<story><title>Google workers discussed tweaking search after travel ban</title><url>https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-workers-discussed-tweaking-search-function-to-counter-travel-ban-1537488472</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>kstenerud</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s bad enough to foster an echo chamber to your personal biases, as is currently standard operating procedure. But to actively engage in hidden manipulation of public views strikes at the very heart of democracy. Democracy only works because of the wisdom of crowds [1], and the wisdom of crowds only works if each participant has independent knowledge. The more people rely upon a shared source of knowledge and truth, the less accurate their collective wisdom becomes.&lt;p&gt;Practically, this means that anyone with wide enough influence can directly affect democratic outcomes, which defeats the entire purpose, and the level of influence possible these days is unprecedented.&lt;p&gt;So regardless of what actually did or did not happen, the fact that a few companies ARE in a position to wield this kind of influential power should strike fear into the heart of every free citizen of every democratic nation.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.amazon.com&amp;#x2F;Wisdom-Crowds-James-Surowiecki&amp;#x2F;dp&amp;#x2F;0385721706&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.amazon.com&amp;#x2F;Wisdom-Crowds-James-Surowiecki&amp;#x2F;dp&amp;#x2F;038...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>TomMckenny</author><text>In this case what did or did not happen was that some employees noticed that search results for &amp;quot;Muslim&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;Latino&amp;quot; were almost exclusively anti-Muslim and anti-Latino. Since the typical person searching for those terms is obviously interested in a broader view, the algorithm was flawed or even gamed. The article title is click-baity.&lt;p&gt;But I agree it is terrifying that there are companies devoted to an overt political stance that have vast reach and even monopolies in many markets like Sinclair [0] and others [1]&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;List_of_stations_owned_or_operated_by_Sinclair_Broadcast_Group&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;List_of_stations_owned_or_oper...&lt;/a&gt;
[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Fox_Networks_Group#International&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Fox_Networks_Group#Internation...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>Google workers discussed tweaking search after travel ban</title><url>https://www.wsj.com/articles/google-workers-discussed-tweaking-search-function-to-counter-travel-ban-1537488472</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>kstenerud</author><text>It&amp;#x27;s bad enough to foster an echo chamber to your personal biases, as is currently standard operating procedure. But to actively engage in hidden manipulation of public views strikes at the very heart of democracy. Democracy only works because of the wisdom of crowds [1], and the wisdom of crowds only works if each participant has independent knowledge. The more people rely upon a shared source of knowledge and truth, the less accurate their collective wisdom becomes.&lt;p&gt;Practically, this means that anyone with wide enough influence can directly affect democratic outcomes, which defeats the entire purpose, and the level of influence possible these days is unprecedented.&lt;p&gt;So regardless of what actually did or did not happen, the fact that a few companies ARE in a position to wield this kind of influential power should strike fear into the heart of every free citizen of every democratic nation.&lt;p&gt;[1] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.amazon.com&amp;#x2F;Wisdom-Crowds-James-Surowiecki&amp;#x2F;dp&amp;#x2F;0385721706&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.amazon.com&amp;#x2F;Wisdom-Crowds-James-Surowiecki&amp;#x2F;dp&amp;#x2F;038...&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Waterluvian</author><text>For some reason I just had a sudden idea about democracy being like Monte Carlo localization. We don&amp;#x27;t need everyone to have the same, or even correct ideas. We need a whole lot of disagreeable perspectives to consider and explore. That way we don&amp;#x27;t get trapped in ideological local minima.</text></comment>