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Tizer
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 Posted -
23/06/2011
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09:34
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I posted a warning about developments at Google in the Attention thread and Belle asked for suggestions of alternative search engines. I thought it would be sensible to repeat the warning and my suggested alternative here in a separate thread and let others have the chance to give alternatives to Google or make comments. Here is the content of my original posts...
Tizer: "I listened to Radio 4's `Start the Week' on Monday and was worried by what I heard there about the latest development in internet search engines. Google are now `selecting' what results they give you to your searches based on what they have recorded from all your previous searches. In other words, two people will get different results to the same search. It's causing much concern among folk who know about it because of the way it will reinforce people's present beliefs rather than providing them with objective information. If an anti-semitist, for instance, makes Google searches now he will increasingly get results that support his anti-semitic beliefs and not the web pages that offer a different view.
"The development also has commercial and privacy implications in the way that the information from your search results is sold on to other companies. The man who presented the story on the radio programme said that your `clicks' could be spread to companies wordlwide in seconds and change your `profile' second by second, allowing them to modify what they offer you in the way of products and services. George Orwell eat your heart out!"
Belle: "This explains why google search results have been so linited recently..it won't be long before the internet is unusable."
Tizer: "Belle, I'm not seeing any significant decline in the number of results I get from searches but I had noticed that some important web sites seemed to be missing, ones that I would have expected to turn up from the keywords that I entered. It seems to confirm what the man on the radio was saying and Google is deciding what `it' thinks I should have rather than giving me all relevant results objectively and leaving it to me to choose which I want to browse. Somebody on the radio programme said that when he bought a newspaper he often ended up reading stories that he hadn't been looking for but this widened his knowledge and honed his opinions. If he searches on the internet he can get newspaper stories but they are now being selected to match what he has searched for before, so he's being channelled down one route and without being warned that is the case."
Belle: "Can you suggest another search engine Tizer? i m not a fan of yahoo."
Tizer: "I don't like Yahoo either and the only alternative I can suggest is `Dogpile' which has had good reviews in the past. I think I'll start using it and see how I go on. It's web page is here:
http://www.dogpile.com/
And it's Wikipedia entry here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogpile
Now it's over to the rest of you. Any suggestions or comments on replacing Google? Give Dogpile a trial and let us know your opinion.
EDIT: I should point out that Dogpile is a `meta search engine', i.e. it uses other search engines including Google to find its results. But I'm hoping that using it means my personal results are not being collated and used as described above.
Edited by - Tizer on 23/06/2011 11:29:52
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pluggy
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Posted - 23/06/2011 : 16:43
Welcome to the Internet.
Since all search engines track your activity for finacial gain (ever wonder how they make their money ?) you can rest assured your searches are being tracked whereever you go for searches. to quote Dogpiles wikipedia entry "Dogpile started a campaign in 2008 to use proceeds from site traffic to raise US$1 million for animals in need"
Since they'll be paying for the actual site traffic to their ISP, they have to make enough from passing your details to advertisers to pay that and raise a million bucks to help our furry friends on top.
If you are worried by this, you can either delete your cookies on a regular basis (expect to have to type in details the next time you goto a site thate wants them) or you can use the privacy mode (so called 'pron mode' because its good for hiding the fact you've been on dodgy sites) built into most medern browsers. It deletes all the cookies you gathered whilst in privacy mode when you close down the browser.
You could turn off cookies altogether but you can expect at least half of the internet to stop working if you do. We'll not go into 'Flash cookies' aka local shared objects which are very difficult to deal with and track you anyway.
Welcome to the Internet..........
Need computer work ?
"http://www.stsr.co.uk" 
Pluggy's Household Monitor  |
Tizer
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Posted - 23/06/2011 : 19:45
Pluggy, it's not the tracking of searches that bothers me here - I resigned myself to that years ago. It's the use of the tracking information by Google to channel my attention (and that of other folk) to an increasingly narrow field, like wearing blinkers (as I've outlined in the first post of this thread). As I wrote above "If an anti-semitist, for instance, makes Google searches now he will increasingly get results that support his anti-semitic beliefs and not the web pages that offer a different view."
One of the people in the radio discussion said "If I buy the Telegraph or Guardian I know I'm buying a right or left wing newspaper but you don't realise that it's now also happening with Google searches". I think it's a dangerous development and will lead to even greater segregation into groups of people with opposing beliefs.
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 24/06/2011 : 06:19
I have taken note Tiz and used the Firefox facility to search for Dopile and install it. It is now my regular search engine. I shall report in due time!
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Tizer
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Posted - 24/06/2011 : 11:22
I'm trying it too. I notice that the first few results may be paid-for promos by commercial concerns and we need to ignore those. It depends what type of words you enter. For example, if I enter `German bombers' I get what all seem to be genuine results. If I enter (off the top of my head) `harry potter' I get a Disney promo for a winnie the pooh film first before the real results.
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Cathy
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Posted - 24/06/2011 : 11:24
Just another Big Brother to contend with. 
Remember a while back when it was revealed that google earth had collected more information about us than was intended, when they filmed our streets and houses etc., ...yeah right!!
All thru the fields and meadows gay .... Enjoy
Take Care...Cathy |
tripps
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Posted - 24/06/2011 : 14:03
Tizer - Since dogpile (what a very unfortunate name) in part uses google, then surely the effect you are trying to get rid of will return? I use nothing but google, and am basically satisfied, but I don't like the way it tracks your searches, and puts ads in totally unrelated sites which you later visit. Still - it costs me nothing, and I am free to ignore them.
PS - they could call it Pure. The more alert ones on here will know what I mean.......
Edited by - tripps on 24/06/2011 2:05:18 PM
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Tizer
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Posted - 24/06/2011 : 14:45
Tripps, I agree about the name - but then I've heard worse names used for Google! I don't think that, as you put it, the effect I'm trying to get rid of will return - Dogpile is doing searches for lots of people so Google won't (I hope) know it's for a specific person (i.e. me). See it as Dogpile being your agent rather than you going direct through Google. But I still can't be sure that Dogpile won't try to be extra clever and start feeding something in that identifies my computer to the search engines it uses (or even already does it). But it seems worth giving it a try. So far it doesn't seem any worse than Google in terms of the results I get.
Don't forget that, judging from what we've now learned, Google won't give you an objective set of results for any given key word(s) you enter. The selection of results will be biased towards what Google decides you should have. It's a slippery slope, especially when Google makes so many billions of dollars from its advertisers. What happens when Acme Inc pays Google extra to make sure your results are biased towards their product or service?
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Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 25/06/2011 : 06:45
David, white Pure of course! Wasn't Dogpile first started to campaign against dog faeces on streets in Japan? I seem to have read that somewhere. Seems to be working well so far....
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
gearce
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Posted - 27/06/2011 : 02:30
I, too, noticed changes in the way Google information was being displayed but I'm not savvy enough to know why it was happening.
Anyone tried Bing?
LANG MEY YER LUM REEK
There are hundreds of languages in the world, but a smile speaks them all  |
Cathy
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Posted - 27/06/2011 : 11:07
quote:
Cathy wrote:
Just another Big Brother to contend with.
Remember a while back when it was revealed that google earth had collected more information about us than was intended, when they filmed our streets and houses etc., ...yeah right!!
All thru the fields and meadows gay .... Enjoy
Take Care...Cathy |
Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 28/06/2011 : 07:24
Have gone back to Google. Dogpile is very bad when you're looking for obscure references. The reults seem to be oriented towards popular culture. Try a search for queen Margot, Google brings up the whisky on the first page, DP is swamped by a group of the same name.
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Bradders
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Posted - 28/06/2011 : 10:07
quote:
Stanley wrote: Try a search for queen Margot, Google brings up the whisky on the first page,................. going to call it Gargle from now on !
BRADDERS BLUESINGER |
Tizer
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Posted - 28/06/2011 : 12:57
Perhaps, like we said, Google does know what you want, so it knows you are always searching for whisky, not pop culture!
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pluggy
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Posted - 03/07/2011 : 11:48
I'm on my hols in Spain and I brought my little Netbook with me, now its hooked to a Spanish ISP (Townwide wireless you can buy a weeks access for) almost all the google ads are either Spanish or aimed at Ex-pats living in Spain. An awful lot of familiar sites are completely different when coming from a Spanish IP address. The BBC site is a shadow of its UK self with a very international feel to the news and no TV/iplayer stuff. And many international sites come up in Spanish rather than English.
Need computer work ?
"http://www.stsr.co.uk"
Pluggy's Household Monitor |
Stanley
Local Historian & Old Fart
36804 Posts
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Posted - 04/07/2011 : 05:01
Well. if you will insist on going to Spain..... Lovely weather here in Barlick!
Stanley Challenger Graham
Barlick View
stanley at barnoldswick.freeserve.co.uk |
Alternatives to Google search engine
