Google: Algorithms Are Objective
July 17, 2016
I know that Google’s algorithms are tireless, objective numerical recipes. However, “Google: Downranking Online Piracy Sites in Search Results Has Led to a 89% Decrease in Traffic” sparked in my mind the notion that human intervention may be influencing some search result rankings. I highlighted these statements in the write up:
“Google does not proactively remove hyperlinks to any content unless first notified by copyright holders, but the tech giant says that it is now processing copyright removal notices in less than six hours on average…” I assume this work is performed by objective algorithms.
“…it is happy to demote links to pages that explicitly contain or link to content that infringes copyright.” Again, a machine process and, therefore, objective?
Human intervention in high volume flows of information is often difficult. If Google is not using machine processes, perhaps the company is forced to group sites and then have humans make decisions.
Artificial intelligence, are you not up to the task?
Stephen E Arnold, July 21, 2016
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