
Google and Facebook Have Failed Us - DLay
https://www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/541794/?single_page=true
======
llamataboot
Zeynep Tufekci had a couple great columns about this recently regarding FB and
the US elections this year. While I recognize that there's always a concern
about who the gatekeepers get to be in the marketplace of ideas, I think this
is a considerably more complex issues than "let all the information go
wherever it wants and let the people sort it out"

Putting 4Chan in a top news slot is not "allowing unedited and unfiltered
access to information", it is algorithmicly promoting a cesspool of
disinformation into a spot that many users believe is fairly authoritative.
There is no way to "not make a choice" here and let information be free. There
is only figuring out ways to filter and sort the firehose of information that
is now at all of our fingertips. (A situation, I should add, that human brains
are not necessarily prepared for)

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/opinion/mark-
zuckerberg-f...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/29/opinion/mark-zuckerberg-
facebook.html)

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/23/opinion/sunday/facebook-a...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/23/opinion/sunday/facebook-
ad-scandal.html)

~~~
Spivak
> into a spot that many users believe is fairly authoritative

I mean that's the real issue. You can't be unbiased while trying to be a
source of truth. You can be impartial and return results based on relevancy or
you can intervene in an attempt to return the truth. Google has ventured into
dangerous territory by mixing the two -- especially with their automatic
snippets that answer questions.

> There is only figuring out ways to filter and sort the firehose

But it's an unsolved problem for how you put the control of this filtering
into the users hands. The best we have right now is to just return everything
and let the users choose what to pay attention to.

~~~
rdiddly
The unfiltered results ARE the truth. 4chan is the truth. In the sense that
"Someone posted this thing on 4chan." And that's the only truth there is in
internet-land: Someone posted something.

Is it real? Is it true, what they posted? Or is it "fake news?" You will never
know, and you probably shouldn't try to take it that far. Or if you do, at
least be able to handle the cognitive dissonance of believing it and not-
believing it at the same time. The only thing you can truly know is what you
witness in person. Or perhaps what you hear from trusted parties, but even
there, your trust may be misplaced, or they may report something false in good
faith that was the result of their having been deceived or mistaken. And you
can misperceive and twist reality even all by yourself in the presence of
supposedly non-subjective and "real" stimuli.

Regardless, from the vantage point of "looking at a computer," all you know
about anything you see there, is that someone put it there. And even the
"someone" part isn't necessarily true... it could be AI-generated like some
sports and financial news is now.

The good news is, that which you can't witness with your own eyes, rarely has
any real effect on your life. I'm experimenting with that. The sun still comes
up, and it's still time to get some shit done. Sure sure, of course there are
myriad ways someone or something far away can have an influence on me. What
I'm saying is, what if you _ignore_ that? What if you construct a mental model
of the world where it's actually not one big joyous tapestry of unity and
interconnectedness, but just a fragmented patchwork and you have your own
little square and that's it. Neither view is right per se, but they're both
equally valid, which is to say, bullshit, yet incontrovertible to those who
believe it. I'll say one thing though, take the fragmented view and suddenly
you don't especially find yourself immersed in news of shootings and Google
can't "fail you" because you don't rely on it as a window to the world - you
only use it for what it's actually good at: looking for shit on the internet.

~~~
pjc50
> The only thing you can truly know is what you witness in person.

> The good news is, that which you can't witness with your own eyes, rarely
> has any real effect on your life

Not only anti-rationalist and anti-Enlightenment, but you're even disagreeing
with object permanence!

~~~
croon
> Not only anti-rationalist and anti-Enlightenment, but you're even
> disagreeing with object permanence!

And not even "not only" that, it also veers into the dirty movement of
muddying the waters of responsible reporting, into a discussion of "what is
truth really?". When "nothing is true", every venue from 4chan to infowars is
_equal_ in its _non-truth_ to AP/Reuters/WaPo/NYT/Atlantic/etc.

When all media is fake, listening to Alex Jones talk about water supplies
making children gay is somehow legitimized.

~~~
rdiddly
Yeah no it doesn't. Just one more thing to ignore. Unless I personally saw
someone turn gay from drinking water, but even if I thought I saw that, I
wouldn't totally believe that either.

And I did mention trusted parties, which could be a reporter. You guys are
just not in the mood for philosophising tonight I guess. You want to be
certain of things. Disappointing response. Should've avoided the term "fake
news." It's Pavlovian.

------
trgv
I think there's already too much filtering.

People need to make up their own minds regarding what is true and what isn't,
what's worth their time and what's bullshit, which links to click on and which
to avoid. If people can't handle this then we need to spend more money on
education, or just accept that some people disagree with us.

I don't think aggressively filtering "untrustworthy" content will lead to a
net benefit.

~~~
phrh8
These platforms have hyper-optimized their products to show as much stuff as
possible that people will engage with (share, click), so that they also engage
with ads and stay active.

The problem is there is often some time when there is no news. No news isn't
interesting, so it doesn't get shared as much as "news". Take the moments
immediately following a disaster. Two types of news articles will show up:

"There was a shooting. We don't know anything yet, but we will keep you
posted". Boring.

"We know who the killer is. Bobby Bobertson done it". Woah!

Now imagine you are a heavy social media user. You don't want to stay silent
on such a big news story, so you want to share something showing you are
engaged. Which story do you share?

(edit: removed duplicate "the problem is")

~~~
grandalf
This comment is absolutely right. The algorithms are not optimized to inform
people, they are optimized to maximize the number of ads people click on while
consuming whatever content the algorithms promoted to the top.

This is at best a conflict of interest when it comes to content that ought to
be viewed as news. But there is significant pressure these days to blend news
with entertainment (which simply means engagement, which entails ad sales).

------
losteverything
I dont know if i could disagree with the author more.

They didn't fail me. I don't want or need to know about shootings, crashes,
floods, etc. Not instantly, anyway. I did not seek news in las vegas: I avoid
it.

If anything the previous news gatekeepers got us used to believing that if we
dont stop everything we are somehow uncaring. So plane crashes, shootings etc
hold a "insta-pass" to news. All hands on deck approach.

To me, the authors premise of FB and G as bad gatekeepers is wrong.
Information is hardly ever right right away. Nobody i know expects that. Even
with that, i believe people know the difference between a photo sharing site,
a email and search/map site and a news organization.

~~~
abrahamepton
I worked at Google News for 5 years, and completely agree w/Alexis. Google
promoted 4Chan as a top result for people who wanted to know about Las Vegas;
that's a fail, period. It is a fail. It should not have happened; it should
not happen again; it should never happen.

Great, maybe you personally weren't fooled. That's entirely and totally
irrelevant since there are 7 billion people on the planet and Google (and FB
and everyone else) wants to serve all of them. Not all of whom are exactly
like you.

Google fucked up, admitted it (kinda) and needs to do better. Period. Not hard
to understand.

~~~
eighthnate
> that's a fail, period.

I disagree. If that's what people are viewing and if that's where the
discussion of the news was happening then google should reflect that.

If 4chan was the only source google was pushing then fine. But as long as
google is posting a wide variety of "news", then anything, including 4chan
should be allowed.

Edit: People forget that the TMZ and even the inquirer used to be attacked
also but they have produced fine journalism from time to time. And
establishment organizations like Rolling Stone, The Atlantic, NYTimes, etc
have produced terrible journalism from time to time.

No entity has a complete monopoly on facts and news. We should have diverse
set of news/opinions/etc.

~~~
tethys
> discussion of the news

That's the problem. If I get the article right, Google listed results from
4chan in their news boxes that appear above search results –– and that's a
problem because in this place you'd expect trustworthy information and not
just some speculation.

Listing a discussion (even if it's on 4chan) within the regular search results
is not a problem and not what the author is criticizing.

------
folksinger
The reason why those of us on this forum can tell the difference between good
and bad information is because we received a good education and learned
critical analysis skills.

Facebook, Google and the internet in general are an objectively bad source of
knowledge. They are subjectively good sources of knowledge.

The vast majority of people do not have the skills to use the internet as a
source for good knowledge.

The contents of the average library contain better knowledge than the
internet. The contents of a library at a world-class University and even more-
so.

The internet is the most overrated institution of contemporary society when it
comes to obtaining knowledge.

It is somewhat good for entertainment but probably not better than your
average game of Dungeons and Dragons.

~~~
jordigh
> The reason why those of us on this forum can tell the difference between
> good and bad information is because we received a good education and learned
> critical analysis skills.

We really need to stop congratulating ourselves on how smart we are and _we_
would never fall for such blatant lies, because we are such highly-educated
critical thinkers. There are a bunch of silly beliefs that we witness even
amongst us like Steve Jobs wanting to cure cancer with unorthodox dietary
changes, that having no gender parity in tech is both good and natural, or
this medical doctor with a respected career who believes the earth is flat:

[https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2017/03/the-men-who-believe-
the-e...](https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2017/03/the-men-who-believe-the-earth-is-
flat/)

We're all vulnerable to believe and defend the silliest things and then call
ourselves critical thinkers while we do so. We can all be tricked. There are
well-documented, effective methods to make us perceive and believe any number
of things. Illusionists and magicians make a living out of doing this overtly;
journalists and politicians do so less transparently.

Quite frankly, half the time I'm walking around slightly horrified that
perhaps I'm believing and defending the stupidest lies and I think everyone
else should feel the same way at least part of the time.

~~~
indubitable
Do you believe Steve Jobs could not have told you the statistics on treatment
for the normal treatment for the cancer he had? Or that he was not aware that
most reputable literature on homeopathics is less than encouraging? Turning
the stables do you feel you have access to all the information necessary on
his situation and logic to be able to accurately judge his actions?

Society as a whole is becoming increasingly arrogant. If an individual does
not agree with "us" that they must be somehow wrong, misinformed, or
illogical. The reason for this is easy to understand. We all hold the beliefs
we do because we hold them to be the most logical and justified. So somebody
who doesn't hold such beliefs must be wrong, and we need to "fix" them. Yet of
course the exact same is true of people who hold differing beliefs.

And this is in no way to suggest that both sides can be right on issues where
there is indeed a clear answer. On many issues one side will be wrong, and one
side will be right. And this is perfectly fine. It is critical in society that
people are at liberty to make decisions that we may not consider logical, or
even appropriate. Elon Musk deciding to spend all of his fortune attempting to
start up an aerospace company and an electric car company is certainly
something that very few would call a logical endeavor. It is missing the
gravity of such risk to suggest it's only money. He gets emotional to this day
when speaking of his time then - one can only speculate what would have
happened had everything collapsed; there was certainly much more than money at
risk there. But he succeeded. So we regard him as brilliant instead of a
misguided fool, illustrating the absurdity of our labeling.

If you want something other than money, consider the history of penicillin.
Now considered one of the most important medical discoveries of all time - the
whole concept of injecting mold into one's body to inhibit bacteria is not
exactly what most would call logical. And for years his discovery was
completely disregarded by the public and by medical science. And that's fine -
but it's also fine that people are free to pursue outlandish avenues and ideas
without condemnation and judgement other than "Well, that's not what I'd think
given the body of evidence available."

~~~
nitwit005
You're imagining Steve Jobs made some sort of rational choice. It sounds like
he pretty much ignored the facts, as well as the advice of family and friends.
Here's his biographer's quote to CBS:

"I think that he kind of felt that if you ignore something, if you don't want
something to exist, you can have magical thinking. It'd worked for him in the
past. He regretted it."

------
mc32
Google is more a conduit of news rather than a gatekeeper. FB is both a
gatekeeper and a conduit to news as well as a news producer (since it pays or
underwrites some orgs to produce news for it).

That said, I think The Atlantic is wrong in placing blame on Google when they
themselves engage in questionable journalism (clickbait as well as often
biased news-source).

There is no way we're going to come up with something "objectively truthful"
because, news as it exists today is not about facts. It's journalism and
journalism has always been about putting a slant on things --quoting
unauthoritative sources ("man named Joe claims," etc.) loose factchecking, and
more. All to sell more news (packaged with ads or for subscriptions, where you
don't want to alienate your subscriber "base".

This is an attempted landgrab by establishment news orgs to corner what is
news. They want to be the only sanctioned sources of news and punish
alternative sources --using an obvious outlier to promote their pov.

~~~
forapurpose
> There is no way we're going to come up with something "objectively truthful"
> because, news as it exists today is not about facts. It's journalism and
> journalism has always been about putting a slant on things --quoting
> unauthoritative sources ("man named Joe claims," etc.) loose factchecking,
> and more. All to sell more news (packaged with ads or for subscriptions,
> where you don't want to alienate your subscriber "base".

I look at it much differently: Nothing is perfect, no news source, no
politician, no text editor, no scientific theory. They all fail our ideals but
some are a lot better than others, some are a little better, and as others
have pointed out in this discussion, an essential skill is to differentiate
between them and also to assume the uncertainties of imperfection and to read
critically.

To throw together all journalism as 'imperfect' is like throwing together all
science, from the theory of evolution to latest upload to arXiv, as all a
failure because it's imperfect. Yes, read Darwin critically, but don't
conflate his work with everyone else's. The more I accept inevitable human
imperfection, the more I'm amazed by people like Darwin and by organizations
like the NY Times, which cranks out a very good, very difficult product on an
amazing schedule. That they and others accomplish all of that under the
constraints of humanity is truly amazing to me.

> The Atlantic is wrong in placing blame on Google when they themselves ...

We're kind of stuck with ideas from hypocrites, at least until the great AI
awakening - and if it's strong AI, hypocrisy might be the first sign that it's
working.

~~~
mc32
I think the Atlantic wants it's cake and eat it too:

>The problems with surfacing this man’s group to Facebook users is obvious to
literally any human.

So it's obvious to any human, yet people aren't good enough to differentiate
fake from real news.

>Most people who joined the group looking for information presumably don’t
know that the founder is notorious for legal and informational hijinks

I mean, the author is picking and choosing anecdotes to make a point in order
to further their agendum.

On the other hand I agree with you but it's irrelevant to the authors' point.
The author, I would posit, is not really interested in sourcing better news
(it's not impossible, for example, for 4chan to have the best info on a
particular issue (via a contributor) while The Atlantic may have none. But
they are arguing a 4chan should not be surfaced at all --not that 4chan should
be better scrutinized and only surface accurate information.

It's an underhanded and opportunistic attempt to delegitimize non professional
journos and build a moat around the "profession".

------
hsod
Google is all about filtering. It doesn't just show you a random selection of
every page on the internet containing your search term. Instead it applies
subjective criteria to present you with what Google thinks would be the "best"
results for you.

This is why people use Google.

So I don't understand when people make the generic argument against filtering,
that filtering is categorically bad and Google shouldn't be in the business of
deciding what we see and don't see. That's the whole point of Google!

~~~
musage
> This is why people use Google.

Wait, what? I use it _despite_ that. Since 2000. Everybody seeing the same
search results was never a problem, and sometimes even useful. There is a wide
area between "just show random pages" (which probably not even the first
prototype of any search engine ever did) and a "personal" filter you can't
configure at all.

~~~
hsod
I don't mean the filter is personalized to you, I just mean that there is a
filter! That is, Google doesn't believe every website is equally "good", they
Rank Pages based on subjective criteria.

I just don't get why no one has a problem with Google trying to filter out
spam (even though it can't be detected with 100% accuracy) but trying to
prevent 4chan/GatewayPundit's blatant and obvious lies from being elevated is
a place to take a principled stand.

Where are the tears for the spammers and scammers who have been so unfairly
censored by Google for so many years?

~~~
musage
> I just don't get why no one has a problem with Google trying to filter out
> spam (even though it can't be detected with 100% accuracy) but trying to
> prevent 4chan/GatewayPundit's blatant and obvious lies from being elevated
> is a place to take a principled stand.

What does this have to do with _personal_ filters? Yes, there are filters,
Google has to "make decisions", and parse language. That's a given. But that
doesn't require showing different things to different people.

With a personalized algorithm behind the curtain, googling for "Pizza" might
show you where to get Pizza near where you are, and let's say "Pizza in
general" would give the results that just typing "Pizza" without a personal
filter would give. So you have "Pizza / Pizza in general" vs. "Pizza shop in
$city / Pizza". Big deal? What was gained here? You trade some convenience for
the impossibility to get the search results everybody else is getting.

When I ask someone what they think is the X-est Y, and they first have a list
of questions for _me_ to answer first so they can tailor their response to me
-- not to clarify the question, mind you, but so they can tell me something I
might like to hear -- I won't be asking that person for their opinion again.

> they Rank Pages based on subjective criteria.

That's not how it works:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank)

~~~
hsod
I feel like we're talking past each other. Personalization of search results
is orthogonal to this article and discussion so I'm going to pass on
responding to your points there.

As for PageRank, I really appreciate the Wikipedia link. Super helpful. If
you're arguing that PR is not subjective because it uses an algorithm, my
response is: the algorithm encodes subjective judgements about how to evaluate
"quality" in a web page. For example, the subjective judgement that a web page
is likely to be of higher quality if there are a lot of other high quality web
pages that link to it.

------
holmak
It's rather bold for the Atlantic to complain about low quality news when they
have clickbait garbage at the bottom of every article.

~~~
askvictor
It's not either/or; many high quality news sources have clickbait rubbish
stories to help pay the bills for the more expensive, higher quality
reporting. It's either that, or paywalls (or both)

------
reissbaker
Not 100% surprising that journalists would view the machines that have wrested
control of the news from them with hostility. Facebook definitely could use
improvements, and it sounds like Google's search ranking in these rare kinds
of situations could too, but the vitriol here — and the suggestion to replace
machine ranking with ... surprise, journalists! — makes it seem like the "Us"
who've been failed by ranking algorithms might specifically refer to The
Atlantic.

~~~
dullgiulio
You are right, but on the other hand, we pay Facebook dearly with our personal
data and in return we get to do the work journalists should do, of navigating
in a sea of information, most of it fact-free. There must be a more fair
distribution of time and income.

------
mythrwy
Google and Facebook have failed the Atlantic which is seizing on tragedy to
imply only sanctioned media (them of course) should be available through
Internet searches.

However most of the rest of us are not failed as we already know results from
4-Chan probably aren't accurate.

Please stop failing all of us with this desperate bid to get back in control
of information dispersal there The Atlantic. I'd much rather see a smattering
of nonsense and be able to make that determination for myself rather than you
deciding what should be available for viewing.

~~~
pdonis
Why is this getting downvotes? It's spot on. The "mainstream media" have been
failing us for years, yet now suddenly it's all Google's and Facebook's fault
that people are getting inaccurate information fed to them?

~~~
dtnomad
+1

~~~
olivermarks
+1 There are plenty of brave journalists/bloggers but very few editors or
corporate media vehicles prepared to publish their investigative reporting. I
wouldn't dream of using FB as a go to 'news' source, while Google is
essentially an aggregator/curator of information sources I may or may not take
seriously. The idea that these lightweight websites should somehow be the
gatekeepers of 'the truth' is pretty offensive. I prefer to triangulate across
multiple sources and make up my own mind base don the information I uncover.
Example: [https://lasvegassun.com/news/2017/oct/02/gunman-who-
killed-5...](https://lasvegassun.com/news/2017/oct/02/gunman-who-killed-50-at-
las-vegas-concert-was-reti/)

A lead story in the local Vegas newspaper states the alleged gunman was a
multi millionaire property owner. Is this true? I have no way of proving it
but it is certainly food for thought...

------
partisan
The article is placing the blame on Google and Facebook when it should be
placed on us, the "consumers" of media. We need to take a look in the mirror
and understand who we are and what we want.

Ask yourself. Really ask yourself:

\- What kind of information am I looking for and why? Am I just a digital
rubbernecker? Do I want to break this story at the watercolor? Or do I need to
know if a loved one was hurt?

\- Do I need to know shortly after an event occurs or am I able to tolerate a
little bit of delay in my gratification?

Shortly after an event, there are many stories and they haven't yet been
synthesized into one narrative. There are people who want to capitalize on
tragedy and their voices are part of the mix. Over time, the noise is stripped
away and what we get is the official narrative and that is one we can "count"
on. If you are willing and able to wait until the official narrative comes out
then a) congratulations, you have will power unheard of in this day and age,
and b) you get the benefit of skipping all of the intermediary chaos states.

If you understand why you need to know and when you need to know it, then you
can control the quality of the news you expose yourself to.

~~~
throwaway2048
These kinds of statements seem deep and meaingful, but ultimately they are
vaccuous.

The only reason any market entity exists is because people buy things from
them, its the buyers fault.

The only reason corrupt governments exist is because the people elect them, or
at the very least don't overthrow them, its the governed's fault.

Its a stupid oversimplication that places all the blame on the giant, vauge,
and futile "everyone", while ignoring incentive structures and pretty much
every ounce of nuance and sublty.

Not to mention that it totally ignores how entities like the aformentioned,
and amagoosoftbook shape our preferences, both actively, and unitentionally.

Its a hopeless putdown of basicly any ability for anything to change, ever.

~~~
partisan
I am speaking specifically about this particular article and the topic it is
covering.

Whatever assumptions you used to arrive at your conclusions were introduced by
the story you wanted to tell. I'd rather you didn't extrapolate from what I
wrote.

Ask me nicely and I will tell you why fixing Facebook and Google are not the
answer.

~~~
electricEmu
The original replier doesn't sound as if they're extropolating to me. You're
also telling a story, and shouldn't be the only one in the conversation to do
so.

> Over time, the noise is stripped away and what we get is the official
> narrative and that is one we can "count" on.

I'd ask why fixing Facebook or Google isn't the answer, but that would play
into _your_ extropolating narrative. Instead, why shouldn't Google and
Facebook be responsible, and held accountable, for posting absolutely fake
news automatically? It's not a "firehose" or "unsubstantiated" information,
it's projected as "news".

~~~
partisan
You've simply restated the problem. Why not contribute to the discussion?

How would you fix Google and Facebook? How would you hold them responsible and
accountable? And why?

~~~
electricEmu
> You've simply restated the problem. Why not contribute to the discussion?

I'm sorry, but I've already asked a direct question and do not consider it a
restatement of the problem.

~~~
partisan
It really would be a better exercise for you to think through how you would
actually hold them accountable.

What service do they provide, concretely? What are their SLAs? What does your
contract with them say? Every service is a contract between a service provider
and a paying customer. There is a specific set of parameters the service
provider must adhere to. What would a contract with Facebook or Google and
their non-paying customers look like? Should people pay for the service or
should we expect Google to eat the cost?

What is "news"? How do you know it when you see it? How do they detect fake
news? What about all of the opinion pieces that appear on the Google News
front page? Should those be included or excluded? Are we talking about white
listing websites? Who controls that list and how do you get on it? Or, should
Google hire people to filter the news for you?

I am asking you to think about what you are proposing so that you can see that
there are problems there, some of them big in scope. Considering think about
it is not a solution.

~~~
electricEmu
I see you've asked another series of questions without answering the one
posed. In many respects, this might be seen as changing the conversation to
something within your realm instead of answering a question.

> Really would be a better exercise for you to think through how you would
> actually hold them accountable.

In short, the questions you've posed range from "bring your life experiences
together" and "think through the specifics". I have, and my thoughts remain
unchanged.

Posing that many questions across such a broad range of subjects and varying
levels of specificity might be seen as a disengenious way to continue the
conversation.

I have posed a straightforward question. Instead of an answer, I've received
only other "thought provoking" questions. In response, that's how I arrived at
my question to you, two responses ago.

In the future, you might find better dialogue by answering questions posed.

------
pdonis
tl/dr: We don't think people are capable of exercising judgment, so we want
the computers at Google and Facebook to do it for them. Good luck with that.

~~~
intopieces
It's not that they are incapable of exercising judgement. It's that when they
do exercise judgement, it is consistently towards bad content. False content.

~~~
nilved
This problem needs to be fixed with education. The article demonstrates an
extremely profound misunderstanding of technology.

~~~
intended
Any problem which ends with "education is needed to fix it" will fail.

Education is a non-solved problem, and you may as well say "society will fix
it", to get a better approximation of what Education entails.

Education on a subject is influenced and affected by

1) Student health, motivation, previous education, available time, availble
security, water, electricity, nutrition, parental nutrition, parental
education, stability, age, and so on.

2) Education and subject matter is affected by development of the country,
politics of the country, cultural importance of the subject, job demands,
payment/funds available for education, structure of educational systems and
more.

So in other words, its not "fixable".

Do note, that if you developed a way to transpose both information _and_
meaning and expertise, a la matrix, into someones brain directly - you would
not only "solve" education, but you would also be able to program legions of
soldiers/attackers/drones with the same technology.

------
RestlessMind
> Worse, when I asked Google about this, and indicated why I thought it was a
> severe problem, they sent back boilerplate.

> Unfortunately, early this morning we were briefly surfacing an inaccurate
> 4chan website in our Search results for a small number of queries. Within
> hours, the 4chan story was algorithmically replaced by relevant results.
> This should not have appeared for any queries, and we’ll continue to make
> algorithmic improvements to prevent this from happening in the future.

I believe Google can be lax about quality of results because it has no real
competitor. These are the moments when I wish there was a healthy competition
among search engines, so that all of them would be on their toes to deliver
best results.

Having said that, did anyone try DDG or Bing during the initial period after
the event? How was the quality of the news results on those sites?

------
timmytwotime
The real crime is that there is an assumption of companies with their own
self-interests at the forefront are somehow benevolent arbiters of information
on the Internet. This shows more the naive crassness of the media.

~~~
ubik
Nailed it. Exactly on what timeline do these people think these megacorp
clickfarms were constitutionally/divinely designated as arbiters of truth?
They have always been run by trash-purveying ad companies and have always been
corrosive [1].

[1] [https://www.anxiety.org/social-media-causes-
anxiety](https://www.anxiety.org/social-media-causes-anxiety)

~~~
Dirlewanger
It's companies fighting other companies for the mindshare of the public and
profits. Your modern day "journalist" has no convictions anymore, they weave
whatever tale their editors want to tell, whether it's true or not. This is
our dire future, and I don't see a way out of it.

------
crag
I agree with the article. I think more humans do need to be added to the
"decision-making" process.

I mean, com'on, promoting 4chan to the top spot in a news channel? Too many
people in this country don't bother to check, they figure if it's the top
article it must be true.

~~~
arkh
> I agree with the article. I think more humans do need to be added to the
> "decision-making" process.

Not really useful when most journalists already demonstrate how even
professionals can't check their sources.

------
aaron695
Reddit and 4chan had more informative information quicker than all the news
outlets.

They did not mislead me on anything about the incident. (They did have
misleading comments that were easy to ignore)

Sorry, but just because there are dumb people in the world why should my
results on Goolge be censored.

It's also bullshit, 4chan is very well know as a poor source and looks nothing
like a newspaper so the concept it would be mistaken for a fact based news
outlet shows more how dumb the writer and people with this belief are more
than anything else.

This writer is so superior they have to save us dummies from facebook groups
and 4chan? I find it insulting.

~~~
intended
Well, you could have been on a certain subreddit, and you would be worried
about false flag operations after a point.

I will agree, that several networks can get information out faster than older
systems.

------
saimiam
If we all such smart people/techies, can we spitball a better breaking news
feed algorithm into existence?

I'll kick it off -

1\. Focus all news on Who? What? When? Where? Omit the "Why?".

2\. When in doubt cite the primary news sources (police feeds/courtrooms/local
authorities/opposition leaders/pictures/geo tagged and timestamped audio&video
feeds with geo tags)

3\. Secondary news sources like news orgs and journalist videos are second in
importance

4\. Quote tertiary news outlets like Reddit/HN/4chan only when they can be
cross verified with a primary source

More suggestions?

~~~
bo1024
Just a comment:

Reputation is key.

Having studied game theory for systems of agents producing results and
content, I feel fairly confident in this conclusion: the only reliable long-
term design to incentivize beneficient, truthful behavior involves assigning
good reputation in return for good behavior, and assigning future
rewards/attention based on past reputation.

Based on this, I postulate that any good news feed algorithm must use
reputation scores based on past history to choose what to believe and what to
show when a new story comes out. Humans of course do this instinctively, which
many modern news organizations will have discovered too late as they sell out
their integrity, accuracy, and priorities.

Remember what von Neumann said about arithmetic attempts to generate random
numbers? Similarly, anyone who attempts to algorithmically determine "truth"
based on instantaneous metrics is living in a state of sin.

~~~
saimiam
When it comes to sourcing information from discussion boards, each top thread
is effectively the one and only time the algorithm will interact with that
thread for that topic.

Unless each thread is monitored and updated by a small subset of power users
when weighting for reputation matters, it is likely that the persons managing
a thread are volunteers at the scene of breaking news or have been
(self-)coopted into that role by circumstances. Such self selected thread
managers can safely be treated as a one-time participant in the prisoner's
dilemma game.

If this is true, the algorithm can safely assume that the other prisoner (the
"thread") is going to betray them and so, betray them first by low-weighting
them.

Of course, you use some sort of reputation for the source of the threads - for
breaking tech news, a GitHub issue tracker is probably going to be a better
tracker than an HN thread than a general purpose Reddit thread than a 4chan
thread.

~~~
bo1024
> Of course, you use some sort of reputation for the source of the threads

Yes, this is what I mean. A news source should have a history of correctness
before being trusted to report future news. The issues you're discussing are
exactly the reason we need reputation -- otherwise some false news can arrive
once, get a ton of attention, and do a lot of damage before going away forever
(and we see this on e.g. reddit).

------
throw2016
Since Google and co were never given the responsibility of telling anyone the
truth this seems to be another naked powergrab to spread FUD and scare stories
so someone can have a 'monopoly on truth'.

Diversity of opinion and widespread rumour mongering is a natural state of
affairs in human society. Those who are unsettled by this and seek some sort
of uniformity and control betray a troubling megalomania. Elevating yourself
over others to decide somehow only 'you' are able to discern the facts
confirms it.

That leads to not to Google or Facebook curating news but 'one source of
truth' controlled by the government and authoritarian entities, using the
exact same logic. Some people may be experts at C and Go but betray an
astonishing illiteracy when it comes to history, freedom and evolution of
human society.

Notions of truth have been debated for eons so there is already a large body
of knowledge. You need an educated literate population and accept people will
have wildly differing views and trying to protect the 'ignorant' not only
turns your society into a tightly controlled cage but reflects a streak of
authoritarianism and megalomania in the 'protectors,' now prevalent among many
technical folks.

------
eighthnate
"In the crucial early hours after the Las Vegas mass shooting, it happened
again: Hoaxes, completely unverified rumors, failed witch hunts, and blatant
falsehoods spread across the internet."

It's the nature of the internet and social media. People rant, rave and
gossip. It's not google or facebook's job to curate what people say, think or
do.

I wish google and facebook and the social media companies would unite to fight
back against traditional media. They've been attacked for the past couple of
years relentlessly.

> their active role in damaging the quality of information reaching the
> public.

With all due respect. If google/fb/social media wanted to filter out quality
of information, they would ban theatlantic and the rest of the traditional
media.

At the end of the day, this guy is just complaining that people are being
people. Eventually things get sorted out.

Looking at the guy's stories list, it seems like all he does is whine about
facebook and social media.

[https://www.theatlantic.com/author/alexis-
madrigal/](https://www.theatlantic.com/author/alexis-madrigal/)

Who is alexis madrigal that we should even pay attention to him?

------
HillaryBriss
> Gabe Rivera, who runs a tech-news service called Techmeme that uses humans
> and algorithms to identify important stories ...

wait a second, you mean a 3rd party site can do a better job at filtering out
fake news than Google/Facebook? and people can instead just _go to a 3rd party
site for high quality news?_

but The Atlantic thinks Google/Facebook should have all the power and ace out
the little 3rd party companies who offer a better product?

waaaaah?!

~~~
mythrwy
Some conservatives are concerned about liberal viewpoints on Facebook and
consider it a conspiracy. Some liberals are concerned about conservative
viewpoints on Facebook and consider it a conspiracy. Almost everyone is
concerned about "trash" when it takes a viewpoint they oppose, less concerned
about trash when it promotes a viewpoint they agree with.

Everyone thinks they know what "Fake News" is and most people who are vested
think Google's algorithms should rank them higher and less deserving sites
lower.

As with most human opinion it's a matter of self interest and so is the parent
article. Stripped of the holier than thou mantel it's whining about page
ranking. Common whine. Lots of us have it. But most of us aren't nasty enough
to seize on tragedy in order to make the point. Which is just another piece of
evidence about the nature of old media and why it shouldn't have a monopoly on
information.

Personally I'm ok with semi-dumb pipes. I think in the aggregate it's better
for all of us regardless of persuasion.

------
jerkstate
Google admits to scraping 4chan for news stories. This isn't just about "the
algorithms" \- a human decided that 4chan could potentially show up in that
carousel.

[https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2017/10/googl...](https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2017/10/google-admits-citing-4chan-to-spread-fake-vegas-shooter-
news/)

 _Google News ' statement claims that these false reports landed on the
service's "Top Stories" feed due to a burst of activity for a name that had
never received many search attempts. "When the fresh 4chan story broke, it
triggered Top Stories, which unfortunately led to this inaccurate result," the
statement reads._

 _" We use a number of signals to determine the ranking of results—this
includes both the authoritativeness of a site as well as how fresh it is," the
statement continues. "We're constantly working to improve the balance and, in
this case, did not get it right."_

~~~
soundwave106
Last I heard, 4Chan founder Chris Poole now is employed by Google as of about
a year ago. Shortly after that, people on various boards noticed /pol/ results
etc. showing up in Google News. I'm not sure if there's a coincidence in that
timing or not :)

At any rate, yeah, someone had to approve including message boards as a
potential source to scrape for news. Not a good decision in my mind -- 4Chan's
reputation makes this decision even more questionable, sure, but I can't think
of _any_ general social media / message boards / comment sections / etc. that
would qualify as "news" in my mind. Certainly this lowers the value of Google
News to me.

------
morsmodr
The value of the systems built by Google and Facebook and the
quality/legitimacy of news from these systems is pretty much dependent on the
users. The feeds are built by what users share. A platform is only as good as
the people contributing to it.

When it is known that insanity in individuals is rare but in groups, nations,
epochs (and also internet) it is the rule - do not look at google/facebook
news feeds to be sources of valid information. If we all are smart and
intelligent enough to use these systems wisely, the benefits are enormous. But
it also allows trolls and people who want to create confusion to operate with
freedom.

For no or 0 money you will obviously get poor quality news. You need editors
to verify sources and then put them in print or online. Go and pay an online
newspaper so their editors will have jobs to do what you expect and they do
not need to publish click-bait articles just for ad money so that their firm
can make money.

------
restlessmedia
If the results can't be trusted, don't use Google or (especially) Facebook as
your news sources. As understand it, Google will aggregate its news - it
hasn't got someone picking the articles. Stick with an established news source
- i'll pick the BBC because I live in the UK.

------
partycoder
The reason fake news, clickbait and SEO techniques on poor content are able to
prevail is the same reason spam mail is still a thing in 2017. Because it's an
evolutionary race where each innovation is countered by a trick to avoid it.

------
jtbayly
"The problems with surfacing this man’s group to Facebook users is obvious to
literally any human. But to Facebook’s algorithms, it’s just a fast-growing
group with an engaged community."

"Most people who joined the group looking for information presumably don’t
know that the founder is notorious for legal and informational hijinks."

Those two paragraphs appear back to back in the article and are completely
contradictory. 5000 people joined because it _isn 't_ "obvious to literally
every human."

[edited to add quotation marks to make my comment clearer]

------
jessaustin
It isn't important for the general public to know accurate trivia about tragic
events within hours of their occurrence. One would think a _monthly magazine_
writer would know that...

------
oelmekki
Actually, I would tend to think net neutrality should apply to content host as
well. Provided content is not illegal, obviously.

The best to do to fight false info is to shame those who share it, just like
we shame news outlets which do not verify their sources. It's probably the
best way to make sure everybody double check what they post (plus, if citizen
start to check their sources, that's a huge win).

------
sharemywin
If you get your news from your neighbor, friend, relative or a site that
claims to be satire, your probably confusing gossip with news.

------
amarant
Not to deny there's a problem but this quote: "the problems in the system
because there are computers in the decision loop"... Does the author expect
hand made search results?

------
j2kun
It's at least a little bit ironic that on the same day major news outlets were
announcing the death of a celebrity before he had actually died, and the story
stayed up for hours.

------
convolvatron
Google and Facebook were in it for the general good? ..i never knew

------
sandov
People being too stupid to discern between 4chan and real news is not
Facebook's nor Google's nor my problem. How about promoting critical thinking
instead?.

------
eurticket
I think more of an issue besides google and facebook would be the way
reporters used the information and also presented twitter as a unequivocal
source of information.

