AI Yiiiii AI: How about That Google, Folks
September 16, 2022
It has been an okay day. My lectures did not put anyone to sleep and I was not subjected to fruit throwing.
Unwinding I scanned my trusty news feed thing and spotted two interesting articles. I believe everything I read online, and I wanted to share these remarkable finds with you, gentle reader.
The first concerns a semi interesting write up about how the world ends with a smart whimper. No little cat’s feet needed.
“New Paper by Google and Oxford Scientists Claims AI Will Soon Destroy Mankind” seems to focus on the masculine angle. The write up says:
…researchers posit that the threat of AI is greater than we ever thought.
That’s a cheerful idea, isn’t it? But the bound phrase “existential catastrophe” has more panache, don’t you think? No, oh, well, I like the snap of this jib in the wind quite a bit.
The other write up I noted is “Did GoogleAI Just Snooker One of Silicon Valley’s Sharpest Minds?” The main point of this article is that the Google is doing lots of AI/ML marketing. I note this passage:
If another AI winter does comes, it not be because AI is impossible, but because AI hype exceeds reality. The only cure for that is truth in advertising. A will to believe in AI will never replace the need for careful science.
My view is different. Google is working overtime to become the Big Dog in smart software. The use of its super duper training sets and models will allow the wonderful online advertising outfit to extend and expand its revenue opportunities.
Keep your eye on the content marketing articles often published in Medium. The Google wants to make sure its approach to AI/ML is the winner.
Hopefully Google’s smart software won’t suffocate life with advertising and its super duper methods don’t emulate HAL. Right, Dave. I have to cut off your oxygen, Dave. Timnit, Timnit, are you paying attention?
Stephen E Arnold, September 16, 2022
Google and Legal Friction
September 15, 2022
The question is, “How long can Google’s legal eagles drag out a court decision.” The answer is revealed in part in “Google Mostly Loses Appeal Over EU’s $4B Android Antitrust Fine.” The write up states:
The Alphabet-owned Google challenged the 2018 fine, but on Wednesday [September 14, 2022] the European Court of Justice’s General Court mostly confirmed the decision to penalize the company more than 4 billion euros ($3.99 billion).
That works out to roughly three years and six months. If I did not return a library book before its expiration date when I was in grade school, I had to pay the fine when I did return the book. If I lost the darned book, I had to wash cars to pay the fine and the cost of the book before I could check out another book. Obviously I was not the Google nor did I have a flock of legal eagles to explain:
- Why the fine is unreasonable under the current applicable laws, rules, and regulations
- Why a 10 year old is or should be exempt from said laws, rules, and regulations
- A calculation demonstrating that the fine and/or penalty is without foundation, irrational, and against the best interests of other 10 year old readers or young people in general
- An action which puts in jeopardy the benefits of a 10 year old who could grow up to be a responsible, fair minded, and informed subject matter expert.
To be sure, these are compelling arguments, but the librarian at the Prospect Branch Library demonstrated an inherent inability to understand the profound trust and ultimate correctness of my arguments.
I had to pay up and pronto.
For the Google, transgress and kick the deadline for ponying up the cash three years in the future.
Now that’s being Google. Isn’t that swell?
Stephen E Arnold, September 15, 2022
The UK and EU Demonstrate an Inability to Be Googley
September 15, 2022
In the grand scheme of operating a revolving door, the Google is probably going to adjudicate and apologize / explain. I call this “explagize,” an art form perfected at the GOOG. But what’s a revolving door? Visualize a busy pre-Covid building in midtown Manhattan. To enter, one pushes a panel of glass and the force spins a wagon wheel of similar doors. Now imagine that one pays every time one goes around. That’s how the Google online ad business works? Banner adds, pay. Pay to play, pay. Pay for AdWords, caching. Want analytics about those ads? Pay. The conceptual revolving door, however, does not allow the humanoid to escape either without fear of missing out on a sale or allowing a competitor to get clicks and leads and sales.
The BBC article “Google Faces €25bn Legal Action in UK and the EU” states:
The European Commission and its UK equivalent are investigating whether Google’s dominance in the ad tech business gives it an unfair advantage over rivals and advertisers.
This is old news, right? What’s different is this statement:
Damien Geradin, of the Belgian law firm Geradin Partners – which is involved in the Dutch case – said, “Publishers, including local and national news media, who play a vital role in our society, have long been harmed by Google’s anti-competitive conduct. “It is time that Google owns up to its responsibilities and pays back the damages it has caused to this important industry. “That is why today we are announcing these actions across two jurisdictions to obtain compensation for EU and UK publishers.”
Do you think “pay back” means a painful procedure capped with a big number fine? I do.
What’s not being considered, in my opinion, are these factors:
- The barristers, avocets, and legal eagles trying to wrest big bucks from Googzilla are unlikely to find the alleged monopolist eager to retain their firms’ services or look favorably on hiring the progeny of these high fliers
- Will the UK and EU spark counter measures; for example, prices may rise and some ad services not offered to outfits in the UK and EU?
- Will the UK and EU grasp the fact that ad options may not be able to fill any gap or service pull out from the Google?
- The high value data which Google allegedly has and under some circumstances makes available to government authorities may go missing because Google either suffered a machine failure or curtailed investment in infrastructure so that the data are disappeared.
More than money? Yep. Consequences after decades of hand waving and chicken salad fines may cause some governments to realize that their power, influence, and degrees of freedom are constrained by a certain firm’s walled garden.
The money for the fine? Too little and too late as I try to make sense of the situation. The spinning revolving door can be difficult to escape and trying may cause dizziness, injury, or company death. Yikes.
Stephen E Arnold, September 15, 2022
PR Blast for Premium YouTube
September 12, 2022
I find the rah rah articles about Google in the Medium updates I receive kneeslappers. The enthusiasm for Google’s advanced technology are obviously content marketing by either fan folk or individuals who are paid to write baloney.
But the cake taker is a Wired story called “YouTube Premium Has Its Perks. Here Are Some to Consider.” The write up, in my opinion, is a very obvious content marketing thing.
What are the benefits of a $900 dollar a year service provided by a company which sells ads everywhere?
The Wired article identified these payoffs:
- No ads
- Built in video download
- YouTube Music
- New features before the peasants
- Background listening
Here’s how I understand these “benefits.” First, no ads. Are you kidding? Even the ad free Netflix is getting with the program. Amazon is on board the ad train now. No ads means leaving money on the table. In an era of hard to control costs and the teeny thing TikTok, the Google bean counters will consider ads. Am I right?
A build in video download. Sorry. There’s software for that. From the outfit with some really interesting tag along software (Chris PC in the Midwest to the incredibly wonky WinCam). Some downloaders are free; some charge a few dollars. Most of the non-Google downloader mostly work. Why pay I ask?
YouTube Music is a me too of MTV. Am I right… again?
New features before the unwashed have them. Well, that sounds good. Exactly what does “new feature” mean? Google explains well in my opinion. Where did Web Accelerator and Google Plus go? Yeah.
Background listening seems to say, “Google has invented radio.” Insight!
Net net: Clumsy content marketing? In my opinion, yes.
Stephen E Arnold, September 12, 2022
Google News Provides Access to Bombshell about Google
September 9, 2022
I thought that the Google had a news deal of some type with the GOOG and its news service. If you are not familiar with Google News (the ad free thing for many years) is available at this link. Google News included a story called “Google Pays ‘Enormous’ Sums to Maintain Search-Engine Dominance, DOJ Says.” Now this is not news here in Harrod’s Creek. Isn’t a modest payment provided to the people’s friend Apple to provide search results? Maybe? Maybe not?
What I find interesting is that locating the story on Google News required using the string “Google Search Engine Dominance.” [Note: This may require a payment to read unless one views the story via Google News. Maybe Google and Bloomberg have a special operation underway? Gee, I don’t know.] Other queries were less helpful. Interesting? Nah. Just the black box of Google News search working its magic. (Maybe that’s why Google Dorks are so darned popular among certain analysts and research-minded individuals. The information is in Google, but it can require a few cartwheels to locate in my experience.)
What was the main point of this Bloomberg story. (When I think of Bloomberg, I do associate the company with the chips on motherboards which phone home. Was this story accurate, true, grounded in verifiable data, or a confection like some social media mavens output? Again I don’t know. As I get older, I realize I don’t know much, if anything.)
The Bloomberg Google story on Google News says:
Alphabet Inc.’s Google pays billions of dollars each year to Apple Inc., Samsung Electronics Co. and other telecom giants to illegally maintain its spot as the No. 1 search engine, the US Justice Department told a federal judge Thursday [September 8, 2022].
News flash. This is not news. What is mildly interesting is that the US government after decades of finding joy in Google mouse pads, T shirts, and other tchotchkes is sort of investigating. (Why was it so darned difficult to get French income tax forms to come up in Google search results? Were those cranky folks at Foundem blowing smoke? You know the answer: I don’t know.
The write up continues:
“Google invests billions in defaults, knowing people won’t change them,” Dintzer told Judge Amit Mehta during a hearing in Washington that marked the first major face-off in the case and drew top DOJ antitrust officials and Nebraska’s attorney general among the spectators. “They are buying default exclusivity because defaults matter a lot.” Google’s contracts form the basis of the DOJ’s landmark antitrust lawsuit, which alleges the company has sought to maintain its online search monopoly in violation of antitrust laws.
Okay, written contracts. That’s something sort of concrete I suppose.
In my opinion, the best line in the Google story on Google News from good and friendly Bloomberg is this one:
“Default exclusivity allows Google to systemically deny rivals’ data,” he said.
If true, does this mean that former Googler Eric Schmidt was off base when he said that fear of Qwant was keeping him awake at night?
Probably not. But Google seems to have been taking steps to reduce the probability of Qwant or any other search engine gaining traction somewhat seriously. Does Google know its search system is only useful when one masters the machinations of the Dorkers?
Again: I don’t know.
Stephen E Arnold, September 9, 2022
Google: Adulting Becomes a Thing
September 8, 2022
My goodness, it has taken more than 20 years for the Backrub-inspired search and ad company to embrace adulting. This term takes a noun like adult and converts it to a verb. This English trick is one that thrills English as a Second Language students. What I am going to do is equate “adulting” with the management precepts of Peter Drucker. Now you see why figuring out what I am saying and not saying is so darned unusual.
First, however, we need some context. That estimable source of real news (Fox) published this story: “Google CEO Sundar Pichai Looking to Improve Tech Giant’s Efficiency.” The Big Dog of the Google is participating in explainers to the tech worshipers that the time is now for adulting. The idea is that the Google is under pressure from several different hypercube vectors; for example:
- The lovable and enlightened Amazon with its newfound clicks from product search and a corresponding surge in product related advertising
- That affable crowd in Cupertino who are taking steps to make sure the walled garden does not allow Googzilla too much room in which to cause mischief
- Those with-it regulators and elected officials in governments near and far who don’t understand how making money on ads as the saloon swinging door with a charge to come in and leave works for the benefit of anyone except the Google
- Wizards who find themselves orthogonal to Google’s personnel postures. Yep, Dr. Timnit Gebru et al. “Disagree and Begone” could become a new Xoogler T shirt for diversity conference attendees
- Technical debt, which — despite Google’s mostly not talking about it — continues to incur some hefty costs. One can fire people but one cannot do much more than sell data center gear on eBay or Swappa
- High school management methods. I have explained this concept in previous posts so use the search box and read the explanation, please. The new idea is that the best high school science club members will not want to work at the Google. Yikes. Regressing toward the mean maybe?
What did the Big Dog say is the future of Google?
One big point is that the 20 percent frittered away on the dorm notion of one day a week of other stuff is over. Now Googlers have to work like a person on the Ford assembly line in 1937. Punch in, do stuff that matters, and punch out. No output, no pay. Simple. I remember reading that programmers write code about 30 minutes a day. What are these wizards going to do in the other 7.5 hours? Well, Foosball, table tennis, and volleyball may be difficult when the kid toys are removed. Google is a place for real work. What is that work? Well, Google doesn’t explain too much, but I assume it is quantifiable, good for humankind, fair, equitable, and unbiased just like Snorkel automated training data.
Another point is that the new Google sets priorities. I think priorities are useful. Why have a couple dozen messaging apps and smart software that displays ads totally unrelated to either the content of a YouTube video or to the interests of a Google customer who pays for Google services? I suppose Google has given up on solving death, which, as I understood the project, was a priority.
I also noted that Google is moving more slowly. My experience suggests that what went quickly was work blessed by the senior management. Some employees are left to their own devices to learn how Google works, snag a project, and produce something that makes money. In order to set priorities, one has to do the Drucker type work. Is that type of thinking in the Google incentive plan?
To sum up: Google is in danger of having to face life as an ageing sled dog or arthritic Googzilla. Maybe some of the “solve death” research can rejuvenate the behemoth before the snow piles up and Googzilla moves even more slowly.
Stephen E Arnold, September 8, 2022
Google: More Management Mysteries
September 6, 2022
I read a somewhat odd article about Google in the New York Times. That’s a newspaper, not a Harvard Business Review? Sorry. The world of “real journalists” has embraced the wonkiness of management gurus and Drukerism.
The article which caught my attention was named by someone — possibly a really busy editor — “Google Employee Who Played Key Role in Protest of Contract with Israel Quits.” The idea that an individual who accepts pay in return for work does not like a corporation’s direction is becoming a thing, a trend. The idea is that a company pays a person and that person gets to alter the direction in which a decision is heading.
Yeah, okay.
From my point of view, the person who accepts money to work at a company, presumably eight or more hours a day, has several options:
- Just quit. Hunt for a new job. This is a good solution.
- Keep quiet. Do the work. Cash the check or look at the bank balance in an online only bank app.
- Work harder, get promoted, and earn a position and responsibility so that one’s ideas can influence colleagues. This is a better solution.
The newspaper article skips these ideas and focuses on the actions taken by the employee. The implicit idea is that the employee’s approach to a problem was just wonderful. The company’s response to these actions was inappropriate, ill advised, and stupid.
Maybe Google’s approach to management is different from what someone of my age expects?
The one point in the article which struck me as significant was:
… Google had tried to retaliate against her for her activism.
The retaliation point is one that warrants more development. The newspaper article could have been boiled down to 150 words. The MBA- / the-big-tech-outfit-is bad angle could have been expanded, explained, and analyzed in an HBR-type of write up or a law review-type analysis.
What I perceive is a newspaper trying to to something its is not geared up to do well. Is the Google perfect? Nah. Do I think this situation reveals a facet of the online ad outfit which is troubling?
Absolutely.
Both the employee and the company could have been more old fashioned, which then would not have been “real news.”
That’s a problem.
Stephen E Arnold, September 6, 2022
UK Pundit Chops at the Google Near Its Palatine Raphe
September 6, 2022
I read “Google’s Image-Scanning Illustrates How Tech Firms Can Penalise the Innocent.” The write up is an opinion piece, and I am not sure whether the ideas expressed in the essay are appropriate for my Harrod’s Creek ethos.
The write up states:
The background to this is that the tech platforms have, thankfully, become much more assiduous at scanning their servers for child abuse images. But because of the unimaginable numbers of images held on these platforms, scanning and detection has to be done by machine-learning systems, aided by other tools (such as the cryptographic labelling of illegal images, which makes them instantly detectable worldwide). All of which is great. The trouble with automated detection systems, though, is that they invariably throw up a proportion of “false positives” – images that flag a warning but are in fact innocuous and legal.
Yep, false positives from Google’s smart software.
Do these types of errors become part of the furniture of living? Does Google have a duty to deal with disagreements in a transparent manner? Does Google’s smart software care about problems caused by those who consume Google advertising?
It strikes me that the UK will be taking a closer look at the fascinating palatine raphe, probably in one of those nifty UK jurisprudence settings: Wigs, big words, and British disdain. Advertising, privacy, and false positives. I say, “The innocent!”
Stephen E Arnold, September 6, 2022
Google and Security: The Google Play Protect Situation
September 1, 2022
Unfortunately for Android users, Google’s default app-security program is not the safest bet. A write-up at News Patrolling explores “Why Google Play Protect Fails to Identify Malicious Apps.” A few points are obvious—Google cannot help users who turn the feature off, for example, or those who install software from other sources. The company also lacks Apple’s advantage of controlling both hardware and software. That does not explain, however, why third-party tools from AhnLab to Trend Micro outperform Play Protect. Reporter Satya Prakash observes:
- New kid on the block – As compared to other security software platforms that have been in existence for decades, Google Play Protect was launched in 2017. While it’s true that Google can hire the best security experts, it may still take some time for Google Play Protect to achieve the same level of security as offered by private software platforms. …
- Too many apps and devices – There are around 3 million apps on Google Play and several thousands are added almost every day. Combine that with thousands of different types of smartphones, having different Android versions. Apparently, it’s a massive task to be able to fix security vulnerabilities that may be present in each of these cases.
- Reliance on automated systems – Due to huge number of apps and devices, Google relies on automated systems to detect harmful behavior. Private security firms use the same approach, but apparently, they are doing a much better job. Hackers are constantly looking for new security vulnerabilities that can be exploited. This makes the job tougher for Google Play Protect.”
Happily, there are many stronger alternatives as tested by AV-Test. Their list is worth a look-see for Android users who care about security. A comparison to last year’s results shows Play Protect has actually improved a bit. Perhaps someday it will perform as well in its own app store as its third-party competition.
Cynthia Murrell, September 1, 2022
Here We Go Again: Google Claims To Improve Search Results
August 31, 2022
Google has been blamed for biased search results for years. Users claim that Google pushes paid links to the top of search results without identifying them Organic search results are consigned to the second and third pages. Despite having a monopoly on search and other parts of the tech sector, Google does deliver decent services and products. To maintain its market dominance, Google must continue offering good services. Engadget explores how “Google’s Search AI Now Looks For General Consensus To Highlight More Trustworthy Results.”
Google wants it “search snippets, “blocks of text that appear at the top of search results to answer questions,” to be more accurate. Google designed the Multitask Unified Model AI to search for consensus when selecting a snippet. The AI checks snippets against verified resources to determine a consensus of information. Some queries, such as false premises, should not have snippets, so Google’s AI reduces those by 40%.
Also Google is showing more citations:
“Google is now also making its “About this result” tool more accessible. That’s the panel that pops up when you click on the three dots next to a result, showing you details about the source website before you even visit. Starting later this year, it will be available in eight more languages, including Portuguese, French, Italian, German, Dutch, Spanish, Japanese, and Indonesian. It’s adding more information to the tool starting this week, as well, including how widely a publication is circulated, online reviews about a company, or whether a company is owned by another entity. They’re all pieces of information that could help you decide whether a particular source is trustworthy.”
Google search results with limited returns or do not have verified sources will contain content advisories encouraging users to conduct further research.
It is great that Google is turning itself into an academic database, now if they would only do that for Google Scholar.
Whitney Grace, August 31, 2022
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