Slashdot Mirror
Google Bombs Are Our New Normal (wired.com)
mirandakatz writes: Tech companies' worst crises used to come in the form of pranks like Google bombs: Users figured out how to game search results, such as when a search for "miserable failure" turned up links to information about then-president George W. Bush. Today, in the era of fake news and Russian interference, that's basically our new normal -- but as Karen Wickre, a former communications lead at companies like Google and Twitter, points out, tech companies' approaches to dealing with the new breed of crises haven't evolved much since the age of Google bombs. Wickre suggests a new, collaborative approach that she dubs the "Federation," writing that "No single company, no matter how massive and wealthy, can hire its way out of a steady gusher of bad information or false and manipulative ads...The era of the edge case -- the exception, the outlier—is over. Welcome to our time, where trouble is forever brewing."
Hard to believe this was back in 2004, but it worked!
Trolling is a art,
Google's smartest people aren't concerned with search results, they're priority is figuring out how to shovel relevant ads at you.
Trolling is a art,
From the article:
No, no we don't. We don't just trust everything we read, and for good reason. Typically, the more you know about the subject of a news story, the more you realize how inaccurate it is. That also applies to the news stories you don't know a lot about, you just may not be the one who has the right background on it. I like hearing from the people who do.
No, we're not pining for the "good old days" when you only had to get the NY Times to preview a story for the three major TV network news teams and it became magically enshrined as the "truth" because no one ever got to see any other opinions.
The answer to bad speech is more speech to compete with it, not censoring speech in order to "control the narrative". Deciding to federate all the Internet media companies into a shared censorship regime because a few spammers purchased a rounding error's worth of advertising in order to promote their click farms is completely out of proportion. It's almost like someone was waiting for an excuse to propose the solution they've been wishing for, a return to the days when not anyone could just speak, when you had to get past the "gatekeepers" in order to communicate to the masses.
The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
Exactly...
When the business of News is obviously in the tank for profits from advertisement, what do you expect from the likes of Google and Facebook? Unbiased commentary and search results? Please.... It's all about profits and getting paid to push advertisements onto your browser, you phone, your tablet, you big screen TV where you have to see them.
The internet is starting to look and sound like a bazar where *everybody* from the kookiest on up get's paid the same way, ad clicks. The crazier you can be, the most interesting spectacle you can produce is what matters, not facts or truth. If you have enough money, you can also just buy viewership from the providers of spectacle but in the end, what you see is about money.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
The answer to noise isn't more noise. If someone is popping off their motorcycle, that doesn't mean someone else has to buy a jet engine to drown out that sound. We are already dealing with a deluge of bullshit every day, with crap coming from all directions, and major social media sites actually paid to disseminate propaganda. Had FB existed in the 1980s US, the Feds would have dismantled and shut down the entire company for acts of sedition and overt treason, be it giving aid and comfort to the enemy, or disseminating enemy propaganda.
What is really needed is a peer to peer signing and moderation system with trust delegations. That way, if I trust Alice on her opinions of news sources and articles, and if she downmods one place, then her negative weight will affect what I see. Similar if Bob rates another place very positively, that positive weight gets passed on. If I find Alice or Bob trolling, then I distrust them, and perhaps add more weight to what Charlie likes or not. This applies to multiple axes. For example, I would trust the Onion for humor, but I might not trust them for news honesty. While, some sources, I might just not trust whatsoever because they are propaganda depots, pure and simple, be it the ones funded by Soros and Bloomberg, or the ones by the Koch Brothers.
You're just jealous because they took your job because they could do it faster and cheaper than you could.
That's exactly what a Russian dezinformatsiya agent would say.
https://beta.theglobeandmail.c...
You are welcome on my lawn.
Look, you people are seeing TEH ROOSHINS in every post, on every thread. If you think Slashdot has any reach anymore, you're sadly mistaken. Most stories barely get double digit comments these days. The whole "blame the foreigners" thing is such an obvious dodge to avoid accepting that Trump voters might have had a point. We all know Podesta came up with this dolchstoss-legende within 24 hours of Hillary's loss, right? You people are seeing TEH ROOSHINS under your bed, and it's honestly kind of sad seeing such great minds succumb to paranoia.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Trumptard spotted. It’s okay. Just because the guy you voted for is Putin’s cuck doesn’t mean you need to lash out.
Regular retard spotted.
Dark Reflection
That's exactly what a Russian dezinformatsiya agent would say.
It's not at all clear to me why this non-falsifiable, modern-day equivalent of McCarthyism would get modded up so enthusiastically. Probably that thing about people not learning from history being doomed to repeat it.
Even when its true and well documented?
I know, right?!! They even used Pokemon Go! to influence the election! Those dastardly Russians!
How dare Train0987 call it nonsense!!
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
...that the OP mentioned "fake news" and "Russian Interference" in the same sentence inveighing against bad information spread widely.
-Styopa