YouTube Brings Back Checking an ID: Just Like a College Bar
October 6, 2020
In the face of criticisms and penalties, YouTube turns to machine learning to keep harmful content from young eyes. A very brief post at Axios reports, “YouTube Will Use Tech Updates to Better Enforce Age Restrictions.” Writer Sara Fischer lists the three upcoming changes:
“1. [YouTube] will begin using machine learning to automatically apply age restrictions to content on its platform around the world.
2. It’s using technology to identify age-restrictive content so that when viewers discover age-restricted videos embedded on most third-party websites, they will now be required to log in to watch those videos in order to verify their age.
3. It will start to request that some users in Europe verify their age with a valid ID or credit card, in response to new EU regulations, like the Audiovisual Media Services Directive.”
Let us leave aside the ease with which youngsters can get around age verification measures. We wonder how well this AI will be able to discern age-restricted content. Sure, a lot will be obvious, even to an algorithm. But how much harmful content will slip through? We hope the software does not give the company a false sense of security. On the other hand, we expect the number of channels wrongly censored to jump—will there be enough human moderators to flip their videos’ statuses back? Some people depend on this avenue for income, after all. AI can be a valuable tool, but human oversight is still needed. Now about those health department warnings at the “Do Drop Inn”?
Cynthia Murrell, October 6, 2020
Googzilla: Just Doing Its Thing
October 2, 2020
Like Android. Learn to love the Google Play Store. The walled garden has few doors. And Google is striking back against the metasearch engine DuckDuckGo too. DarkCyber is not a big fan of metasearch systems. The “old” Vivisimo system was okay, but now deduping becomes filtering. It is difficult to determine why certain “known” content is excluded from a results list.
What’s this have to do with Google, a company which loses sleep over Qwant. You know about Qwant, right? The Google is now worried about DuckDuckGo. “As Predicted, Google’s Search Preference menu Eliminates DuckDuckGo” reports a deletion: Is this hasta la vista, Duck thing?
The write up states:
The Q4 2020 results of Google’s search preference menu auction have been released and, as we predicted, DuckDuckGo has been eliminated in most countries.This EU antitrust remedy is only serving to further strengthen Google’s dominance in mobile search by boxing out alternative search engines that consumers want to use and, for those search engines that remain, taking most of their profits from the preference menu.
The write up explains:
DuckDuckGo, despite being the Google alternative that consumers most want to select, will no longer appear in most countries. As a result, many EU residents buying a new Android device will no longer have an easy way to adopt a private search engine.
The Google will accept money to display just about any search engine in which one might be interested. Well, perhaps not even cash will allow Tblop.com to appear, but that’s a guess from the DarkCyber research team.
If Duck thing does not pay, so be it. Googzilla effectively stomps another click sucking upstart.
Observations:
- Google is pushing boundaries in order to get some competitive and revenue matters resolved to its satisfaction before the regulatory hail storm arrives
- Google is doing what Google does: Extend its control over what information is available, from whom, and its mode of access. Guess what that is? If you said, another search system you would be incorrect.
- There is meaningful competition but only a tiny fraction of those online know or use iSeek.com, Swisscow.com, or Yandex.ru (much more useful that Yandex.com in DarkCyber’s opinion.)
Are there risks in monoculture search? From Google’s point of view, of course not. From a researcher’s point of view, absolutely, sky high risks.
Is there a fix? DarkCyber does not want to be a Sad Sally but…
The answer is, “Nope, not after decades of indifference to basic online research precepts.” There is a chance that governments will manifest some backbone, but until it happens or Google self destructs from internal forces, Google defines information, search, and online content.
What? No listing in Google for a Web site, service, person, place, or thing?
The consequence is, gentle reader, that entity effectively does not exist for many online users. Cancel culture or disappeared? You choose, please.
Stephen E Arnold, October 2, 2020
Google and Search Results: A Stay at Home Mother Explains
October 1, 2020
DarkCyber has a sneaking suspicion that Google wants to deliver the answers to users’ queries in a manner which:
- Prevents a user from obtaining non-Google “approved” information
- Requires zero latency between presenting an answer to a query and a click on an advertiser’s message
- Appeals to a statistically significant percentage of users who accept the precept “Google makes one’s research easy”.
Other people do not agree with DarkCyber; for example, Google executives testifying before Congress or Googlers who are paid to explain how wonderful Google really, really is.
“Google Wants to Eliminate Search Engine. Introducing Semantic Search” is an interesting and possibly disconcerting write up. One of the DarkCyber researchers noted for me this passage:
The experts at Google want to eliminate the one thing that Google does best – searching.
Since Google is perceived as search, what’s up? What’s up is that Google wants to deliver the “correct” answer directly to a thumb typing user or an impressionable child using a Chromebook and Google approved information to learn.
The write up explains in cheery stay-at-home mom panache:
With semantic searching, the algorithm working behind the search engine will understand the meaning of the search term and hence provide meaningful results, saving users a lot of hassle and a lot of time. In short, the new search is going to allow users to smart search for everything on the web.
Yep, smart search. Everything. The Web.
Sounds perfect, particularly for Google and its ad-centric approach to services.
Plus, users benefit because search engine optimization will no longer force the ever-smart Google search system to display irrelevant results:
Google is just preventing website owners to dig out the most-searched for keywords and then bulk them on to their websites.
DarkCyber finds the “just” an interesting word. Google just wants to make users better informed. How thoughtful. Research becomes little more than accepting what Google determines is optimal. Why read? Why compare? Why analyze? Google knows best: Best in terms of controlling access to information, shaping perceptions, and selling ads. Yes, that “best” may mean that an advertiser paid to get the click.
The DarkCyber researcher put an exclamation mark next to this passage:
In order to calm website owners down, Google has provided that the new algorithm is going to consist of an improved form of the same algorithm which will provide an opportunity to work towards legitimate optimization instead of spamming.
Yes, be calm. Accept what is delivered.
Stephen E Arnold, October 1, 2020
Google Will Not Play Baseball with a Mere Nation State
September 29, 2020
DarkCyber spotted an interesting article called “Google Slams Arbitration System in Australia’s New Media Code.” We have heard that Googlers are fans of college basketball, specifically the NCAA tournament. And some Googlers are true fans of cricket. Baseball? Those crazy rules. No thanks.
The write up reports:
The system being proposed is called ‘binding final-offer arbitration’, referred to in the US as ‘baseball arbitration’.
DarkCyber thinks baseball arbitration works like this:
- Side A and Side B cannot agree
- Each side writes up a best and final offer
- An objective entity picks one
- The decision is binding.
Google’s view is that the system is not fair. The write up includes this passage:
Google said it is happy to negotiate fairly and, if needed, see a standard dispute resolution scheme in place. “But given the inherent problems with ‘baseball arbitration’, and the unfair rules that underpin it here, the model being proposed isn’t workable for Google”. [The Google voice is that of Mel Silva, VP, Google Australia and New Zealand.
The issue seems to be that a US company is not going to play ball with a country. Which is more important for citizens of Australia?
Google appears to adopt the position that its corporate interests override the nation state’s. The country — Australia in this case — seems to hold the old fashioned, non Silicon Valley view that its interests are more important.
DarkCyber believes that Googlers will perceive Australia’s intransigence as “not logical.” Google is logical as evidenced by this article “Alphabet Promises to No Longer Bung Tens of Millions of Dollars to Alleged Sex Pest Execs Who Quit Mid-Probe.” Logical indeed.
Stephen E Arnold, September 29, 2020
Microsoft Bing: Assertions Versus Actual Search Results
September 25, 2020
DarkCyber read “Introducing the Next Wave of AI at Scale innovations in Bing.” The write up explains a number of innovations. These enhancements will make finding information via Bing easier, better, faster, and generally more wonderful.
The main assertions DarkCyber noted are:
Smarter suggestions. The idea is that one does not know how to create a search query. Bing will know what the user wants.
More ideas. Bing will display questions other people (presumably just like me) ask. Bing keeps track and shows the popular questions. Yep, popular.
Translations. Send a query with mixed languages, and Bing will answer in your language. No more of that copying and pasting into Google Translate or Freetranslations.org.
Highlighting. This is Bing’s yellow marker. The system will highlight what you need to read. The method? “A zero-shot fashion.” No, DarkCyber does not know what this means. But one can ask Bing, right?
Let’s give Bing a whirl and run the same query against Googzilla.
Here’s a DarkCyber Bing query related to research we are now doing:
Black Sage open source
And here’s the result:
Black Sage is an integrator engaged in the development of counter unmanned aerial systems. The firm’s marketing collateral emphasizes that its platform is open. DarkCyber wants to know if the system uses open source methods for compromising a targeted UAS (drone). Bing focuses on a publishing company.
Now Google:
The first result from the Google is a pointer to the company. The remainder of the results are crazy and wacky like the sneakers Mr. Brin wore to Washington about a decade ago to meet elected officials. Crazy? Nope, Sillycon Valley.
DarkCyber uses both Bing and Google. Why did Google produce something sort of related to our query and Bing missed the corn hole entirely?
The answer is that Bing does not process a user’s search history as effectively as the Google. All the fancy words from Microsoft cannot alter a search result. DarkCyber is amused by Google and Microsoft. We are skeptical of each system.
Key points:
- Microsoft is chasing technology instead of looking for efficient ways to tailor results to a user.
- Microsoft wants to prove that its approach is more knowledge-centric. Google just wants to sell ads. Giving people something they have already seen is fine with Mother Google.
- Microsoft, like Google, has lost sight of the utility of providing “stupid mode” and “sophisticated mode” for users. Let users select how a query should be matched to the content in the index.
To sum up, Google has a global share of Web search in the 85 percent range. Bing is an also participated player. Perhaps a less academic approach, deeper index, and functional user controls would be helpful?
Stephen E Arnold, September 25, 2020
Google Joins German Retailers in Digitization Project
September 24, 2020
The German Retail Federation (HDE) has teamed up with Google in what looks like a move to outflank Amazon in that country. MNA International shares this tidbit of information in the very brief post, “German Retailers, Google Launch Digitization Program.” The federation reports the pandemic has had a severe impact on Germany’s retail sector. The write-up reports:
“The digitization program consists of different instruments and is intended to accompany participating companies step by step from the classic offline store to a ‘hybrid company,’ both offline and online, according to HDE. ‘The retail trade forms the foundation of our inner cities and makes an essential contribution to social cohesion,’ said Stephan Tromp, deputy managing director of HDE. The aim of the program, which is directed at around 250,000 companies in Germany, is to ‘strengthen the stationary business with the help of online tools and make it fit for the future,’ according to HDE. The existence of up to 50,000 stores in Germany was threatened, HDE warned. Another reason for the digitization program was that many retail businesses in Germany were only digitalized to a limited extent due to a lack of resources.”
The federation hopes this initiative will make it easy for retailers to move part of their operations online, facilitating their recovery and boosting the economy. We are sure Google has a solid plan to boost its revenue with this program, as well.
Cynthia Murrell, September 24, 2020
Waze: Suffering from the Rona?
September 18, 2020
Less driving and carpooling during the pandemic means less ad revenue for a certain navigation and mapping service. The Verge reports, “Google’s Waze Lays Off 5 Percent of its Workforce, Closes Offices in Asia and Latin America.” For Waze, that five percent represents about 30 folks out of its 555 workers. Those jobs mostly come from the sales, marketing, and partnerships departments. The company hopes to strike a balance by adding a similar number of jobs in technology and engineering in upcoming months. We wish them luck with that. The offices to be shuttered in Malaysia, Singapore, Colombia, Chile, and Argentina also represent a trade-off. Waze plans to focus more on markets in which it had been growing—the US, the UK, France, Brazil, Canada, Italy, and Mexico.
Reporter Andrew J. Hawkins writes:
“As shelter-in-place and working from home become the new norm, fewer people are using Waze for their daily navigation needs. Fewer eyeballs on the app means less advertising revenue for the company. Waze, which was acquired by Google in 2013 for a reported $1.1 billion, has seen a dip in both monthly active users, or the number of customers using the app each month, and driven kilometers, the metric by which the company measures how far its customers drive while using Waze.”
Though Waze’s numbers have been gradually recovering since lockdown restrictions were lifted in some countries, the global weekly driven kilometers dipped by a striking 70 percent in June. As one might imagine, usage the company’s ride-sharing service, Waze Carpool, has also dwindled. We’re told:
“With more people working from home, fewer people are using Waze Carpool to share rides with co-workers or other neighbors who work along a similar route. As a result, Waze is shrinking the number of people who work on its standalone carpooling service. Earlier this year, Waze was on track to cross 1 million monthly carpool trips globally, and now the company is nowhere near that, a spokesperson said.”
DarkCyber finds that completely unsurprising. Hawkins gets much of his information from an email Waze’s CEO Noam Bardin sent to employees, which is reproduced in full at the end of the article. He notes the company is sympathetic to its workers who must say goodbye, and Bardin pledges to help them into the beginning of next year with severances, bonuses, and health insurance.
Cynthia Murrell, September 18, 2020
Google: WFH Engineers with Zero Hands On Real World Knowledge Are an Amusing Group
September 17, 2020
The Google thing is a meh to me. The dumpster fires at YouTube are a source of amazement. Odd ball behaviors in Gmail allow email to appear and disappear with merrie abandon. So be it. We noted “Google, Nobody Asked for a New Blogger Interface”, an interesting essay which tackles a facet of Google we have not paid attention to for years — Blogger.
The write up explains interface changes and behaviors of the editor. Most Blogger users may not care. The author of the TenFourFox Development essay does. As a result, there is a believability and emotion in the write up. Here’s an example:
By switching into HTML view, you lose ($#@%!, stop indenting that line when I type emphasis tags!) the ability to insert hyperlinks, images or other media by any other means other than manually typing them out. You can’t even upload an image, let alone automatically insert the HTML boilerplate and edit it. So switch into Compose view to actually do any of those things, and what happens? Like before, Blogger rewrites your document, but now this happens all the time because of what you can’t do in HTML view. Certain arbitrarily-determined naughtytags(tm) like <em> become <i> (my screen-reader friends will be disappointed).
There’s more, including the clunky workaround the TenFourFox Development author has figured out.
Welcome to the new and improved Google?
Several observations:
- Changes at Google often emerge before someone with actual hands on experience is aware of the changes. Don’t you love those rippling changes across time zones from Google search professionals? Same deal. Make a change. Go forth. Catch up later? Maybe. Maybe not.
- With less human-to-human Foosball interaction, advice is not shared casually. Consequently young entitled wizards do things and without rules or effective management, stuff happens. Case in point: The introduction of changes without considering 360 degree impacts. What 21 year old thinks beyond a single point of focus: Hey, this works. Not many.
- When managers are involved, those individuals often have their sights set on the next big thing; that is, a lateral arabesque to a task that will deliver fame, glory, and a bonus or a promotion. The utility of a change from a user’s perspective is not part of the job description.
For that reason, YouTube throttling, ad injection, and irrelevant search results seem to be the new normal. Don’t you love entering a query with a phrase in quotes. Google happily displays results with a required word excluded from the results list. Hey, those are really unhelpful fixes in my opinion. The policies burn through the ad inventory and annoy “customers”, don’t they? No. I think I understand.
Net net: DarkCyber has concluded that work from home engineers with zero hands on, real world knowledge are an amusing group. Just another task for the affable Google senior management to tackle. Unfortunately disconnects in Blogger are examples of an interior deterioration of bits and basics. That’s not amusing.
Stephen E Arnold, September 17, 2020
Google Bert: Why Not Apply Method to Advertising?
September 17, 2020
DarkCyber noted this story: “Google Accused of Allowing Scammers to Display Fake Adverts for Debt Help Online.” The main point is that questionable advertisements continue to appear for some Google users. Google needs advertising revenue to pay to keep the plumbing shipshape. Extra money is needed to fund noble projects like the Loon balloon and solving death.
Does Google have a potential solution?
“Google Using Language AI Model to Match Stories with Fact Checks” raises the possibility that the company can. The write up reports:
Google is now leveraging BERT, one of its language AI models, in full coverage news stories to better match stories with fact checks and better understand what results are most relevant to the queries posted on Search. The more advanced AI-based systems like BERT-based language capabilities can understand more complex, natural-language queries.
But maybe not?
The article points out:
Google has more than 10,000 search quality raters, people who collectively perform millions of sample searches and rate the quality of the results.
DarkCyber thinks there may be another reason for faulty advertising screening.
That reason is money. Google needs cash and laying off people, automating, and fending off Amazon, Facebook, and Microsoft is expensive. Maybe any advertising is judged differently from other types of content.
Stephen E Arnold, September 17, 2020
Apple, Google Make it Easier for States to Adopt Virus Tracing App
September 12, 2020
Google and Apple created an app that would, with the cooperation of state governments, aid in tracing the spread of the coronavirus and notify citizens if they spent time around someone known to have tested positive. It is nice to see these rivals working together for the common good. So far, though, only a few states have adopted the technology. In order to encourage more states to join in, AP News reveals, “Apple, Google Build Virus-Tracing Tech Directly into Phones.” Reporter Matt O’Brien writes:
“Apple and Google are trying to get more U.S. states to adopt their phone-based approach for tracing and curbing the spread of the coronavirus by building more of the necessary technology directly into phone software. That could make it much easier for people to get the tool on their phone even if their local public health agency hasn’t built its own compatible app. The tech giants on Tuesday launched the second phase of their ‘exposure notification’ system, designed to automatically alert people if they might have been exposed to the coronavirus. Until now, only a handful of U.S. states have built pandemic apps using the tech companies’ framework, which has seen somewhat wider adoption in Europe and other parts of the world.”
In states that do adopt the system, iPhone users will be prompted for consent to run it on their phones. Android users will have to download the app, which Google will auto-generate for each public health agency that participates. Early adopters are expected to be Maryland, Nevada, Virginia, and Washington D.C. Virginia was the first to use the framework to launch a customized app in early August, followed by North Dakota, Wyoming, Alabama, and Nevada. O’Brien describes how it works:
“The technology relies on Bluetooth wireless signals to determine whether an individual has spent time near anyone else who has tested positive for the virus. Both people in this scenario must have signed up to use the Google-Apple technology. Instead of geographic location, the app relies on proximity. The companies say the app won’t reveal personal information either to them or public health officials.”
This all sounds helpful. However, the world being what it is today, we must ask: does this have surveillance applications? Perhaps. Note we’re promised the app won’t “reveal” personal data, but will it retain it? If it does, will agencies be able to resist this big, juicy pile of data? Promises about surveillance have a way of being broken, after all.
Cynthia Murrell, September 12, 2020
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
