Google's New "SearchWiki" -- Super Feature or Dangerous Graffiti Playground?

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Lauren Weinstein <lauren () vortex com>
Date: November 21, 2008 3:18:00 AM EST
To: dave () farber net
Cc: lauren () vortex com
Subject: Google's New "SearchWiki" -- Super Feature or Dangerous  
Graffiti Playground?



 Google's New "SearchWiki" -- Super Feature or Risky Graffiti  
Playground?

                http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000473.html


Greetings.  Google has introduced a significant new search feature
that is now accessible to users who are logged in to Google accounts.

Called "SearchWiki" ( http://tinyurl.com/searchwiki ), it allows
users to modify the results returned for any given search query.
Users who are not logged in to Google accounts will see conventional
results without these added features.

Capabilities associated with SearchWiki include the ability to
promote (that is, move upwards on the results display) result
entries associated with particular searches, or to delete chosen
results from the list that is displayed to you for any given search.

You can also place comments on search results, and this is where
things get really interesting, and potentially very messy.

Changes that you make to your listings via SearchWiki only apply to
your own results.  Other people making the same search will not be
affected by promotions or deletions that you have made.

However, any user who is logged in can choose options to display the
number of promotions or deletions that have been associated by the
SearchWiki user community at large for each item in a set of search
results.

And -- here it comes! -- SearchWiki users can choose to view the
comments that all other users have associated with search results.

This last feature is of course potentially the real beaut.  While we
may safely assume that most people will use the comment feature
responsibly, it also seems certain that a small percentage -- who
may still be relatively large in obsolete numbers -- will view this
public comment capability very differently.

It seem inevitable that popular search results in particular will
quickly become laden with all manner of "dueling comments" which can
quickly descend into nastiness and even potentially libel.  In fact,
a quick survey of some obvious search queries shows that in the few
hours that SearchWiki has been generally available, this pattern is
*already* beginning to become established.  It doesn't take a
lot of imagination to visualize the scale of what could happen with
the search results for anybody or anything who is the least bit
controversial.

While Google provides a "thumbs down" mechanism to flag
"inappropriate" comments for review, questions about how
inappropriate materials will be defined, and how well Google will be
able to handle large numbers of comments that may be flagged,
remains to be seen.

This is all a very complex issue.  On the one hand, reasoned
comments can be very valuable.  And since comments are only visible
to Google users who are logged in and specifically ask to see them,
comments will not be viewed by users who don't meet these two
criteria.

On the other hand, it seems likely that persons, Web Sites, and
other associated entities who feel that their search listings are
being "polluted" (however they personally define pollution) may
become extremely upset, especially since (unlike with YouTube
comments, for example) there appears to be, *as far as I know at
this time*, no way for a Web site owner to definitely delete
comments, preapprove comments, or turn off the comments feature
entirely for SearchWiki results associated with their sites.

They could try to use the "thumbs down" mechanism on each
"offending" comment tied to every search query that they can think
of pointing at their site.  But this would obviously be utterly
impractical in many cases, there's no guarantee that Google
reviewers would remove the comments, and similar comments could
quickly reappear in any case.

One thing we can depend on -- many individuals and sites who may
feel that comments on their search results are defaming or otherwise
damaging will likely demand some better way to control those
comments, and in some cases will want to take legal action against
the comment authors -- who will generally be very difficult to
identify and locate.

This suggests that despite the real positive value that could come
from the SearchWiki mechanisms, Google itself stands a significant
chance of becoming the target of various significant legal actions
that could be instigated by a range of parties who feel themselves
to be aggrieved by the SearchWiki system.

One potential way to avoid this dilemma would be for Google to
provide a means for sites to indicate that they do not wish to
participate in the SearchWiki ecosystem (perhaps via a robots.txt
type of indicator).  Another possibility would be for sites to have
access to a set of comment controls similar to those available to
submitters of videos on Google's YouTube.

Google SearchWiki is pushing the search envelope in a major new
direction that invokes a range of new and complicated questions.
Such devotion to innovation is part of what makes Google great, but
also can carry significant risks, complications, and sometimes
serious unintended negative consequences.

It will be fascinating to see how SearchWiki plays out.  Fasten your
seat belt!

--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren () vortex com or lauren () pfir org
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
http://www.pfir.org/lauren
Co-Founder, PFIR
  - People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
Co-Founder, NNSquad
  - Network Neutrality Squad - http://www.nnsquad.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com





-------------------------------------------
Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now
RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/
Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com