Did I call for a Fundie fatwa against the company producing the product? No. Am I attempting, in any way, to restrict access to that site, or Google? No. Drop the William Wallace, "They'll take our lives, but they'll never take our butt plugs" angle, as it isn't relevant, or for that matter, remotely appealing.

What I am asking for is an investigation into what is either human manipulation of search results (which would for Google as a company actually be the best outcome), or an algorithm that is either compromised, or biased by flawed human design, or compromised by poor adherence to the company's own stated standards of penalizing those that abuse searches.

Is their a logical reason to suspect bias could be in play? Absolutely.

Google has a strong left-leaning political bias, which is beyond dispute. Employees have donated $463,500 to Democrats, and $5,000 to Republicans over the past 3 election cycles according to the FEC. 98 percent of the $207,650 Google employees gave federal candidates in the 2004 elections went to Democrats according to USA Today. Those are just cold, hard facts.

Two other Google products, Google News and Google Adwords have been shown to have a strong liberal bias, which are also well-documented.

And a search for baby Jesus isn't the only search result that seems to have been tweaked by Google.

When you do a search for talk radio, do you expect that Air America would be the top result? It is on Google. How very... liberal of them.

Nor has Google attempted to adjust for widely known google-bombing hacks such as when you type in failure and hit "i'm feeling lucky" and it takes you to President Bush's White House bio. Again, this all builds towards a strong circumstantial case towards there being a strong liberal bias at Google, one that apparently affects search results.

None of the other search engines I tried, even those running a branded-version of Google, have the same link as the most relevant result in this search. This factor, above all others, makes me suspect human intervention. I may very well be wrong, but given Google's track record, it is not a far-flung possibility, at all.

I don't see any legitimate way that a sex toy should show up as the top search result for a religious figure. Period. So there are a handful of possible answers.

One is that an employee thought it would be cute to "tweak" the results to favor this site, bumping it up seven or eight spots from where other search engines (even branded versions of Google) thinks it should belong. Given Google 's strong leftward lean this is a distinct possibility.

Another option is of course that the result is "relevant" according to Google's search algorithm, in which case Google's flagship product would seem to be flawed in design by the bias of left-leaning programmers and managers as are oft-cited examples Google Adwords and Google News. I don't think anyone could successfully argue that a sex toy should be the most relevant result for someone looking to find out information about a religious figure. This would indicate a failure of relevance in the Google search algorithm that it alone (again, even those sites used a branded version of Google do not give this result such a high ranking) cannot seem to figure out. This arguably brings up an issue of competence.

Another possible angle is that this was the subject of a "Google bomb" or SEO tweaking and according to Google's own policies, the listing should be demoted and moved down the page, perhaps to the 8-12 ranking it seems to warrant according to most other web searches I used, including those with branded versions of the Google product.

In any event, this search result, while it should not be delisted, does not apparently deserve the ranking it has thus far received.

If that makes me crazy, so be it.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at December 27, 2005 11:36 AM

Um...I'll come back later, ok? I'll just go eat some Christmas cookies or something...

Posted by: Theresa at December 27, 2005 12:51 PM

Did I call for a Fundie fatwa against the company producing the product? No.

You sure didn't but quite a few of the people leaving comments stopped just short of it. From your comments section: From Pamela:Google must die From Robert: Damn Google! Google Delenda est! (Seem familiar, maybe a post title???) From Shoprat: The enemies of the truth are getting crazier and bolder every day. Come Lord Jesus. If you had paid attention to the post Some commenters calling for the destruction of Google you'd have realized this wasn't a shot at you.

Am I attempting, in any way, to restrict access to that site, or Google? No. Drop the William Wallace, "They'll take our lives, but they'll never take our butt plugs" angle, as it isn't relevant, or for that matter, remotely appealing.

No you're aiming to tarnish a company that you perceive to be left leaning and that provided offensive results even though you didn't use the tools they gave you. With Safe Search strict turned (as one of your commenters mentioned) on the page doesn't come up.

What I am asking for is an investigation into what is either human manipulation of search results (which would for Google as a company actually be the best outcome), or an algorithm that is either compromised, or biased by flawed human design, or compromised by poor adherence to the company's own stated standards of penalizing those that abuse searches.

One of the major faults of bloggers and why 99.9% of them will never be considered as a serious news source is they’re a bit "big for their britches". Please do explain what gives any of anyone the right to ask for an investigation into a private company's procedures when no harm has been done? Funny some folks got all kings of pissy about the questions being asked of Pajamas Media and how they handle things, but wait that's private isn't it?

Again, if you're offended by adult oriented sites use the Strict Setting of Safe Search. Had the result come through the Safe Search option, then you'd have a half-way decent reason for your panties to be knotted up, but when you don't use the tools provided how can you complain about the outcome? As far as the company abusing the search process, check the page again, it has the phrase mentioned about the same as the other posts, only there are a couple of hyperlinks on the company’s site to it’s products.

Is their a logical reason to suspect bias could be in play? Absolutely.

Google has a strong left-leaning political bias, ... Those are just cold, hard facts. Didn't I read where you'd closed your comments due to people making the jump and blaming this on Bush and the Neocons? How is this any different?

Surely you can't think that all democrats would back this? Don't you think blaming Google for content on a site it doesn’t control is off base; especially since Google hasn't even had time to respond? It was Christmas Eve when you found the result, with today being the first business day after. At best they've had five or six hours to wade through e-mail complaints from people also bitching about their selection of holiday logos.

Two other Google products, Google News and Google Adwords have been shown to have a strong liberal bias, which are also well-documented.

Last I checked Google had documented their policies regarding news sources. Rusty was added back after he met the requirements. I think Michelle Malkin is back too, after meeting their requirements. Once again, just because you don't like the results there isn't a conspiracy. Otherwise please provide Cold.Hard.Facts.

And a search for baby Jesus isn't the only search result that seems to have been tweaked by Google.

When you do a search for talk radio, do you expect that Air America would be the top result? It is on Google. How very... liberal of them. Since you mentioned the widely known tactic of Google Bombing then surely you know Google counts links and ads weight to them. This would explain the reason Air America is rated as highly as it is; just think about the number of links and mentions Air America has received the past year from Conservative Bloggers alone. The same goes for the failure search. Should every blogger that has linked to either to them be banned from Google’s inclusion as well?

It is easy to exclude a site when they've "gamed" the system. However excluding results and key words would be something else all together. Which is why they posted an explaination about the search results for "jew". If they responded to every half baked, half drunk conspiracy theorist on the internet they'd spend all their time writing explanations instead of building their business.

Nor has Google attempted to adjust for widely known google-bombing hacks such as when you type in failure and hit "i'm feeling lucky" and it takes you to President Bush's White House bio. Again, this all builds towards a strong circumstantial case towards there being a strong liberal bias at Google, one that apparently affects search results.

How would you propose they deal with these results? Adding checks for "offensive" phrases has already been done with the Safe Search option. The only thing they can do is drop offending sites that make a common practice of using google bombs and perhaps send an e-mail out to people telling them to RTFM.

None of the other search engines I tried, even those running a branded-version of Google, have the same link as the most relevant result in this search. This factor, above all others, makes me suspect human intervention. I may very well be wrong, but given Google's track record, it is not a far-flung possibility, at all.

Which makes this a conspiracy theory What is needed are Cold.Hard.FACTS. and nothing less. Google’s code makes it unique, just like all the other search engines, thus you should expect different results. Why have different programs if they all operate in the same manner?

I don't see any legitimate way that a sex toy should show up as the top search result for a religious figure. Period. So there are a handful of possible answers.

One is that an employee thought it would be cute to "tweak" the results ...

Another option is of course that the result is "relevant" according to Google's search algorithm, in which case Google's flagship product would seem to be flawed in design ...

Another possible angle is that this was the subject of a "Google bomb" or SEO tweaking and according to Google's own policies...

In any event, this search result, while it should not be delisted, does not apparently deserve the ranking it has thus far received.

Maybe a bit of conversation with somebody who writes code for a living would help with some background as to how hard it would be to effectively create a left leaning search program. If you were dealing with a static, small sample of data, sure it'd be possible. Yet to add weight based on ever changing values, political climates and time of the day, well that's where the Aluminum Foil comes into play as it would be damned near impossible. Creating a weather control machine would be easier and a whole lot less subjective.

If that makes me crazy, so be it.

Hey, You said it not me. ;p Posted by: phin at December 27, 2005 01:28 PM

No you're aiming to tarnish a company that you perceive to be left leaning and that provided offensive results even though you didn't use the tools they gave you. With Safe Search strict turned (as one of your commenters mentioned) on the page doesn't come up.

I perceive Google to be left-leaning? No, the Federal Election Commission does, since Google employees gave 98% of their cash to Democrats in the last elections. I just pointed out the obvious statistical fact.

Google's default moderate settings allow the same offensive results to come though, and having default settings accept content like this would seem to be a Google software design flaw to many, if not most people. You are welcome to disagree.

One of the major faults of bloggers and why 99.9% of them will never be considered as a serious news source is they’re a bit "big for their britches".

You may very well be right, but the same can be said for many journalists and Op-ed writers. Read The Sixty-First Minute and ask Mary Mapes how her job search is going. Or for that matter, see if you can find out what Eason Jordan is up to these days. That .1% can do quite a bit of damage on occasion.

Little stories can turn out to be the tips of icebergs, or they may simply be little stories. In any event, that should not dissuade people from writing about what they see as problems, whether that problem be as big as taking down the head of a network for slanderous comments, or as apparently "insignificant" as trying to keep the average web surfer from having to view contextually inaccurate and offensive Web search results.

By the way, did I say that I expected Google to respond to this? No, I did not. But things do not change unless people are made aware of problems, as I am sure you are aware, and I doubt you can find anyone who will argue that this top-ranked result is a desired top search result for this phrase by either Google’s senior management nor the vast majority of their readers. It is a massive contextual inaccuracy at the very least, and one none of the other search engines made. I’d like to know why that is.

Should every blogger that has linked to either to them be banned from Google’s inclusion as well?

I never called for the site's ban. I simply stated that there is no way that anyone (other than programmers, apparently) can say this is a valid contextual search result, and therefore, it should not have the top ranking, which I clearly stated above when I said "the listing should be demoted and moved down the page, perhaps to the 8-12 ranking it seems to warrant according to most other web searches I used, including those with branded versions of the Google product."

You want facts? I do, too. But until someone can explain why this particular site ranks so high here and here alone, I think I have a legitimate reason to ask why, and to be somewhat offended until this can be explained rationally.

Your own evidence about Google's response in a search for the word "Jew" would seem to bear anecdotal witness to the fact that there is at least a reason people might find anti-Semitic commentary contributing to the top ranking for that term. That at least shows a rational contextual reason for the search results. Right or wrong, there are a lot of people who hate Jews.

But people looking up baby Jesus aren't generally interested in sticking Christ up their ass. I feel fairly confident in saying that, even without the empirical evidence to support such an outlandish claim. Again, call me crazy, but something is wrong with these search results.

Maybe a bit of conversation with somebody who writes code for a living would help with some background as to how hard it would be to effectively create a left leaning search program.

You maybe a programmer (and a very good one for that matter), but you still miss the underlying point: programming is still language, and all language has the potential for bias. At some point, people reviewed the results of various Google searches and make the human determination that these are or are not the results that are acceptable.

People make the determination of whether a search is good or bad, and people define what is accurate or inaccurate. I don’t claim to be half the programmer you are, but even I’ve been in a position to see code changes that affect the outcome of a program by tweaking a variable here and there, so not only do I know if can be done, I’ve seen it with my own two eyes, if admittedly not on anything like this scale.

Acting like Google programs and programmers live in a contextless noble vacuum of some sort where outside influences don’t hold any sway is unrealistic as well.

Posted by: Confederate Yankee at December 27, 2005 03:51 PM

I perceive Google to be left-leaning? No, the Federal Election Commission does, since Google employees gave 98% of their cash to Democrats in the last elections. I just pointed out the obvious statistical fact.

I've seen this stat thrown around before and have yet to see documentation. To quote Mark Twain, there are Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics. I'd also love to see a source for the information and then maybe it'd be a bit more believable. Call me cynical, but I just don’t buy into everything I read on the Interweb.

Google's default moderate settings allow the same offensive results to come though, and having default settings accept content like this would seem to be a Google software design flaw to many, if not most people. You are welcome to disagree.

And disagree I will. How is any program supposed to have intrinsic knowledge that one phrase shouldn't return adult oriented material when another should? Again, if you're not going to use safe search, don't complain about the results.

ask Mary Mapes how her job search is going. Or for that matter, see if you can find out what Eason Jordan is up to these days. That .1% can do quite a bit of damage on occasion.

Little stories can turn out to be the tips of icebergs...

The .1% also filed on well founded and well documented charges. Not a conspiracy theory without backing other than gut feelings and baseless allegations that border on slander. This is and has been my point from the beginning.

You may be a programmer (and a very good one for that matter), but you still miss the underlying point: programming is still language, and all language has the potential for bias.

Not so much. With most languages there isn't room for interpretation, it’s black and white, hit or miss, true or false, 0 or -1. It's called a language for lack of better terminology. The program, which may be written in various languages, is simply sending instructions to the computer in 1's and 0's, which I haven't seen lean anyway other than right (when italics are used).

At some point, people reviewed the results of various Google searches and make the human determination that these are or are not the results that are acceptable.

People make the determination of whether a search is good or bad, and people define what is accurate or inaccurate. I don’t claim to be half the programmer you are, but even I’ve been in a position to see code changes that affect the outcome of a program by tweaking a variable here and there, so not only do I know if can be done, I’ve seen it with my own two eyes, if admittedly not on anything like this scale.

I'll guarantee that at no point until now, has anyone ever thought of intrinsically excluding valid results when safe search was provided and not utilized.

This isn't meant as a dig, but how would you propose they improve the results? How is the program supposed to know that someone may be offended by a page that may or may not even be there tomorrow? If you can write an algorithm (non programming language specific) to meet the interpretive nature you've described, I'll code it and we'll both the multimillionaires. Hell lets start with a program that checks for infinite loops and move on from there.

Acting like Google programs and programmers live in a contextless noble vacuum of some sort where outside influences don’t hold any sway is unrealistic as well.

In a business environment, especially one as closely scrutinized as the search engine market, don't you think predominantly sacrilegious and / or left leaning results would have been spotted long before now? Surely Google didn't wait until Christmas Eve to launch their attack on the Interweb. Don't you think Yahoo! would be all over this with lawyers, guns and money if they thought there was even a remote chance to damage their largest competitor? Don't you think the Fox News war on Christmas crowd is chomping at the bit to find a story like this?

Alas, nobody else has picked this up because the only thing there is an adult oriented toy site done in poor taste and a couple of North Carolinians pissing into the wind trying to convince one another that they’re wrong.

The main reason this conspiracy theory stinks to high heaven, is because Google can't afford, business credibility wise, to do something of the nature you've suggested.

Posted by: phin at December 27, 2005 11:03 PM