared on every post in the archives, which themselves appeared to be at many different domains.)
She said, if I'd looked you up beforehand I never would have called you. She would have been intimidated.
Thank goodness for a little lack of knowledge.
Freelance tech journalist for the Economist, MIT Technology Review, Macworld, and others
If this practice takes off you can guarantee we'll be setting up a few impartial "third party" websites that bespeaks a plethora of praise in our own honor.
Each site'll have a whole bunch of meta tags, something like:
BENEVOLENT, NATHDOT, KIND, LIKES LONG WALKS ALONG BEACHES, NATHDOT, NATHDOT, NEVER KICKS CATS, NATHDOT, NATHDOT, NATHDOT, CHARITABLE TOWARD ALL MANKIND, NATHDOT, 9 1/2" PENIS, NATHDOT, GREAT COOK, etc. etc.
Simply by flooding the source of information she'll be hard pressed if she can ever find that juvie record for arson and wilfull destruction of property.
Think Different.
I wouldn't be so sure. So far, no one, and I mean NO ONE can seem to spell "goat sex" right. What is that, like 7 letters?
Keep your packets off my GNU/Girlfriend!
...and whom is this date you're sharing tiki drinks with?
Sorry, you must be new here.
lol
and I Googled you mom last night
What's a date?
Small towns are truly a place where everyone *wants* to know your business, and it is assumed that you will be forthcoming with details of any knowledge you have of activities of interest. I live in a small town (moved from a city) and refrain from such gossip.
Interestingly,(and somewhat obviously)the less that people know about you, the more interesting you seem. If someone really wants to know something about me, all they need to do is ask.
It seems that technology, designed to facilitate communication, is only training people to communicate in a more impersonal way. Little glowing screens and and text messages, video phones, and what-have-you will not replace the immersion of face to face contact for an intimate relationship.
Besides, all that Google stuff about me having sex with midgets and pumpkins was taken totally out of context.
As far as I'm concerned, assuming you are reasonably suspicious of the information, this is no different than asking around, as Mr. Cohen says. If all the government does is google for me, well, I still don't think the whole statism deal is a good idea, in a perfect world, but in this one I'm willing to live with that. On the other hand, intercepting my email is inappropriate for a government, and intercepting your date's email... Well, do I need to say it?
-- an esteemed member of the .test community
That's very interesting. The other day a less computer saavy buddy of mine came over looking for some techincal assistence, gleaming over the new PC he'd just purchased and hooked up to the internet. Since he's not very "connected", I decided to play around with his head a little, telling him that you could find out anything about a person through this magical search engine called "Google". To prove this to him I ran his name (not a common one) through it, not really expecting anything. Low and behold it came up in the form of a .txt file from a job he hadn't held in about a year. Along with his own name came his father's name and email address (who is a Labor Relations manager, a field that can get heated), his mother's name and where she went to high school, and countless other miscellaneous tidbits of information about him and his family.
What surprised me most, however, was the information that didn't surface. While all of this trivial information found it's way to my monitor, the information I would have expected to appear didn't. A few years ago, during a low point in his life, he'd manage to amass quite a criminal record: a few semi-violent crimes (bar fights constitute assult) and an attempted felony, he had even been associated with a large hate group. None of that surfaced in my googling.
I guess the moral of the story is googling your date isn't exactly the most acurate way of checking his or her background if you're into that type of thing. I'm glad this information didn't surface in his case, as he's put his past behind him and started a new life. I don't think "ex-neo nazi skinhead" sends potential dates the right message on a first date. He's told his current girlfriend, but only when the relationship was a point where he felt okay in doing so, and she accepted it.
Anyway, that's my two cents.
"In a Democracy, people get the kind of government they deserve." -Winston Churchill
Google won't find anything beyond the charade an individual has created on a home page...or makes up in a blog, for that matter.
...$17.95 per month (and up) will get you a lot more information than some skim-the-surface search engine. If you're really into finding out about someone, subscribe to one of several online investigation services...that's where the real dirt is.
Mr. Cohen's article sounds more like an advertisement for google, than a holiday tip for the lovelorn.
Am I the only person that uses Google and a wireless web device to fake knowledge during conversations? I pick out keywords as people talk and read about it while half listening and then reply as if I actually knew about the subject. Of course I kind of do know about the subject then but it never fails to impress people that you know about everything they are interested in. If you're good they won't even notice you looking stuff up.
:)
I can only imagine more of this as we get more into wearable computers or even wetware.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
This issue has been visited before. Checking out a potential partner via dna tests (movie and real life occurances), checking out a potential partner via private investigators, etc.
Since every search you ever perform on google can be revealed at a later date, what happens when your partner finds out you investigated them prior to making any kind of commitment? Not a problem? What about the cases that made news previously about private investigations of partners? There were even shows based on this.
And how do you expect to find me?
"I swear, it was a different Zeph Campbell!"
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
googling for "ken williams" produced the following:
k e01.shtm l
/ view/deve loperId,59/
o s2002/view/e _spkr/773
Ken Williams the major league baseball player
http://www.baseball-reference.com/w/willi
only problem is i never played baseball
Ken Williams the game developer (Sierra Online)
http://www.mobygames.com/developer/sheet
thats not me either
Ken Williams the perl consultant
http://conferences.oreillynet.com/cs/
not me either
there are also judges, mayors, police chiefs, government officials from US and England, an FBI agent, and numerous criminals convicted of everything from drug trafficking to armed robbery and even murder.
-- ken williams
"but warns against jumping to conclusions based on a quick search or confusing someone for others with the same name"
Even more specific to imagies.google.com if your dates name end in 'ie'. =)
Okay, mine's an opposite situation but with the same guilt:
This summer I went on a blind date with a girl. We had some common interests but we just weren't hitting it off. Later that week I did a google search on her and found out that she was a pretty well respected artist. I read up on the artists she worked with, the school she studied at, the galleries she'd been in, and found that we had some common ground in art and new tech. The next time we went out, we had a fantastic three hour conversation about art and technology. I never told her about my google search.
Is that cheating?
Care to share? *cough* I want to make sure it's not the same girl.
Er.
both on and *off* the web that I'm not about to start worrying about it now. More to the point, I 've said a good deal that a prospective date or employer will take offense at that *I don't regret at all.*
As my sweet, little old granny used to say, "Fuck 'em if they can't take a joke."
If things I've written are going to deny me a particular date/job as far as I'm concerned better finding out now than later. It saves us all a lot of unneeded pain and suffering in the long run.
I'm dead serious and I'm not about to go about my life worrying about what some future unnamed and unknowable personage is going to think about me because of something I believed or said once upon a time.
Like me or dislike me. I don't really care in particular. *Someone* likes me. I'll go hang out with them.
Hell, there are even people who like RMS. Go figure.
KFG
That what they say online is often archived and then a part of the public record. I've said this many times online that what you will say cana nd will come back to haunt you.
It doesn't necessarily mean that Big Brother is watching. What it means is that if you develop a reputation online - a flame thrower, lunatic, nutcase, All-Information-Wants-To-Be-Free-Die-Private-Softw are-makers-Die - it might just come out in the least oppurtune times. During a job interview or say if the general public becomes net savvy at last...
Remember that Usenet convo that you are embarassed to think about? Yeah, we do too. Soon your future SOs and employers will be looking too.
THINK before you open your mouth. It was good advice before the net came about and its even better now.
Do you know why the road less traveled by is littered with the bones of the unwary?
I routinely google people. Not just dates or potential dates; but nearly everyone I come across. People (especially in .ox.ac.uk) tend to have a variety of interests and expertise, and by googling someone I can find out about those much more quickly than by spending hours talking to them.
And it goes both ways: If I've met someone new and they want me to briefly describe myself, I'm quite likely to tell them to google me instead. I've done lots of stuff over the years, and I'm likely to forget to mention whatever any particular person is most interested in.
It has nothing to do with potential amorous interests; googling people just makes sense. (Assuming, of course, that you can identify which person you're looking for out of those sharing the same name; but in my experience that isn't too hard.)
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
I tried selling her half used bottle of skin cream on eBay the other week. If she did a google for it, then I might be in a world of hurt.
At least it wasn't yeast infection cream, huh?*
*No infection had ever occurred to my knowledge.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
You can use google to improve a relationship you're in. For instance, you can find other people of the same name and say ...
* This Jane Doe in Athens, GA is a black belt. Maybe you should work out now.
* This Jane Doe in Palo Alto has a PhD in Chemistry, maybe she doesn't burn all her food.
But anyway, I'm back to using it to check out hopeful dates.
----------
I am an expert in electricity. My father held the chair of applied electricity at the state prision.
Google works pretty well on me (not that anybody ever wants to "research" me), even finding some web pages from the mid-nineties that I'd rather forget :)
OTOH, the various "online investigation services" and even the full background check used for "pre-employment screening" only find one small aspect of a person, and mostly info you'd want to have before hiring or marrying somebody, but probably not the stuff you really need to know before the third date.
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
I am in google.. All Good :)
... is leading people to the conclusion that I have something to do with Customer Relationship Management. And I thought I was hard up.
It can be interesting to find out what others with your name are up to. Might even make for useful conversation starters on a date. "No I am not the Joe who's roses won first prize at the world florist's show last year."
-Rusty
You never know...
this parent AC has an excellent point about /. spelling, and google.com
I looked at the title "Googling For Dates?" and I thought Google started a dating service (dates.goolge.com) but after i read the thing, you have to have a date already :(
Free Instant Site Inclusion
Would the moderator who modded this as offtopic please stand in the road in front of a bus?
How the hell is talking about google, and ex's offtopic on this discussion?
First of all, how many available, attractive women actually go to the trouble of putting up their own sites or publishing their info? Unless they're in the news somehow, there aren't going to be that many references to the really desirable women because they don't need to use the internet to meet people. This is nothing new. Even if there were some questionable info on someone on the net, do you really care? Is it true or is it a satire or hoax like the onion? It's like reading a person's diary or setting up a surveillance camera inside their house. They present themselves to the world how they want to, and if you try to find out about someone online you're just asking for a skewed perspective. "Uh, honey, I found those hardcore pictures you did online 10 years ago, I wanted to let you know I still love you." Turns out it was her twin sister and she's offended that you actually *looked* for something bad about her. If you do find something online and allow that into your relationship with someone, you may find out how little you really know of yourself and each other. I mean sure, I'm as fond as the next guy of searching for news articles on women I'm interested in to see if they have any hobbies so I can ask them what they do in their spare time, but for example searching the local recorder's office to see if they own property to see if they live in a nice area is just out of line. Why don't you just ask, it will look better if they ever find out. This reminds me of that device in Japan that tells people whether there's a "match" in the immediate vicinity, like while walking on the sidewalk. Seriously, people.
Well I knew their had to be some pro side of having the last name of Smith.
Now I am sort of glad of having a full name that has all common names in it, I looked and couldn't find anything.
If what you are reading sounds funny, or sarcastic, lame, or stupid
it is because it is supposed to be. just laugh
I Googled for Ms. November last night, and we had a great date until I ran out of tissues.
/.ers need to worry about dates.
:)
Yeah, like
Or ethics.
Opinions on the Twiddler2 hand-held keyboard?
While I've never done this on a prospective date (well, does my ex count....after the fact?), I have done it on other people. One in particular I know who is a wanted fugitive....I found the little rodent's livejournal, even. It's been a struggle to decide whether or not to turn him in or not.
;-D
This kind of thing will become more commonplace.
I don't really have a problem with it.
BTW, if your date's name is "Clair Swire," do a search first and decide for yourself.
You're among nerds here. The space counts. :-)
Money for nothing, pix for free
He... ...warns against jumping to conclusions based on a quick search or confusing someone for others with the same name.
So basically do exactly the opposite of what they'd do on Three's Company. Got it.
People shape laws. Not the other way around.
try googlism.
usually more fun (but less accurate/informative).
----
i do not use drugs, i AM drugs -- Dali
Don't just consider web pages, but if you post news non-anonymously (or to /. non-anonymouly) it isn't just the carefully considered rant that is archived forever more, but every ill-considered flamage as well. Having posted to news from well before "dejanews", I was a bit surprised, and not entirely pleased that my posting history back to 1996 is available.
On the otherhand, I do choose to post non-anoymously. While that has some problems, it does mean that not only do I consider what I might regret later, anybody reading my posts can expect that I consider what I might regret later. That might add a smidgen of credibility (which of course can be squandered easily).
Prime numbers are exactly what Alan Greenspan says they are -S. Minsky
I remember when the OSI (that's office of special
investigations to you) gave me the thrid degree,
with full blown polygraph involving questions like
"Are you now, or have you ever worked for an
organization involved in gathering intelligence
against the United States?".
At one point during the week long interview the
agent in charge (bad cop) mentioned that I liked
to play darts, drink saki and lusted after
Japanese women. Sure enough, a little ego
surfing on altavista (this was well before google)
revealed I'd left some non-sense in a "guest book"
on some web page...
Unfortunatly for him, I also knew he had access to
my FBI records and wasn't particularly impress
with what he *wasn't* telling me. Of course, I
didn't tell him that...
still, it's amazing what sort of verbal garbage
I spewed on Usenet in the late 80's while in
college. Thank god I never graduated from that
particular institution...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Really--I fail to see how this is stalking or anything like it.
I haven't done it; I'm married.
However, I have looked up old girlfriends to see how they're doing. Is that stalking? It's worth noting that I do it to find out how other friends are doing as well.
How is looking up stuff about a date on the web that bad? It's not uncommon to seek out information in other ways: in the past, friends have looked through mutual friends' old high school yearbooks, or asked questions about them, what they were like, and so forth. How is looking on the web any different? It's publicly available information, after all. In many cases, it's probably on their own web pages--they intended others to see it.
As for mistaking someone with someone else, forget it. If I were dating someone, and they mistook me for a rapist, and inappropriately acted on that alone, I'm not sure I'd want to date them anyway. Would you want to date someone that bases their assumptions about you on a Google search? How about if there are 50+ others with your same name? Frankly, I'd think they were rather unintelligent.
And if I were once a rapist? Well, that's a different issue entirely. Putting aside any issues about the public knowing that I was once a rapist--I don't think they should--perhaps my date should know that information. And in any event, it wouldn't be any different from what anyone is legally entitled to know.
Searching for information on someone on Google is not an invasion of privacy, unless what's put on the web was put there without permission or legal authority.
is called Cindy. No prizes for guessing the signal-to-noise ratio for a search on her name...
(Of course, I hardly need to go anywhere near Google to get this sort of stuff - shortly after we started dating I started getting spam from "Cindy" who wanted me to sample the webcam she had recently installed in her college room... just slightly too close for comfort...)
I know what his secret is. He found a way to end SPAM. It involves Lasers, GPS, and Traceroute.
If you reply, do so only to what I explicitly wrote. If I didn't write it, don't assume or infer it.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I had an interview, so I called the company and asked for the name of the person who would be interviewing me.
I searched for information on him. I found out he was a marathon runner, I thought Hey I was on the track team in high school, I still run 5k a day (at the time) so I brought it up in the interview.
when he asked what I do in my spare time.
I thought it went over well, I didn't get the job, but I think that had more to do with my lack of qualifications than anything else.
--meh--
the impossibilty of seperating the 'victims' of Megan's law from its intended 'perps.'
I rather suspect that you weren't exactly treated in a real 'innocent until proven guilty' manner either. As you say, "fun night."
*All* laws that seek to 'preempt' crime create a class of innocent vitims. Some of them have their lives ruined beyond repair. Be greatful it was only your night that was 'fun.'
I'd go so far as to state that preemptive laws create many, many more innocent 'victims' of law than they save actual vitims of crime.
Have you read the so called "Patriot" Act? Hell, from now on it doesn't even necessarily *matter* if you're innocent or guilty.
KFG
Ok. Maybe not always
why don't we have a newer word for that?
Free as in mason.
Given the vast amount of information on the internet, it is not unlikely that while googling for a certain person, you will find someone else entirely. If you really know nothing at all about the person you're looking for (for example, if you're looking up a blind date or a job applicant), there is no way for you to know if you're reading about your person or someone else.
For example, I just did a google search for my own name, and could not find my website or, for that matter, anything else affiliated with me in the top 50 links. However, I did find a lawyer, a statistician, a food expert, a college professor, a witness testimony, a sex offender, and an author with the same name as myself. If my date is googling for me, is she supposed to think I'm the professor or the sex offender?
The chances of getting incorrect information makes googling seem far too risky in my opinion. Has anyone else had better luck finding accurate information?
"Flying is the art of throwing yourself at the ground and missing." - Douglas Adams
What's the big deal?
In the past, you used to ask friends who knew the girl about her, to get an idea of what she likes or what she's about. This is just a technological update of that idea, and I really think it's harmless.
If you were to search for me, you'd find out:
a) I've played Quake
b) I've posted on Slashdot
c) I'm a Tool fan
d) I've gone to UCLA
We're not talking about sniffing her panties and going through her mailbox, we're talking about searching the (public) Internet.
-Berj
Snopes
NBC30
See? =) ALWAYS check with Snopes first, hehe.
-Berj
I just know my old Geocities site is out there, waiting to bite me in the ass the moment I meet a great gal... "Oh my god, there's horrible pictures of you getting drunk with a goat in Russia!! I can't be seen with you, freak!" and yes, those pics do exist on the net....and for arguments sake, the goat followed us every day, just to drink beer. Yeah.....that's all....
Defender of Microsoft and Communism!!!
hide things about themselves or lie to impress them. They *like* guys to just 'be themselves.'
So if you're really desperately hot for a particular chick and can fake casual sincerity you've got it made.
They really *love* guys who can do that.
KFG
http://www.sltrib.com/2002/Dec/12142002/saturday/1 1099.asp
here's the same story... found via google news
Yes now google has become the de facto search engine since more and more people use it to find search results
Chris ,
Php Programmers.
or confusing someone for others with the same name.
Yes, very good advice.
For anyone wondering, I AM NOT a teen-aged Canadian actor... and if I get one more e-mail or IM from an 11 year-old kid who wants to tell me how great I am, I may just loose my mind.
And you people think spam is bad...
Doesn't "Google" use as a verb dilute its trademark value? (Something like that happened to Xerox).
I just refer girls I date to The Labyrinth (my writings) found at my web-site. They either come away thinking I'm one fucked up individual or find me interesting.
I'm religious but I'm not afraid to poke fun of my religion. Any like minded girl that can read "Justification for It's Existance" and not get offended at the line "Jesus tells the funniest stories when he's drunk" or "Dinner Party" and laugh at "Resurrected Jesus cookies" is a girl I want to get to know.
Researching someone on Google is lame. These days everyone and their dog and its chew toy has a web-site. If they don't have a personal site then stick to the old fashion "conversation."
Finding random spats of information someone wrote is an excellent way to get the wrong idea about them. Who knows when it was written, what they've gone through since then, ect. If someone wants others to know about them on-line, they'll put up a homepage and point you to it if you ever meet them.
I'd rather get to know someone before digging through their history and judging them without giving them a chance to explain. People change. They make mistakes. They move on.
Ben
Work Safe Porn
As long as the person never finds out about it, you are A-OK. It's not illegal to do research; it's what you do with that research that makes or breaks you.
Most anti-stalking statues have a clause or two about putting the "stalkee" in fear, emotional distress, or causing intimidation. You typically also have to show a pattern of such behavior... a single incident does not a stalker make.
Think about all the drooling britney spears fanboys out there (like 95% of slashdotters... cmon, it's cool to hate her music, but ALL of you geeks secretly want her body... admit it). They are not guilty of stalking simply because they plaster their room with pictures, and constantly google the 'net for new britney sites.
Stalking implies much more than just a google search.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
er... wait...
Free Java games for your phone: Tontie, Sokoban
Slashdot's use of the phrase "free reg blah blah" could be a neologism.
;-)
Just how many stories hosted by The New York Times must we see here before Hemos puts in a link to the NYT Random Login Generator
Yes, I googled for it. Yes, I've googled for information about girls. Yes, there are too many of Chris Simmons's online.
user@host$ diff
If only I had dates to look up their questionable past on Google...
-If
Run a pencil-and-paper RPG campaign with your far-off friends: Gametable!
My girlfriend discovered a murder committed by a family member against another by searching Google. Not a joke. Not something I want everyone to know about, so a fine example of how you might find something you don't really want to know, nor should you know, when you start nosing around. It didn't strain our relationship but it very well could have. I don't recommend nosing around until you're planning to get married.
True story: I was thinking of asking this one girl out. Honor student, totally anal, the whole works. So I googled her, as any good hacker would. What came up?
The local police blotter!
Thank you, Google! I still know where my wallet is because of you!
My due diligence before a round of interviews included a Google search on the hiring manager's name. I was looking for conversation ideas, but when I told him how I learned that he played the drums, I think I stepped over a line. Or maybe I didn't get the job for some more substantial reason?
Excuse me, I'm french. What does "looking up" mean ? Is that a neologism for "googling" ?
seems to be a benmark to measure the penetration of a technology or event or even a person :
Even good ole slashdot has made it. After all , most sites linked from slashdot get slashdotted. We have the southpark syndrome for all the extra-abusive nerds, we have the bill clinton neo for all in-office perverts.. the list is long.... there must be a list out there... gotta find it. Oops.. i mean gotta google it.
I'll put up the link so that we can slashdot that site.
|/________
|\A|ALYS|
This is interesting and all, but I fail to see why the slashdot crowd needs to know this.
I mean, it's not like we're going to spend our time googleing our girlfriends. We already know everything about them. After all, we made them up.
Google search: Britney Spears Chance in Hell
Results: None.
WTF?
With such a common name I have no idea how people think they can find out anything about a person on-line unless they've specifically made it available.
I can envision a time where we can openly
document our dating histories (possibly
without full names of past SO's, unless
authorised by each one, in turn), and -
like Philip Greenspun seems to do -
invite (by their publication) - anyone
to have a read, eg before coming any closer.
In Sweden, the Tax Office still (AFAIK)
allows one open access to anyone else's
most current year's tax record, including
net income for state & local tax purposes.
That's one of the parameters that some
check before deciding how close to come,
or so goes one urban myth...
Telling more personal details, eg publish-
ing our diaries, histories of loves past,
present & [perferences about] future, as
if written (in part) for use as profiles
for online dating services...
Of course buyer beware still applies!
As if I need one more thing keeping me from getting a date, now she's gonna look up info on me over the Internet?
I'm never going to get laid at this rate.
Pick two. This old principle applies to information as well as it applies to other goods and services. Sure Google is fast and it's free, but the quality of the information you get is low. You don't necessarily know if the information you're getting is really about the person or if it's someone else with the same name. The information generally lacks context. Was it posted in jest, but you just don't happen to be in on the joke? Is the language ambiguous such that it could be misinterpreted as something else (an unintended double entendre)? The true authorship of the information is unknown so you don't really know if it comes from someone with an axe to grind.
e -Found-Bad-Things-On-Google-Associated-With-His-Na me really did/said those things before I turned him down for a job because of it.
Sure, it sounds like it might be a useful technique for someone who is an intelligent, discriminating reader and doesn't take anything at face value, but rather carefully evaluates sources for quality, context, and bias. But, frankly, that sounds like an awful lot of work and, let's face it, most people do have a tendency to take things at face value without scrutinizing the accuracy and bias of the source. Observed behavior is far more valuable information than what Google can offer regarding what a person is really like. What's their body language saying? What are their friends like? How do they treat friends, strangers, and family? What is their family of origin like? If you need help recognizing behavioral cues, pick up a good psychology/sociology/self-help book written by a credible expert.
As for employers making hiring decisions based on info from a Google search, that sounds like a lawsuit just waiting to happen. I'd want to be certain that Mr. Otherwise-Exceptionally-Qualified-Applicant-But-W
- If your date has a Web site of her own, well, first off, you're dating the kind of girl who'll love a /.er tenderly, and secondly, there's no need for awkward phone-number and e-mail cullings when you have WHOIS.
But she propably had more IRC/Chat/ICQ/etc. friends, than you have.. well.. anything. Atleast this goes for most of girls that I know. You'd be amazed to see how fast they can get like 1000 names in MSN.
alt.paranoid.dates.search.search.search
By reading this comment, you immediately waive any and all rights regarding it.
Came up empty for my name. Phew. "Richard Stallman axe murderer" on the other hand gives 56 results. Careful, girls
I entered my own name into Google to see what it'd turn up. Well, it seems like there is a Hollywood actor with the same name as me. I hope he doesn't get particularly famous - I have a domain in my own name and I can just see the domain-dispute-lawsuit heading my way if he does :-/
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
Am I the only one that finds it fiercely ironic that Google is providing regstrationless entry into a registration-only New York Times article talking about the ethics of using Google? :)
She called me and told me that she had searched for my name in Google. Just for fun. Well, most of the first sites it provided was somehow related to me. Usenet-posts I had made, that sort of stuff. Nothing shady though. She did say that she instantly recognised my style (we have been together for a long time now).
Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
since every time I hit the link, it ends up dead.
I don't want to register to the NYT, period.
nosig today
"I feel lucky"
This sig is made from 100% recycled bytes. No keys were typed in the creation process.
About 30 Minutes after the police issued an arrest warrant for John Allen Williams in connection with the DC area sniper murders, I looked him up on Google. In only a matter of minutes this page had already been set up.
Going from your post subject I was expecting "Free, as in women". Ah well.
Not to be confused with neo-Legoism, a recent religious architectural fetish centered around building vast, plastic, ad hoc cathedrals out of tiny bits of plastic...
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
Every morning I wake up tired, and end up googling for myself to make sure my other name isn't Tyler Durden.
... i found a weasel chomping on my privates.
---
sig a rat
the computer is online
i am not at it
what a waste of ressources
well, you can still elgoog 'em...
the computer is online
i am not at it
what a waste of ressources
1) Enter preference (e.g. "hair:Blonde sex:Female age:25 breasts:big")
2) Click "I'm Feeling Lucky"
Yeah, Randy Cohen is probably right. This is not a good idea.
why would I put up a page saying something that I may regret later?
It's better to regret something you did, than to regret something you didnt do.
I regret what you say already:)
I read the blurb on the main page and couldn't, for the life of me, figure out what the hell the topic was. Why would searching for dates be an ethical problem? I try to find things in past on Google all the time....
Oh. Dates. As in girls. Not Julian calendar dates.
Slap forehead.
Now that's why I always post as an anonymous coward!
- The Ottoman Turks, led by Memed II, capture Constantinople: the end of the Byzantine Empire, 29 May
- Talbot defeated and slain at Castillon, Gascony, in final battle of The Hundred Years War, 17 July
- King Henry VI suffers mental collapse at royal manor of Clarendon, 1 August
- Queen Margaret gives birth to Edward, crown prince, 13 October
- Bordeaux, last English possession in Guyenne, surrenders to the French , 19 October
- Somerset arrested and confined to The Tower, 23 November
Without Google, I'd only have known about the fall of Constantinople and the end of the Hundred Years' War! Thanks Google!If she doesn't have a web presence, then the date's off. She obviously has no geeky attributes and is perhaps even computer illiterate.
:)
I could just ask her about computers, but doing so would defy my own geeky introversion and shyness.
Yes siree. Google has now branched out again. In addition to Froogle.google, they now have Oogle.google for all your dating needs.
Anyone care to chime in on this? Sometimes, when I'm feeling meloncholy for my youth, I type in an old girlfriend's name just to see where they might be.
Is this OK, or am I some sort of stalker freak?
I've used Google a couple times simply to verify that someone I've met on-line has some sort of personal history(irregardless of what it may be) outside of meeting me. I've met too many "women" who turned out to be shills for a porn site. If her e-mail address picks up a couple things here and there, then odds are she's a real person with a life.
She could still be some psycho out to headfuck me(which I've also run into), but at least I won't be getting e-mails like "Check out my picture at http://www.goatse.cx/mandy.html if you're still interested in me!"
My ex also googled me when we first got together and spent an entire day reading stuff about me, looking up posts on usenet, etc. Thankfully, she didn't run screaming in the other direction.
As a lifelong Daniel Martin, I know how it is.
So what you're saying is that you're not my roommate from junior year?
I extensively googled the 20 women I dated seriously from college until I was married, and I managed to find information about exactly two of them, a PR page for the law firm that one of them works for now and a footnote in a white paper that another contributed to. The others turned up exactly zero hits. All the people I dated were college educated, and a few were involved in science/technology.
One might connect it to women changing their name when they marry -- if Jane Johnson becomes Jane Anderson, how will you ever find her unless she's some ubergeek who continues to go by her original name or alias(es)?
I've done this with other people I've known but not seen for a while, including people that were heavily involved in computers pre-internet and I can't seem to track them down either. I'd mostly assume though that the people you can turn up are primarily active, current users of public forums or have had a lot of public news exposure and have easily identifiable names or aliases.
Based upon my highly unrandom sampling, I'd say that's very, very few people outside of today's current internet "insiders."
I'm sure I'm not the only one, but what about posting stuff on the net in order to get information about yourself out there. I'm talking about posting some good stuff so if you get googled you'll be good to go. I've googled myself many times and can't find a thing. Does anyone know of a way to post to a site so that google will be able to find my name and information that I put in about myself? Has anyone done anything like this? ....I gotta admit. I want one of my exgirlfriends to find me.
This is really old news; The Wall Street Journal ran a similar article in 1996, only then 1) it was AltaVista, and 2) it was actually news.
...-.-
"The Member ID fuckyou is not available. We suggest fuckyou146 instead. To accept it, click to register at the bottom of the page, or enter a new ID and click to register."
:)
It seems that the email addresses nospam@nytimes.com,
nospam2@nytimes.com and nospam666@nytimes.com were all taken too.
Something like nospam1389423958798175@nytimes.com should work
I'm a German film producer, a lawyer, and a former US Army Special Forces member who is now an anti-terrorism instructor!
I kick ass according to Google.
A "Googling" of "Edmund White Evanston" yields mixed results.
Edmund White, not to be confused with me; Edmund William White, is originally from Evanston, Illinois.
He's an older white man. I'm the opposite.
He's known for works like, Once a Sodomite, Twice a Philosopher and other queer-studies materials. I'm a house DJ.
These are fairly strong differences, but I've had more than a few employers confuse me with him. In one case, I walked into an empty interview room to find this on the interviewer's monitor. He was quite shocked to see that I wasn't what/who he was expecting. I've had other potential employers respond with, "You're too old" or "How's your writing career," etc. It's a good ice-breaker, though.
Edmund White
http://flickr.com/ewwhite
A similar story was out on NPR 8 months ago.
I d=1140957
http://discover.npr.org/features/feature.jhtml?wf
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
I had a girlfriend who was really into Googling the minutae of my life; she participated in the livejournals of ex-girlfriends whom she had tracked down with only a first name, roommates, etc.
So we placed an adWord based on my name with links to some sports photography done by my roommate at a big fencing tournament, with "Hot Fencer PiXXX! See Darius in steamy qualifier action! http://www.foilporn.com"
It took her all of 3 days to find it, and even better, the entire fencing team was in a van on the way back from a tournament.
"You clicked on a link that said WHAT?!?"
darius
darius
We pause here to note that Google's ranking algorithm is popularity based. You're looking for the girl that has been "linked" the most. Jesus, dude, why not just read the bathroom walls?
</aghast>
Although potential employers might use Google to check you out, it's even easier for potential employees to check out the employer. Layoffs, turnover, negotiating tactics, benefits, employee unrest, managers to be avoided, all of this is fair game.
Considering the "perpetual retention" of Google Groups, a Usenet opinon carries a lot of weight for a long time. Although I would never make employment-related decisions based entirely on unsubstantiated/third-party/quasi-anonymous opinions, I would certainly know what questions to ask, and where to probe for additional detail.
I think the greatest pain from Googling will be employers who have obnoxious, hard-to-defend HR tactics. Before accepting my current position, I searched for the employer's name, looking for protest pages or other signs of employee unhappiness. Had I found anything, I would have asked many questions before accepting the job.
Answer: none.
Why does anyone listen to anyone like this? There's no reason to believe that they have any more insight about a topic than I do, except for the self-applied title of "ethicist."
One thing I've done is to stop using my full name, anywhere. When I sign as "Travis" or "Travis P", it is very hard to find everything I've done on the net, since there are a lot of people named Travis.
:)
of course, search for Kallahar and I'm screwed
Travis
While googling about you, I found this:
"It could be. But if they trust you as well, they may easily let you take her out. Case in point, Charles Dodgeson. He used to take girls out for the afternoon. Though, he even got an eleven-year-old, Isa Bowman, to stay with him when he went to the sea-side. He was completey trusted with her. Though different parents trusted him to different extents."
So you are dating 11 years old girls. You are a sick man! I don't know how you are going to get away with that.
And remember that "X-No-archive:yes" doesn't do you any good if the next guy quotes back everything you said when he replies!!
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
While googling about you, I found this:
"It could be. But if they trust you as well, they may easily let you take her out. Case in point, Charles Dodgeson. He used to take girls out for the afternoon. Though, he even got an eleven-year-old, Isa Bowman, to stay with him when he went to the sea-side. He was completey trusted with her. Though different parents trusted him to different extents."
So you are dating 11 years old girls. You are a sick man!
An AC writes where no one will see it, "It's better to regret something you did, than to regret something you didnt do."
:)
Quite true. And I'd rather google someone and discover I *might* be dating an axe murderer, than not google 'em and become a statistic
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Click here or here.
There was an old DOS program called something like "FBI". You'd punch in your buddy's name and a code number, and it would go thru all the motions of dialing the FBI's system (complete with modem noises) and produced an official-looking report on your hapless buddy -- complete with juvie records, sexual preferences, etc, etc.
:)
Only the trick was, it was preconfigured (and user-configurable) with all sorts of juicy info, and what it produced in the report depended on the code you used. Loads of fun with security newbies.
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
Speaking of things you didn't ever expect to see on Google, I Googled for an ex-girlfriend one time, and I ran across her friggin obituary.
What a haunting experience that was.
Willow: "Have you googled her yet?"
Xander: "Willow, she's seventeen!"
Buffy The Vampire Slayer, "Help"
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I understand "to Google", but what is this "date" thing of which you speak?
the major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur - A.N. White
I did this on myself a few weeks ago and discovered I had just recently retired from being the CEO of a power company in Ohio, I also had recently gotten married in Redding, CA. Gee the life I live...
I looked at their wedding photos, pictures from camping trips with friends, pix of their kids and relatives, and their business website. What's even more interesting is that they didn't hesitate to put even the most personal details of their lives online. I mean their home address (old and new), home phone number (!), when and where their kids were born, resumes, personal facts...I know more about these people than I knew about the last neighbors in four years of living next door! And they've only just learned our last name.
I rather suspect that these folks might read Slashdot. If so, I'm sure they know now who I am! So...hi, folks; let's get together for a BBQ this summer sometime!
He must not wield much power within the paper - otherwise we wouldn't have the NYT as the voice of the Fifth Column in America.
Since when has anyone actually heard anyone else use it in this manner, or used it themselves?
I use it as a replacement for "searching", and I hear countless other do the same..."go google for foo". Yes, I guess it could be applied to a person, but I seriously doubt it's used soley as that - unless you are some executive type who doesn't even know where "all your base are belong to us" comes from...so many of these assholes still think yahoo and microsoft are the only way to search. Yes, the same assholes who repeat, "talk to the hand", "don't go there, girlfriend", "show me the money!" and other stupid memes.
Is the dipstick who wrote this immersed in internet culture at all, or is he just another "pundit" who only uses AOL and for IM and email, at that? I wonder if he's heard of mailing lists and Usenet, or is it all about "chat rooms" for him?
I bet his next editorial will be: "The latest neologism: 'blogging' - is it okay to read others' online diaries????"
What a tool this guy is. More apropos to privacy issues would be companies' being able to do a financial background check on employees - why can't *I*, as an employee, do the same for the people running the company I work for? After all, we are entering into a sort of contract that would ordinarily require due diligence, but this is not an option for employees. Or honesty and full disclosure in accounting at companies - why can't *I* know the company is bleeding money, and there will likely be layoffs? These are much more pressing issues in the realm of ethics, not some fucking puff piece on dating.
In the dim recesses of Internet memory, AltaVista was king.
You remember that? Wow, you are old!
;)
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I always google someone as soon as I can after (or even before) the first date.
The main reason is safety. There are a lot of wackos out there. (The majority of people AREN'T wackos, but it can be dangerous if you end up with one who is.) If it's possible to find out if a guy is an ax murderer *before* I take him home to bed, it would be negligent to myself not to.
If I googled a man and found that he had, say, a website full of paranoid tracts about the alien government conspiracy, or a site titled "secret upskirt photos of my dates", then I would know he's not the guy for me. I want to know whether he shows up in newspaper articles or on the FBI's most wanted list.
Of course, you can find out good things, too. Maybe he's got clever posts on Slashdot or a blog full of interesting essays. I may find things online that make me more attracted to him.
I always google the guy. If the relationship looks like it might be going somewhere (say 3 or more dates), I'll tell him that I did. No one yet has been mad at me when I told him this.
I met my current boyfriend (five months, yay!) online. He was kind of taken aback when I wouldn't give him personal information for a while -- I was using an email address that is not linked to my name. Later, when we talked about googling, and he knew me better, he understood why -- a quick google search could reveal my workplace and organizations I'm associated with, and someone with a little more web knowledge could easily find my home address. That's information I want to hold back until I'm relatively convinced the guy isn't going to show up at my house at 2am in a psychotic state.
If it's online, it's public record -- it's not unethical to access it (although I did feel obligated to ask permission first before reading a guy's online "diary"). It's easy to get this information, so why not read it?
-- Female Anonymous Coward
Thanks CowboyNeal, your the best as for Mr. ZUMA IDRISA I'll be looking for you next time I'm in Nigeria, so watch out - JAK
I made the mistake of doing a Google search for an ex-girlfriend that I never really got over. It was bad enough that half an hour later I found myself missing her so badly that I almost sent her e-mail (which would've been a mistake of bibilical proportions). What's worse is that it looks like she still has an interesting life and cool friends. Inconceivable! I still think my life is more interesting than hers, but now I can no longer fool myself into believing that she lays in bed at night thinking about what could have been.
;)
The nerve of her!
-Cybrex
(Wondering if she reads Slashdot...)
Boundless Expansion, Self-Transformation, Dynamic Optimism, Intelligent Technology, Spontaneous Order- BEST DO IT SO!
but why do people think that information posted to the public Internet is anything but public? If you have some dorky site from high school (I held back the strong opportunity for an example), how is it wrong for me to find it? Has the access of a URL now become a matter of invitation?
Also, if a person is careless enough to have something truly bad about them in a public forum, what does that say about what lies beneath the surface?
Googling does require some level of salt when being however, and should give the person the benefit of the doubt when questionable material is found. This isn't me.
Preferences...No Icons...Save.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Well, I certainly can't argue with your experiences. And googling for my significant other turns up quite a few different people. Often it's fairly obvious when that happens; the places and the roles vary widely.
...
I don't seem to share my google footprint with any other *people* - I just have an unfortunate name to start with. Well, it's not normally an issue, except around very juvenile individuals. And around Google. A (hypothetical; I haven't tried this example) Google for "John Hand" will return you references to "John's hand". My last name is 'Butt'. I get what looks like porn, but may just be something from a TV soap episode. My father shares his first name with at least one US president and some film stars; his google footprint is *far* more polluted.
I look forward to marrying; for many reasons, of course, but adopting my beloved's common and innocuous name is one of the minor benefits.
Incidentally, googling for screen names is often little or no better. I was surprised to find I share my screen name with an odd little organisation that appears to be chinese. And then there are all the screen names taken from books and games and so on
Rachel
Systems have sub-systems and sub-systems have sub-systems and so on ad
infinitum -- which is why we're always starting over.
-- Epigrams in Programming, ACM SIGPLAN Sept. 1982
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