"I think what you're seeing is an odd little linguistic artifact, [...]"
Yes, actually if you read the article, which is rather interesting, it's not really about a potential bias in Google News, it's about how Google and Yahoo News works: Google relies entirely on algorithm while Yahoo uses human editors.
The article then details how using specific search terms can skew the results (searching for "Kerry" returns much more balanced stories than "John Kerry"), and makes suggestions for potential authors who wish to have their articles appear in Google's news page (e.g., don't blog: that won't be indexed).
Why do they mention the conservative bias thing? To get you to read the article. As well, it's an interesting illustration of how Google's ranking algorithm works.
As it often happens, we've been distracted by a misleading headline and are missing the point of the article.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, actually if you read the article, which is rather interesting, it's not really about a potential bias in Google News, it's about how Google and Yahoo News works: Google relies entirely on algorithm while Yahoo uses human editors.
The article then details how using specific search terms can skew the results (searching for "Kerry" returns much more balanced stories than "John Kerry"), and makes suggestions for potential authors who wish to have their articles appear in Google's news page (e.g., don't blog: that won't be indexed).
Why do they mention the conservative bias thing? To get you to read the article. As well, it's an interesting illustration of how Google's ranking algorithm works.
As it often happens, we've been distracted by a misleading headline and are missing the point of the article.