Friday, June 17, 2011

Internet thoughts






With the birth of the internet came the promise of broadened horizons 
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With fantastic new ways to connect people 
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Giving us viewpoints in ways we could not have imagined
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But in reality, the internet has quickly encased us in private little bubbles 
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Increasingly the only people and ideas we encounter are the ones we already know rather than expanding our world-view
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Facebook, Google and others of the internet are tweaking their algorithms to personalize user experience
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They are filtering content that shows us only what it thinks we want to see rather than all we could see
.
Maybe all that we should see
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The internet is your own personal, unique universe of information that you live in online
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What’s in it depends on who you are and what you do
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But the thing is, without most people realising it, you don’t decide what gets in.
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And most importantly you don’t see what gets edited out
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Facebook and Google for example check what you click on. 
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If they see that you clicked more often on links from left-leaning friends 
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Then they simply edit out the rest using an algorithm which hides from view the kinds of content with which, by past behavior, it has determined you are less likely to interact
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Facebook and Google aren't alone in doing this kind of personalization
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Two people in different regions with different interests will receive different Google results when typing in the same search terms.
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Recently in different locations people put in the same search requests on the protests in Egypt 
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One set of replies in one location was full of links while others were not
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Google’s algorithm considers 57 different elements in catering it's search results for you
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As a result there is no standard Google search anymore
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These are some of the political and social effects of web personalization.
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Is it dangerous?
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Maybe
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Should it worry us?
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Maybe
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Certainly we need to check with each other what we are seeing on any given subject or issue
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But then we would do this in the old world pre internet wouldn't we?
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Just engage brain when accepting results
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Check on different sources to be better informed.

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