
Google increasingly is promoting a single answer for many questions - angpappas
https://www.wsj.com/articles/googles-featured-answers-aim-to-distill-truthbut-often-get-it-wrong-1510847867
======
dontnotice
Halfway down that piece:

 _A study this year by Stone Temple, a prominent analyst of the industry,
showed Google’s search engine answered 74.3% of 5,000 questions, and on those
answers it had a 97.4% accuracy rate. Both percentages are higher than
services from Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc. and Microsoft Corp._

Alternative WSJ:

Let's bury that tidbit under the fold while we nitpick and highlight edge
cases in a constantly improving system.

We should also emphasising how integral google's search is to the health of
society and civilization because we are mandated by management and ownership
to produce anti-google PR and provide a steady supply of ammunition to its
critics.

~~~
untog
That's absolutely the wrong way to go about looking at it. Not all facts are
of equal importance. 97 correct facts about, say, gardening, and three
incorrect facts about first aid is not a successful system.

If Google is presenting the tool as a canonical source of truth, it needs to
be right 100% of the time. In fact, being right 97.4% of the time is worse in
many ways, as it lulls people into a false sense of security about how much
they can trust the system. Get 97/100 obvious answers correct, then give
someone wildly inappropriate advice when they ask something more "off piste".

And let's not delude ourselves here, Google isn't doing this out of an
altrustic desire to help people. They're making sure fewer people leave
google.com, in the process starving the very sites they're getting information
from of revenue. That should worry all of us.

> we are mandated by management and ownership to produce anti-google PR and
> provide a steady supply of ammunition to its critics.

This feels like an absurd criticism. Couldn't it apply to absolutely every
negative thing written about Google, ever? Why should Google be immune from
criticism?

~~~
jdietrich
>If Google is presenting the tool as a canonical source of truth, it needs to
be right 100% of the time.

Should we burn all the dictionaries and encyclopaedias because they aren't
perfectly accurate? Textbooks don't have a black-box warning on the front page
saying "The accuracy of this book cannot be guaranteed. Please verify any
facts stated before storing them in your long-term memory or using them for
any purpose"?

"Truth" is an inherently messy concept. The very best curated sources and
human experts are frequently fallible. If you assume that Google (or any other
source) is infallibly accurate, then the problem lies with your education, not
the source.

~~~
ColanR
> Textbooks don't have a black-box warning on the front page saying "The
> accuracy of this book cannot be guaranteed. Please verify any facts stated
> before storing them in your long-term memory or using them for any purpose"?

I just checked a 2004 medical textbok I had nearby (don't ask). YES, they do
have such disclaimers, and they're worded even better than you put it.

~~~
dragonwriter
> I just checked a medical textbok I had nearby (don't ask). YES, they do have
> such disclaimers

Most textbooks do not. _Medical_ textbooks (and websites, etc.) often do
because of special circumstances (legal and practical) applying to that field.

~~~
ColanR
A few levels up, medical facts were the example used for needing disclaimers.
The point is that Google isn't putting up disclaimers even where they should.

> ...97 correct facts about, say, gardening, and three incorrect facts about
> first aid is not a successful system...

~~~
dragonwriter
_General_ information sources that include but aren't specifically focussed on
medical information don't usually have disclaimers on the medical information
(e.g., encyclopedias don't have disclaimers on entries that happen to concern
medical information, while medical textbooks do).

------
alister
Google's instant answers are generally pretty good in my opinion, but in
situations where the answer really matters, it could cause dangerous
situations in the cases where Google does get it wrong. A good example is how
Google chose the _wrong_ picture on how to do cable crimping:

[https://imgur.com/a/H3Uhg](https://imgur.com/a/H3Uhg)

Regarding the example above, Google's answer with a picture looks clear and
sounds very authoritative. No further reading seems to be necessary.

~~~
ebola1717
I’ve found it pretty unreliable. I was researching Teflon pans the other day,
and all the instant answers were myths about how Teflon pans will give you
cancer. And when you click no the sites, it’s usually clear if their answer is
at all reliable or not. Stuff like that means I always have to do more work
with instant answers than if I just ignore it.

------
muzani
My favorite example is "are lemons acidic?"

It's full of "alkaline diet" sites trying to SEO itself into convincing people
that lemons are good for you because they're an alkaline. It's become a little
less inaccurate over the years but is still dodgy.

Then again the answers are so consistent and I'm so used to trusting the first
page of Google that I'm almost convinced that lemons alkalinize your body.

~~~
dTal
I'm not even sure Google's behaviour is wrong in this instance. The kind of
person who would google something as obvious as that is probably actually more
interested in the woo-answer, and I don't neccesarily think it's Google's job
to be the woo-police (as appealing as that sounds, it's risky unless they can
do a 100% accurate job).

To illustrate with another example, if I ask Google where the government is
hiding the aliens, I'm probably more interested in the answer "Area 51" than
"the government isn't hiding any aliens".

~~~
pjc50
_" 2 Balances pH: Lemons are an incredibly alkaline food, believe it or not.
Yes, they are acidic on their own, but inside our bodies they're alkaline (the
citric acid does not create acidity in the body once metabolized"_

That's what I get in the answer box. Wow.

I think it absolutely is Google's job to be the woo police _in the privileged
answer box_. They can just choose not to display it for answers they're not
confident in owning and leave you with the general search results.

It probably needs to be a whitelist. Most of the time it's wikipedia anyway (a
whole other can of worms, but at least it won't tell you that lemons are
alkaline or feed your conspiracy theories)

~~~
tgb
It looks like that's correct though, as supported by the first google hit [1]
for that subject, which in fact is arguing the stupidity of the alkaline diet.
It's also supported by the table in this paper [2]. The only catch being that
your kidneys eliminate the extra alkaline products in your urine so it has no
effect on most of your body.

[1] [https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/lemon-juice-acidic-
or-a...](https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/lemon-juice-acidic-or-alkaline)
[2]
[http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0002822395...](http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0002822395002197)

------
coldcode
I looked at a search result today and there were ads at the top, a few answers
in the middle, and more ads on the bottom of the first page. Once Google has
to start paying all the ISPs their net neutrality blood money, I imagine a
single result in a sea of ads will be the norm.

------
melling
Single answers is basically what's needed for Alex, Google Home, etc. I was
surprised that Google beat Alexa. Siri was horrible.

I haven't purchased a home voice device yet because I wanted it to get a
little better. However, I'm not sure if there will be much improvement in the
device itself. The real work is on the server.

~~~
jacksmith21006
Surprised Google beat Alexa? I have had the Echo since late 2014 and now
several Google Homes. For understanding you and answering questions Google is
well ahead of Amazon.

But you find this surprising?

This is what Google does and has for almost 20 years now.

~~~
dingo_bat
I think people who have always used iphones seriously underestimate how good
google has become at this.

------
jamiesonbecker
A lot of these answers seem to be borne of algorithmic consensus of top-ranked
sites. There are probably worse ways to go about it, but in many ways Google
has to take sides on ideas or concepts that are still strongly debated.
Consensus does not create or prove facts, even if it's a strong signal. There
are _certainly_ things that I strongly believe that you do not. Does that make
my beliefs (or yours) any less valid (until we're confronted with sufficient
evidence to change our views), even if one of us has to be wrong?

* Are there sea monsters? Aliens?

* Is there a God?

* Is there a multiverse?

Historically, there was so many things that were 'consensus' concepts that
were just flat (oops) wrong. Google would have gotten all of these wrong..

* What happens when you sail over the edge of the earth?

* What's holding up the earth?

* Is the earth the center of the universe?

How about:

* Is the speed of light a fixed constant?

* How much statistical error is introduced into carbon dating when extrapolating behind more than a few hundred years?

* Is cracking my knuckles bad?

How about this one, if it was listed on thousands of spammy self-help sites:
"recent studies have shown that it's beneficial to drink gasoline in small
quantities." (please do not drink gasoline. That's insane.)

Should Google be liable for those answers that are now coming from its site,
with the authority of the world's dominant answer generator, instead of the
third-party site that's spouting nonsense? (yes.)

Really, though, Google's answers are probably as good as any until we learn
everything about everything and finally agree on _everything_. Even if they
are self-serving to keep you on Google and not send you to a third-party site
to get your answer.

~~~
tintor
"And, should Google be liable for those answers that are now coming from its
site ..."

This is why Google references the source when it gives you the answer.

~~~
abiox
"what is tom cruise's age" didn't reference a source when i checked.

------
k2xl
With my Google Home, I often ask it, "Can my dog eat X" and it'll answer
usually from the single answer from Google.

While Google Home usually says the source, "According to WebMD..." or
"According to <some blog post>..." it would be horrible if it gave the wrong
answer - saying something was safe to eat but it really wasn't.

I hope they take extra precaution with answers related to medicine/safety.

~~~
VonGallifrey
I personally would hope that _you_ take extra precaution with answers related
to medicine/safety. Why would you trust google with something like this? If
you ask Google "Can my dog eat X" and blindly trust the answer then it is your
fault and not google's if your dog gets sick. Google isn't responsible for
your dog, you are!

~~~
tudelo
Why would you trust anything? Not to go to the extreme, but we do things every
day where trust is integral, and what we trust is not something we verify
independently. Or maybe you are different.

~~~
VonGallifrey
Yes we do things every day where trust is integral, but I do verify
independently accordingly. This is relative to the importance of the thing off
course. That is just common sense.

I accept googles answer when I ask for the weather. If google is wrong on this
it mostly has no effect. So it is absolutely appropriate to accept this answer
blindly.

I trust my doctor when I have a minor illness, but I did select my doctor
carefully and I would get a second opinion if it is something serious.

Putting the same care into both of these things would either be dangerous or
obsessive. It does terrify me that people here are suggesting that there are
people who put less care into answering medical or safety related questions
for themselves than I do reading a weather report for the day. It's crazy.

------
SloopJon
After the Vox music player changed from freeware to freemium, I searched for
something like "best free flac player mac 2017". It took me a moment to
realize that the featured result was one vendor's self-serving comparison with
competitors.

I'm prepared for half of the results to a query like that to be littered with
affiliate links, but I wasn't expecting a featured result like that.

~~~
tudelo
That for me is the largest downside to google (or other search engines,
really). It's impossible to get objective information on products unless you
know a reviewer who is objective in the given domain...

------
qaid
On one hand, I see this as great way to encourage curiosity. A child can ask a
simple question "why does it rain?" and get back an immediate response. No
more clicking through links to try and find a simple explanation, only for
them to have lost interest.

At the same time, I can't help but feel that way more people will look for an
answer and just give up on their question if the immediate answer is not clear
enough or not immediately available. With attention spans being as short as
they are already, I can see it discouraging many people from performing the
acts of reading and trying to understand what they read. And that kind of
culture worries me a lot these days.

------
therealmarv
If you search in German Google (does not need to be in Germany) and Google
mainly for English search terms... you won't see any of those. Google is still
in many ways a "US English first" company :/

~~~
whatyoucantsay
In many ways, this is a US English first world :/

------
rhspeer
I did some research on how to optimize for getting a site into the answer area
at the top of results using schema.org's question & answer protocol.

[http://robertspeer.com/schema-org-for-busy-
professionals/](http://robertspeer.com/schema-org-for-busy-professionals/)

Turns out it's a LOT easier than it sounds. Unfortunately I never got a client
to bite on this so I don't have results to share.

------
cosinetau
Is it possible this is the first iteration of an initiative getting more
complete, nuanced answers?

As software developers, we talk about small cycles and iterations first that
drive toward a working product, not a singular giant leap toward a goal. This
would be consistent with that pattern.

------
philipodonnell
Obviously context is important in pieces like this, as others pointed out, and
I can't read it because stupid paywalls, but...

There should be some real anti-trust concerns with Google providing answers to
questions itself. Google gets those answers by crawling sites with content
owned by others. It has avoided copyright issues by arguing that they only
show a snippet of the content to aid finding the best search result, thus it
is not reproduced in whole or in part, but that the searcher will still visit
the page and benefit the copyright owner.

If Google just gives you the answer and there's no need to visit the page,
then that is a much bigger issue I think.

------
tryingagainbro
The real answer is: "don't go to the website we stole this info from, but
click on an ad here"

------
jwilk
Paywall-free archived copy:

[https://archive.is/KLzPH](https://archive.is/KLzPH)

------
MoD411
I hate links to wsj.com because I do not have an account...

------
jo-m
Use this bookmarklet to access WJS paywalled content:

    
    
        javascript:location.href='http://facebook.com/l.php?u='+encodeURIComponent(location.href)

~~~
brlewis
Caveat: This helps Facebook track you even if you have an ad blocker.

------
anon1385
I'm generally very critical of Google, especially the search results page, but
it's important to remember the background context to this article:

[https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/nov/16/rupert-
murdoch...](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/nov/16/rupert-murdoch-
newspapers-struggling-digital-age)

>Rupert Murdoch say News Corp is not looking to expand its newspaper empire,
conceding digital advertising “has been tremendously damaging to print” and
some of his papers were struggling.

Over the next few years it will be interesting to see how successful the right
wing anglosphere press is at getting governments to regulate Google. It's been
building for a while now and not just from the Murdoch press. The Daily Mail
in the UK has been campaigning against Google for a number of years now.

~~~
saas_co_de
The NYTimes and Guardian have been as aggressive in attacking Google and
Facebook as anyone (subjectively I would say more so) so I don't think this is
just right-wing. It is more like the entire world has realized that having
these monopolies control the flow of information is incredibly dangerous.

~~~
jerf
From a very crass and cynical perspective, but probably accurate, as Google
and Facebook become more powerful, they can and should expect opposition from
_all_ previously entrenched power centers. It would be a very, ah, Silicon
Valley utopian nerd idea, for lack of a better phrase, that it could
otherwise. And even if there are some ideological lines drawn, well, even
people on the "same side" still jockey for position and work at cross-purposes
at times. If Google and Facebook are agreed to skew left, yeah, you can
probably expect a bit more vigor in the right side attacks if only because
they have more operating space, but you can still expect plenty of left-wing
"jockeying", and that the latter may even have a greater effect over time.
(Could go either way, assuming you can even agree on a basis for measurement.)

