SEO writes
“Because of a recent controversy regarding Google SERPs,
Google will seek to change it’s Algorithms to eliminate HATE SITES.
Google Story Here.
Search engine Google has received praise from the Anti-Defamation League for responding to the result rankings of extremist websites. The issue comes from JewWatch.com, an Anti-Semitic site, being the top search result for the keyword “Jew”.
In a letter to ADL, Google President Sergey Brin apologized to users who found the search results for the word “Jew” upsetting and promised to work for a solution that would satisfy ADL’s concerns and those of users offended by the #1 ranking of an anti-Semitic Web site.
“We are extremely pleased that Google has heard our concerns and those of its users about the offensive nature of some search results and the unusually high ranking of peddlers of bigotry and anti-Semitism,” said Abraham H. Foxman, ADL National Director. “Google has shown great responsiveness to this issue and a willingness to consider changes to better identify extremist Web sites, so that users can still have the benefit of Google’s unique search technology while being alerted when they are about to enter into a hate zone.””
Uh-oh
The can of worms is now officially open.
Re:Uh-oh
I’m Irish; I hope everything with mackerel snatcher in it is filtered out as well as Mick and lerprchaun. I find all of those terms offensive. In fact I find anything but the winning lottery numbers and the Pope’s encyclicals offensive.
But then again no one is forced to use google so who cares. If you use google you put up with their censorship. If you smoke in my car you deal with no ashtrays. About the same severity if you ask me.
Bunch of useless wimps!
Suck it up you spineless bastards!
Do you think that I’m going to have any respect for you because you snivelled so loudly a bunch of politically correct trash caved in to you?!
I hold you and every other spineless puke like you in utter contempt! Nazi, Jewish, or Black! If you had half the brains God gave a grasshopper’s ass you’d see that your censorship is exactly the same thing Hitler did in the thirties, pal!
God-damned neo-fascist little shits!
<whiny voice> Aw, gee whiz! His words hurt my feelings! I don’t like his ideas! You have to stop people from seeing them! They scareded me! I have my rights, I have my freedoms, so they’re not allowed! </whiny voice>
God preserve us all from ultra-wrong-wingers; right and left. There is nothing more contemptible, although profit-sucking useless gits certainly run a very close second.
Fuck them all.
Very Spunky!
That’s how I’d moderate your post, if such a moderation were offered. Blake? Spunky? Please?
Is Google lying to us?
According to Search Engine Watch, Google claims that the Jew Watch site disappeared from search results for the word “jew” only because that site was offline for a while, and not due to a removal decision by Google execs. Which doesn’t explain why, now that the site is back up, its highest-ranked page in the results list is down to number 110.
Seth Finkelstein concludes that the Jew Watch home page — but not interior pages from the site — has been blacklisted from Google.
Re:Bunch of useless wimps!
It is Google’s sandbox, they should be able to do whatever they want. If they want to cave into pressure from the ADL, the Unitarians, the Rothchilds, Moveon.org, Greenpeace, or the Masons, shouldn’t they have that right?
Does one have the right to be listed on Google?
If you don’t like what Google does, don’t use them. For that matter, start your own search engine.
Re:Bunch of useless wimps!
Certainly don’t buy their stock at the IPO.
I have heard that people are being forced to use Google against their will.
Just like I am being forced to get off the computer, go sit by the pool and have a margarita.
Oh! The pain of it all.
Re:Bunch of useless wimps!
Did you actually read any of what they’re proposing to do? Did ANY of you? Whoever wrote the post here said that Google will “seek to eliminate hate sites.” Bull. The actual news stories say:
The company may classify racist sites in their own category and perhaps offer additional information, including an explanatory note about why the potentially offensive sites appear at all.
The policy would be part of a broader change at Google to bring back category labels to all search results, not just for Web sites that some people find offensive.
from SF gate
So basically, you won’t turn up hate sites unless you’re specifically looking for them. This isn’t censorship, it’s accurate searching!
Re:Bunch of useless wimps!
Hi, April.
I will grant you that it is not censorship. It is, however, kowtowing to political correctness nonetheless, and this is not an isolated incident with the Anti-Defamation League. In recent years they have trended too much towards knee-jerk reactionary semitism-name-calling. This is a group that will brand you for being anti-semitic for daring to offer any criticism of Israel however valid that criticism might be. What it boils down to, in my not so humble opinion, is that Google’s choice was a political decision, not a business decision.
Not censorship
Well, it is a close cousin of censorship, and it creates huge problems for the organization that does it. Libraries tried it with labeling. I think it is funny that these tech companies that could learn so much from libraries are making all the same mistakes.
Here’s my view of (some of) the problem:
1. “This site isn’t classified as a hate site, so it must be ok.” Once you start labeling, your taking on an implied responsibility for the content of the sites.
2. Is a sie that calls a group of people an abomination that deserves eternal suffering a hate site, or is it a fairly mainstream expression of the belief’s of one of the world’s major religions?
Homosexuals and anti-gay conservative Christians are both rather powerful lobbying groups. What can a search engine do?
But, it sounds like google isn’t doing this:
“Some people concerned about this issue have created online petitions to encourage us to remove particular links or otherwise adjust search results. Because of our objective and automated ranking system, Google cannot be influenced by these petitions. The only sites we omit are those we are legally compelled to remove or those maliciously attempting to manipulate our results.”
http://www.google.com/explanation.html
Site Drops off Google april 27th 2004
http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1104_2-5200203.html
Google puts ADs on Anti-semitic Results
Google has begun taking out adwords campaigns on certain search results to explain their side of the story on the recent anti semitic controvery
for the queries “jewwatch” or “jew watch”e =UTF-8&q=jewwatch
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&o
you will get this is the Paid sponsor results
http://www.google.com/explanation.html
Sponsored Links
Offensive Search Results
We’re disturbed about these results
as well. Please read our note here.
http://www.google.com/explanation
here is an excerpt
An explanation of our search results.
If you recently used Google to search for the word “Jew,” you may have seen results that were very disturbing. We assure you that the views expressed by the sites in your results are not in any way endorsed by Google. We’d like to explain why you’re seeing these results when you conduct this search.
A site’s ranking in Google’s search results is automatically determined by computer algorithms using thousands of factors to calculate a page’s relevance to a given query. Sometimes subtleties of language cause anomalies to appear that cannot be predicted. A search for “Jew” brings up one such unexpected result.”