A DarkCyber Tip: Stay On Google’s Good Side
September 20, 2019
If your Web site does not appear in Google, it might as well not exist. Being in the top Google search results is key to your Web site’s success or failure, but how do you get in the top search results? The answer is: being on Google’s good side. Bit Rebels explains how to be on good terms with Google in the article, “How Important Is Getting On Google’s Good Side.”
You want to focus on getting in Google’s top search results, because 73% of all online searches are conducted via it. Google is the big guns when it comes to online search and if you get to the top of Google, then you will get to the top of the remaining search engines.
Being on the second, third, and fourth pages might appear to be an accomplishment, but humans have short attention spans and do not want to browse. Humans want instantaneous results, so that action involves a once over of the first page and clicking on a link.
Do not forget that SEO is an important part of high rankings:
“At this point, you probably have an idea what search engine optimization, SEO, is. In case you don’t, though, it’s the process of making your website more attractive to a search engine. When the popular search engine that is Google arranges results, it does so using specific criteria; relevance of the domain name to the search keywords, website speed and reliability, relevance of web content, popularity and several other factors.
We also noted:
What’s more, Google also takes into consideration how many clicks does your website often get. So, if it is a frequently visited website, it would automatically get bumped up the results page. Having said that, get ready to scoop the leftovers of your mind off the floor because we’re about to blow it to bit.”
To get on Google’s good side the formula is simple: create good content, concentrate on SEO, gets hits, and maybe invest in some online advertising?
Whitney Grace, September 20, 2019
YouTube: Will It Continue to Fancy Dance to the Editorial Control Be Bop?
September 20, 2019
Kids these days have ambitions of being astronauts, writers, scientists, and YouTubers. YouTubers are social media influences with mass followings that make decent livings through YouTube, mostly through ad revenue. YouTubers love and hate their platform of choice and it does not come as a surprise due to how controversial YouTube has become. The Guardian runs down YouTube’s recent headlines and spoke with YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki in the article, “YouTube’s Susan Wojcicki: ‘Where’s The Line Of Free Speech-Are You Removing Voices That Should Be Heard?’”
YouTube faces frequent scandals, involving its creators posting questionable content like hate speech, Holocaust deniers, etc. And there are those pedophiles who communicate in the comments of children’s videos or engage in code speak related to videos posted by a doting parent for digitally aware Silver Surfer.
YouTube made some progress with anti-hate speech policies to curb hate mongering videos and periodic takedowns. YouTube allegedly has a 10,000 alert, morally upright, dedicated human moderators working with smart software and systems able to the alleged five hundred hours of video posted every minute. Wojcicki seems to say her Googley unit cannot catch every instance of hate speech and questionable video, but they are trying and making a good effort at it.
The video streaming platform is one of the most popular ways Americans entertain themselves and generate money for the online ad giant. The problem is these scandals and bad actor videos that stain YouTube’s reputation, but does removing/banning them violate free speech:
“But hasn’t it been dangerously influential? [Wojcicki] pauses. ‘Look, [these question videos are] a very small percentage of our views, and the way that we think about it is: ‘Is this content violating one of our policies? Has it violated anything in terms of hate, harassment?’ If it has, we remove that content. We keep tightening and tightening the policies. We also get criticism, just to be clear, [about] where do you draw the lines of free speech and, if you draw it too tightly, are you removing voices of society that should be heard? We’re trying to strike a balance of enabling a broad set of voices, but also making sure that those voices play by a set of rules that are healthy conversations for society.’”
This particular write up adds a human dimension to the problem of hate speech and child abuse. Wojcicki’s life includes hobbies. (Imagine. A hard working Type A Googler having a hobby.) She is determined to leave a strong legacy and wants to influence more women to work in the technology industry. A good attitude is a plus when working for a company whose top lawyer makes headlines about personal behavior and the video content contains some darned awful data.
YouTube would have made a great MBA case study had not the market for MBAs imploded and free online classes demonstrated that MBA students go to school for contacts, not learning.
Nevertheless, a great case study awaits.
Whitney Grace, September 20, 2019
YouTube Recommendation Engine Benefits Advertisers, Users?
September 17, 2019
Beware the YouTube recommendation engine, especially where the kids are concerned. We are warned by Scientific American in its piece, “YouTube’s Recommendation Algorithm Has a Dark Side.” (And, no, this is not about the pedophile thing.) Writer Zeynep Tufekci readily admits there is a lot of good information on YouTube. In fact, that is why just staying away is not an option for most internet users. He cautions us, though, not to go for the worthy instructions and stay for the captivating rubbish. He writes:
“‘How do I’ assemble that table, improve my stroke, decide if I’m a feminist, choose vaccinations, highlight my cheeks, tie my shoelaces, research whether climate change is real…? Someone on YouTube has an answer. But the site has also been targeted by extremists, conspiracy theorists and reactionaries who understand its role as a gateway to information, especially for younger generations. And therein lies the dark side: YouTube makes money by keeping users on the site and showing them targeted ads. To keep them watching, it utilizes a recommendation system powered by top-of-the-line artificial intelligence (it’s Google, after all). Indeed, after Google Brain, the company’s AI division, took over YouTube’s recommendations in 2015, there were laudatory articles on how it had significantly increased ‘engagement’: Silicon Valley–speak for enticing you to stay on the site longer. These ‘recommended’ videos play one after the other. … YouTube’s algorithms will push whatever they deem engaging, and it appears they have figured out that wild claims, as well as hate speech and outrage peddling, can be particularly so.”
We’re reminded that kids (most of whom do not have the experience to consistently discern good information from bad) are likely to go to Google-owned YouTube with their questions before any other search platform because, like it or not, they much prefer video to text. Couple that with the fact that Google’s Chromebooks, which come preloaded with YouTube, dominate the U.S. K-12 market. Grown-ups probably underestimate how much time young people spend on the platform, and especially how often they are lured away from approved educational fare.
Tufekci’s suggestion is for Google to disable the recommendation engine on schools’ Chromebooks. That would be a good place to start, but how do we convince a pusher to cut off its youngest and most vulnerable users? Legislation may be required.
Google wants engagement. Google wants revenue. Is the Google speak making these two factors too difficult for users to discern?
Cynthia Murrell, September 17, 2019
Amazon and Google Discover Tension
September 17, 2019
Google is proud of its search algorithms’ secret sauce. Google does not share its secret sauce with anyone else, because Google likes to be the top search provider in the western hemisphere. Google hates it when anyone other than Google manipulates its search results. Amazon results tend to rank at the top of many Google searches and Google wants to stop that says Tame Bay in the story, “Google Search Diversity Update To Challenge Amazon Discovery Dominance.”
Google wants its search results to be more diverse. Instead of returning a list of Amazon links to queries, no more than two Amazon links or other dominant Web pages will appear in search results. Searchmetrics wanted to know how many Web sites dominated Google search results. Searchmetrics discovered:
“Searchmetrics analyzed top ten search results on Google.com for 10,000 words before and after the diversity update. The research says that three URLs from one domain are now appearing for 3.5% of the analyzed keywords. That’s down from 6.7% before the update. This halves the chance of shoppers to see the same website appearing three times in the ten ranking positions.”
With the diversity update Amazon is limited to only two links in a box above third-party organic search results. Google did state if the search results from one domain are specifically relevant to the query then it would display more results from that specific Web site.
The downside is that sellers with paid Amazon listings will be pushed lower in the search rankings. However, it proves the argument that sellers need to diversify their marketplace with their own Web site and other channels to sell their products, instead of relying only on Amazon.
Whitney Grace, September 17, 2019
YouTube May Be Too Big to Monitor or Fail
September 17, 2019
A friend if mine who shall remain nameless, but who is a Baby Boomer and not technology illiterate once said that the United States government should just shut down the entire Dark Web. I burst out laughing at this statement and incredulously he asked why I guffawed. After explaining how wide spread the Dark Web is, the number of countries involved, and using the “herding cats” metaphor my point was made. Google is facing the same problem as it tries to sanitize YouTube, you can read the story from IT Wire.
YouTube is a big Web site and its expanse does not know an end. Google’s CEO Sundar Puchai stated to CNN that it was too difficult to clean up the entire video platform. YouTube tends to obey the US’s First Amendment Right to Freedom of Speech, but there is a mega backlash when it comes to YouTube hosting harmful content.
The definition of “harmful and malicious” content varies. The general consensus is videos related to neo-Nazism, white supremacy, racist, nudity, promoting terrorism, sexism, hate speech, and anything that specifically targets ethnic or social groups in a negative fashion fits the harmful definition.
Pichai said that using a combination humans and machines Google has gotten 99% of YouTube sanitation right, but videos still sneak between the upload cracks. This reminds me of Web filters “supposed’ to protect children from harmful Internet content, but they always took things to the extreme. Pichai admitted that while he wants the harmful content on YouTube to be well below 1%, he admitted that any large scale system will have a trace amount of fraud, take credit cards for example. Pichai remained silent when confronted with a conspiracy question:
“Asked why YouTube had taken nearly seven years to remove videos claiming that the massacre of children at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut in 2012 never took place, Pichai did not give a straight answer, but danced around, saying he wished that the company had gotten to the task of removing such videos much earlier. The Google chief was not asked about the fact that numerous alternative media sites have now been demonetized as a result of the purge of content which Google says is unsuitable for YouTube.”
Yep, impossible.
Whitney Grace, September 17, 2019
Tools and Tips for Google Analytics Implementations
September 16, 2019
Here is a handy resource to bookmark for anyone with Google Analytics in their future. Hacking Analytics describes “The Complexity of Implementing Google Analytics.” Writer and solution architect/ data manager Julien Kervizic explains:
“There is more than just placing a small snippet on a website to implement Google analytics. There are different integration patterns in order to capture the data into Google Analytics, and each integration is subject to a lot of pitfalls and potential regressions needed to guard against. There are also question as to whether or how to use the different APIs provided by GA.”
Kervizic begins by detailing three primary integration patterns: scraping a website, pushing events into a JavaScript data layer, and tapping into structured data. Next are several pitfalls one might run into and ways to counter each. See the write-up for those details.
Of course, your tracking setup is futile if it is not maintained. We learn about automated tests and monitoring tools to help with this step. Last but not least are Google Analytics APIs; Kervizic writes:
“Implementing Google analytics, sometimes requires integrating with Google Analytics APIs, be it for reporting purpose, to push some backend data, or to provide cost or product information. Google Analytics has 3 main APIs for these purposes.”
These are the three main APIs: the reporting API, augmented with the dimensions & metrics explorer for checking different field-naming; the measurement protocol with its hit builder tool for setting up requests; and the management API for automating data imports, managing audiences, and uploading cost info from third-party ad providers.
Cynthia Murrell, September 16, 2019
Alternatives To Google Products
September 15, 2019
Google remains a dominant feature in millions of lives, whether you use the search engine, email, free office suite, or any of the other Google physical or digital products. While some individuals have totally given themselves over to the Google cult, there remain stalwart dissenters such as the SGT Report have not: “The Complete List Of Alternatives To Google Products.”
The list for Google product alternatives was made because:
“With growing concerns over online privacy and securing personal data, more people than ever are considering alternatives to Google products. After all, Google’s business model essentially revolves around data collection and advertisements, both of which infringe on your privacy. More data means better (targeted) ads and more revenue. The company pulled in over $116 billion in ad revenue last year alone – and that number continues to grow. But the word is getting out. A growing number of people are seeking alternatives to Google products that respect their privacy and data.”
The main reason people use Google is as a search engine. There are a wide variety of alternatives and they note that these alternate search engines do filter their results from Google or Bing. Apparently there is only one search engine with its own crawler: Mojeek from the UK.
The list continues with more alternatives to Gmail, Chrome, Google Drive, Google Calendar, Google Docs/Slides/Sheets, Google Photos, Google Translate, Google Maps, Google Analytics, and the Google Play Store. There are even alternatives to YouTube, but the majority of these are hit and miss with their content. The Google Play Store his rivalry by F-Droid, an installable catalog of free and open source software. The only problem is the applications are only for Android. Curses to Apple!
These alternatives are great, but they do have their weaknesses. Google has its evils, privacy issues among them are the worst. However, you have to admit it does make good products. Just stay away from the speakers and use Firefox.
Whitney Grace, September 15, 2019
Google Maps: Complex and Tricky for Some Users
September 12, 2019
Google Maps has become the one stop map tool due to its reliability, ease of use, accuracy, and wealth of information. The map app, however, is not as accurate as you think says Media Street in the article, “You Can’t Trust Google Maps To Find It All-Fake Businesses Are Everywhere.” The Wall Street Journal discovered that nearly eleven million businesses listed on Google Maps are fake. Other companies create the listings to boost their own business info ahead of the competition and others are scams.
In 2018, Google removed more than three million fake listings and more than 90% were removed before a user saw them. Users reported 250,000 fake profiles, while Google’s own system flagged 85% of the removals. Google encourages users to report anything suspicious or appears fraudulent.
Google does its best to track down the fake businesses:
“Google typically verifies if a business is legit by calling, mailing a postcard, or emailing a numerical code that is then entered on the website. It’s a pretty easy process for savvy scammers who likely use fake addresses and businesses for their listings anyway. Knowing this, the company says that they are constantly developing new ways to weed out fake listings, but can’t elaborate on what they are due to the sensitive nature.
Every month Maps is used by more than a billion people around the world, and every day we and our users work as a community to improve the map for each other,’ Google Maps’ product director, Ethan Russell, wrote in the blog post. ‘We know that a small minority will continue trying to scam others, so there will always be work to do and we’re committed to keep doing better.’”
There are ways to be wise to scams. You can avoid businesses that have names that included “dependable” or “emergency,” screen your phone calls, do not trust all the reviews, and also do your own research. See if the business has a Web site, check other review sites, view social media accounts, etc. Never forget to trust your gut instinct either.
Whitney Grace, September 12, 2019
YouTube and Copyright: Changes Made
September 11, 2019
Finally YouTube Changes Its Horrible Copyright System
YouTubers love and hate their platform of choice. They love that they have the freedom to make videos, but they hate YouTube’s unfair copyright infringement system. If you are unfamiliar with YouTube’s copyright infringement system, then read Gizmodo’s article, “YouTube Announces Some Changes To Its Infamously Awful Copyright Infringement System.”
The opening paragraph says it all:
“The number of issues plaguing YouTube at any one time boggles the mind, and range from accusations it promotes extremist content to reports its nightmare algorithm recommended home videos of children to the pedophiles infesting its comments sections. One of the less overtly alarming but still widespread issues has been the shoddy state of its copyright infringement claims system, which report after report have repeatedly indicated is trivially abused to file false claims, extort creators, and generally make YouTubers’ lives hell.”
YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki announced in July 2019 that there would be numerous changers to the copyright claim system. The copyright claim system is different from the copyright infringement system, because the former is manual. Anyone who files a claim through the copyright claim system will need to input exact timestamps of the violation, instead of flagging an entire video.
Before YouTubers were not told how one of their videos violated a copyright claim. The new timestamp system will highlight the video’s section that is under scrutiny. YouTube will also promote more of its tools to make a video copyright compliant, such as muting sound or deleting a segment. These tools were available before, but YouTubers were unaware of where in their videos the problem was.
Problems still exist for content creators using copyrighted material for reviews, education, research, or news. Many YouTubers who make these types of videos claim their content falls under fair use guidelines.
Maybe the suffering of some YouTubers will lessen. Maybe.
Whitney Grace, September 11, 2019
Google Translate Continues to Improve
September 10, 2019
Google Translate is a handy tool, imperfect though it may be. Google made some cosmetic changes to the UI earlier this year, and now is rolling more substantial improvements. Pakistan’s Technology Times reports, “Google AI Translation Adds 60 New Languages.” Not only are more languages, from Afrikanns to Zulu, now included, the translate-images function has gotten a boost. Writer Sayyed Shehzer Abbas tells us:
“The prevalent tech giant Google is rolling out a significant update to the camera feature on its Translate app. The new version of the app adds support for 60 new languages. It’s great news for regular users of Google Translate, where the camera feature is fantastically useful for translating things like menus and signs. Key to the update is the integration of Google’s AI translation methods, known as neural machine translation (NMT). These models have been incorporated into Google Lens and the web version of Translate, but they are now supporting instant camera translation, too.
We noted these languages:
“New languages supported in the update include: Afrikaans, Arabic, Bengali, Estonian, Greek, Hindi, Igbo, Javanese, Kurdish, Latin, Latvian, Malay, Mongolian, Nepali, Pashto, Persian, Samoan, Sesotho, Slovenian, Swahili, Thai, Vietnamese, Welsh, Xhosa, Yoruba, Urdu and Zulu.
We learned:
“The updated version of the Google translate app will also automatically detect what language it’s looking at, which is handy if you’re traveling in a region where multiple languages are common.”
The write-up emphasizes the importance of language translation to companies like Google. It has become a benchmark for evaluating an enterprise’s AI capabilities, and it underpins software many have come to rely on, like AI assistance, commerce, and social media. Will Translate put Google ahead of the competition?
Cynthia Murrell, September 10, 2019
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