The World According to Google on PBS

[cwerdna]

I just finished watching this on PBS after a friend pointed me to it. Some of the stuff they showed was scary to him (presumably from a privacy point of view).

At least 1/2 of it wasn't new/news to me since I work in technology but I figure it might of interest to others who don't follow the company/technology world that much. I gave it 2 thumbs up on TiVo.

Real Estate Blog - "The World According to Google" Interesting Video is someone's blog entry on it.

YouTube - Google: Behind the Screen (IJsbrand van Veelen VPRO 2006)

YouTube - Google: Behind the Screen (IJsbrand van Veelen VPRO 2006)

should have the whole thing (~47 minutes).

[efusco]

Mind summarizing a little? I just don't have the patience for a 47 min YouTube vid.

[cwerdna]

Originally Posted by efusco

Mind summarizing a little? I just don't have the patience for a 47 min YouTube vid.

I know what you mean.

Basically, they talked a lot with Vint Cerf (aka father of the Internet) and Marissa Mayer about the various topics like the company, privacy, a bit about pricing of advertising (I know little about AdSense), their algorithms and biases. They showed parts of the Google campus inside and out, various projects like Google Earth (due to the Keyhole acquisition), machine translation (and what motivated one guy to join). They also talked a bit about the 20% time employees get, where the "dont be evil" motto came from and book scanning project. They were unwilling to show and process the machines used for the book scanning.

They also spoke to some like the founder of the Internet Archive (acrhive.org) and a British guy who were concerned about Google's possible biases, business practices, privacy, them being too big, data retention and them potentially holding a scary amount of data on people.

The blog entry in my original post also has a bit more on it.

[Heretic]

Ha! I liked the bit about the billboard equation. That's an interesting recruiting technique.

Thanks for the vid. Hadn't seen it before.

[cwerdna]

Originally Posted by Heretic

Ha! I liked the bit about the billboard equation. That's an interesting recruiting technique.

EA had an interesting one too.
Cryptic Billboards - Billboardom: funny billboards and billboard creativity

[donee]

Hi All,

Watched this thing. I find the mesengers in this piece are the Big-Brother advocates, not Google. They go on and on about how Google "Could" be used to limit information diversity, "Could" end controlling the printed word of humanity, "Could" be this , "Could" be that when they themselves are the advocates of limitation of Google and Google-like services - which to me IS the Big Brother activity. Because such limitation would have to be done by somebody, and that somebody's information basis would then be the limited access to information!

LAS guys gotta be more academic, and not hang out in the bars so much. Including taking a history of technology class. Google is no different than a Hammer. A hammer can be used for all sorts of evil - but what is the primary purpose hammers are put to? Building houses to keep people from freezing. The good far outweighs the evil. Google knows very well that as soon as they do the stuff that is talked about, will be as soon as they loose the number one position.

The only valid negative that was presented was that google was not making the information collected about searches anonymous. Instead, treating that information as a buisness resource.

The arguement that "Google" could be used for evil rings a bell with me. As in Illinois the law regarding video screens is very specific as what is permitted and what is not. But it limits what can be used for the specifically legal functions, in total oblivion that ALL devices will be such devices in a short while, due to the economics of technology. In effect, all devices will be illegal shortly. Indeed, by the letter of the law IPhones are now, if turned on in a car, and visible to the driver.

I do not like any law, or any television program, that says that something IS bad , just because it COULD be used for bad. Its perfectly fine to make the bad action illegal - not the bad instrument. Taken to an extreme, such laws would have us all naked and living in the woods in tropical regions. And LAS people that are mostly technologically ignorant are the worst people to make such laws regarding technology.

Of course, the wold is not simple. And I would not support any law that lets instruments specifically designed to be lethal weapons, with little or none other purpose to go uncontrolled.