My post assumed they were actually biasing the results themselves. For the case you describe, yeah, I have no problem with google doing that, mostly because it is very obvious what they are doing.
No, it's not the same. Especially not if they specifically advertise their service as being unbiased. And especially if they want to avoid antitrust scrutiny.
If you want to make analogies, it's as if the lawn mower store happens to be owned by the same company that owns the local news station, and they do a review of lawn mowers on the news. Then people would be right in complaining about bias / conflict of interest.
Whether or not Google has a right to do this legally, if they are claiming to be unbiased, it is quite reasonable for journalists to keep an eye on whether or not they are keeping their word.
Depending on how you ask the question, I'm sure you could get "the majority" to say pretty much whatever you want. There are many freedoms that can be restricted without due process, assuming you define "freedom" to include "ability to do whatever you please, legal or not".
I may not agree with this decision, but I think there is a reason we don't directly vote on every issue. We instead delegate that to people who have the time to understand the issues and then vote on them appropriately. Also our system accounts for the fact that while the majority may favor this or that, it also matters how MUCH each person cares about each issue....that is how they prioritize such things in electing a representative. Maybe the majority favors something, but the minority that doesn't, cares much more strongly about it.
Our system is flawed in many, many ways (corruption comes to mind), but the fact that something can win without majority support of the electorate is not one of them, in my opinion.
a) the monopoly is more efficient than any competitor, thereby providing better service to their customers.
Until the competitors are out of business, and they have no reason to compete. Anyway, "more efficient" doesn't necessarily mean "better service". It could be that they are just more efficient at making profits....which tends to be the case when a company has a monopoly.
The issue has little to do with how "necessary" or "important" the service is. Ok, so you can survive without facebook, as can I. So? What does that have to do with anything?
Regardless, the difference here is that, with the internet vs. "physical things", network effects are in full play. Just as Ma Bell had a network monopoly (who's going to sign up for Joe's Phone Company when they can't call anyone because everyone else is on the Bell System?), and Microsoft had/has a certain sort of monopoly (who's going to get an alternative operating system when most of the apps they want to run are Windows-only, and who's going to write an app for that alternative operating system when most of the users are on Windows?)
How is that true with steel or oil? It's a lot harder for someone to control all steel production. Possible, I suppose, but a lot harder. Eventually, everything tends toward monopoly if you don't have antitrust law being enforced, but with "network" sorts of things (which includes things like proprietary API's), the situation is a lot more pronounced.
So why aren't they greedy in Europe? I have a hard itme beleiving that human nature is different in Europe than the US.
More likely, it is a legislation issue. Corporations tend to do what is best for their bottom line (sometimes that may include appearing to be non-greedy, but I digress....). It's up to the lawmakers to keep them in line on stuff like this.
And I think that is how it should behave. If you agree with the people most of the time, they will be more likely to give you a listen when you have an opposing view.
But if you disagree with them on most things, why should they listen to you now? Karma systems like slashdot's do what we do in real life....learn from experience who is worth giving our attention to. There's good reason for it to work that way...given that our attention is a limited resource.
I disagree with the crowd all the time on slashdot, and yet my karma's pretty good. If you can express your point of view intelligently, it doesn't matter so much if you agree or disagree with "the masses". Slashdot's system is far from perfect, but if you compare it to other online forums, it's clear that a well designed karma system can mine the intelligence from crowds. The fact that wikipedia is pretty good, and that it is hard to out-guess prediction markets are other examples.
It is a simple analogy, and makes plenty of sense. It isn't a matter of being "fashionable", people have tried to understand biology by analogy to man-made machines for centuries, and it is very useful.
I often hear it referred to as "the nature/nurture debate," as if people are actually debating whether we are products of our genetics or our environment. There is no debate, we are products of both. I suppose there are lots of little debates about how much each affects some particular trait. But the implication here that there is a single, central debate that can somehow be "resolved" is absurd.
This may not be so mathematical, but it explains it in a way so that you can wrap your head around why it can work. (as well as why people might be inclined to think it wouldn't work, even though it does)
http://karmatics.com/dwfttw
I sure don't say that. (in fact I say the opposite in other posts above)
I do say that being non-selfish may have greater long term benefits than being selfish, however. Just because it has benefits to oneself I don't think something meets the definition of "selfish."
By my definition, selfishness is defined by how highly one prioritizes the goals of others, in determining one's own goals. The more you consider the impact of your actions on others, the less selfish it is. Or something like that.
I guess my problem in extending the word "selfish" to include things that are also "cooperative behavior" (that ultimately also benefit the individual, possibly in the long term) is that you then can easily find yourself labeling almost all behavior as selfish.
For instance, compare a child who won't share his cookies -- so he can have more cookies -- to one who shares -- so he can gain friends. The latter one may find greater benefits than the former, but still, the word selfish applies more to the first.
If you label each as "selfish", why have the word in the first place?
I would argue that the word "selfish" loses its meaning when it is applied to behavior that there is "nothing wrong with".
Yes, technically the behaviour may benefit oneself in the long term, but unless it is directly beneficial, and is non-cooperative behavior, I don't think the word "selfish" is really a good choice.
Wikipedia does it because the main thing of value they offer is the content itself, which can be crowdsourced (admittedly, they have to pay for bandwidth and servers as well). Most of Google's money is spent on writing the code, and providing the infrastructure to do fast searches. That's going to be a whole lot more expensive than what Wikipedia offers (beyond the content itself).
he idea that a large public company like google will do anything other then maximize profits is silly beyond belief;
That is like saying that it is inconceivable that a person, being a product of Darwin, would do anything other than what is necessary to survive and reproduce, that is, behave 100% selfishly.
Fact is, being selfish turns out, in many cases, to decrease chances of said reproduction. It may be indirect (i.e. people figure out they can't trust you, you lose friends, you don't find a spouse, you don't have anyone to help you out when bad things happen to you, etc)
Same thing happens with corporations. Behaving purely "selfishly" (i.e. do everything to maximize profits) can have the opposite effect. (i.e. you have to pay a lot higher saleries if you want to hire the best and brightest, you lose customers because they think you are evil, etc)
I'm not saying anything one way or the other about Google, I'm just saying I disagree with the simplistic notion that all corporations, large or small, will only act in ways to maximize profits....or your implication that "being a good citizen" can't be a viable strategy toward maximizing profits.
It's absurd to think that they would allow any web page to capture video or audio without having a rock solid way of making sure the user actually wants to do that. I mean, browsers have had a "file upload" widget since practically day one. But never did they allow javascript to browse your hard drive and upload files without you explicitly telling it to.
Same here. Even the most computer illiterate should be aware that having a browser able to do such a thing without the user's permission is crazy. Why is anyone, on Slashdot no less, even debating it?
Aside from the end user experience, as an Android developer (in the process of porting iphone apps) I can tell you that android sure makes it difficult to do the slick effects that on iPhone are practically free. For instance, the transitional animations that make the iPhone seem so slick are a nightmare to accomplish on Android. I hope they do a lot of work in this area.
Slashdot Mirror
My post assumed they were actually biasing the results themselves. For the case you describe, yeah, I have no problem with google doing that, mostly because it is very obvious what they are doing.
No, it's not the same. Especially not if they specifically advertise their service as being unbiased. And especially if they want to avoid antitrust scrutiny.
If you want to make analogies, it's as if the lawn mower store happens to be owned by the same company that owns the local news station, and they do a review of lawn mowers on the news. Then people would be right in complaining about bias / conflict of interest.
Whether or not Google has a right to do this legally, if they are claiming to be unbiased, it is quite reasonable for journalists to keep an eye on whether or not they are keeping their word.
Wait....what? The minority is the politicians? Our voices should be heard louder than the people who represent us?
I don't even know where to start with that. Seriously bizarre way of looking at representative democracy.
Anyway, if they did the opposite, they'd be accused of pandering to the voters.
Depending on how you ask the question, I'm sure you could get "the majority" to say pretty much whatever you want. There are many freedoms that can be restricted without due process, assuming you define "freedom" to include "ability to do whatever you please, legal or not".
I may not agree with this decision, but I think there is a reason we don't directly vote on every issue. We instead delegate that to people who have the time to understand the issues and then vote on them appropriately. Also our system accounts for the fact that while the majority may favor this or that, it also matters how MUCH each person cares about each issue....that is how they prioritize such things in electing a representative. Maybe the majority favors something, but the minority that doesn't, cares much more strongly about it.
Our system is flawed in many, many ways (corruption comes to mind), but the fact that something can win without majority support of the electorate is not one of them, in my opinion.
...on my cryonically preserved brain?
Until the competitors are out of business, and they have no reason to compete. Anyway, "more efficient" doesn't necessarily mean "better service". It could be that they are just more efficient at making profits....which tends to be the case when a company has a monopoly.
The issue has little to do with how "necessary" or "important" the service is. Ok, so you can survive without facebook, as can I. So? What does that have to do with anything?
Regardless, the difference here is that, with the internet vs. "physical things", network effects are in full play. Just as Ma Bell had a network monopoly (who's going to sign up for Joe's Phone Company when they can't call anyone because everyone else is on the Bell System?), and Microsoft had/has a certain sort of monopoly (who's going to get an alternative operating system when most of the apps they want to run are Windows-only, and who's going to write an app for that alternative operating system when most of the users are on Windows?)
How is that true with steel or oil? It's a lot harder for someone to control all steel production. Possible, I suppose, but a lot harder. Eventually, everything tends toward monopoly if you don't have antitrust law being enforced, but with "network" sorts of things (which includes things like proprietary API's), the situation is a lot more pronounced.
So why aren't they greedy in Europe? I have a hard itme beleiving that human nature is different in Europe than the US.
More likely, it is a legislation issue. Corporations tend to do what is best for their bottom line (sometimes that may include appearing to be non-greedy, but I digress....). It's up to the lawmakers to keep them in line on stuff like this.
Ummm....actually Google got popular by making things that were their idea of what people wanted.
Maybe you could apply for a job as VP of Marketing for Google, since you understand better than they need to do to compete....?
Or, just turn the feature off.
And I think that is how it should behave. If you agree with the people most of the time, they will be more likely to give you a listen when you have an opposing view.
But if you disagree with them on most things, why should they listen to you now? Karma systems like slashdot's do what we do in real life....learn from experience who is worth giving our attention to. There's good reason for it to work that way...given that our attention is a limited resource.
I disagree with the crowd all the time on slashdot, and yet my karma's pretty good. If you can express your point of view intelligently, it doesn't matter so much if you agree or disagree with "the masses". Slashdot's system is far from perfect, but if you compare it to other online forums, it's clear that a well designed karma system can mine the intelligence from crowds. The fact that wikipedia is pretty good, and that it is hard to out-guess prediction markets are other examples.
It is a simple analogy, and makes plenty of sense. It isn't a matter of being "fashionable", people have tried to understand biology by analogy to man-made machines for centuries, and it is very useful.
I often hear it referred to as "the nature/nurture debate," as if people are actually debating whether we are products of our genetics or our environment. There is no debate, we are products of both. I suppose there are lots of little debates about how much each affects some particular trait. But the implication here that there is a single, central debate that can somehow be "resolved" is absurd.
This may not be so mathematical, but it explains it in a way so that you can wrap your head around why it can work. (as well as why people might be inclined to think it wouldn't work, even though it does) http://karmatics.com/dwfttw
....to Microsoft, for moving in the right direction of adopting standards. I still hate you, Microsoft, but I hate you less.
Now figure out a way to get people to stop using IE6. (maybe an add-on to IE9 that makes it so you can run your ancient IE6 only apps?)
Compared to what? Got something better for us?
I sure don't say that. (in fact I say the opposite in other posts above)
I do say that being non-selfish may have greater long term benefits than being selfish, however. Just because it has benefits to oneself I don't think something meets the definition of "selfish."
By my definition, selfishness is defined by how highly one prioritizes the goals of others, in determining one's own goals. The more you consider the impact of your actions on others, the less selfish it is. Or something like that.
I guess my problem in extending the word "selfish" to include things that are also "cooperative behavior" (that ultimately also benefit the individual, possibly in the long term) is that you then can easily find yourself labeling almost all behavior as selfish.
For instance, compare a child who won't share his cookies -- so he can have more cookies -- to one who shares -- so he can gain friends. The latter one may find greater benefits than the former, but still, the word selfish applies more to the first.
If you label each as "selfish", why have the word in the first place?
I would argue that the word "selfish" loses its meaning when it is applied to behavior that there is "nothing wrong with".
Yes, technically the behaviour may benefit oneself in the long term, but unless it is directly beneficial, and is non-cooperative behavior, I don't think the word "selfish" is really a good choice.
Wikipedia does it because the main thing of value they offer is the content itself, which can be crowdsourced (admittedly, they have to pay for bandwidth and servers as well). Most of Google's money is spent on writing the code, and providing the infrastructure to do fast searches. That's going to be a whole lot more expensive than what Wikipedia offers (beyond the content itself).
That is like saying that it is inconceivable that a person, being a product of Darwin, would do anything other than what is necessary to survive and reproduce, that is, behave 100% selfishly.
Fact is, being selfish turns out, in many cases, to decrease chances of said reproduction. It may be indirect (i.e. people figure out they can't trust you, you lose friends, you don't find a spouse, you don't have anyone to help you out when bad things happen to you, etc)
Same thing happens with corporations. Behaving purely "selfishly" (i.e. do everything to maximize profits) can have the opposite effect. (i.e. you have to pay a lot higher saleries if you want to hire the best and brightest, you lose customers because they think you are evil, etc)
I'm not saying anything one way or the other about Google, I'm just saying I disagree with the simplistic notion that all corporations, large or small, will only act in ways to maximize profits....or your implication that "being a good citizen" can't be a viable strategy toward maximizing profits.
It's absurd to think that they would allow any web page to capture video or audio without having a rock solid way of making sure the user actually wants to do that. I mean, browsers have had a "file upload" widget since practically day one. But never did they allow javascript to browse your hard drive and upload files without you explicitly telling it to.
Same here. Even the most computer illiterate should be aware that having a browser able to do such a thing without the user's permission is crazy. Why is anyone, on Slashdot no less, even debating it?
Aside from the end user experience, as an Android developer (in the process of porting iphone apps) I can tell you that android sure makes it difficult to do the slick effects that on iPhone are practically free. For instance, the transitional animations that make the iPhone seem so slick are a nightmare to accomplish on Android. I hope they do a lot of work in this area.