NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] The Washington Post's "What if Google Were Evil" Idiocy
The Washington Post's "What if Google Were Evil" Idiocy
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/001017.html
To watch the accelerating fall from grace of the once venerable
"Washington Post" is perhaps to view traditional journalism's
quandary in a nutshell.
First, their ombudsman suggested it was unlikely that the Post would
implement a paywall, for a variety of sound reasons.
Then the Post fired their Ombudsman. Then they announced the
availability of notorious "sponsored posts" throughout their pages.
And it's been ever more rapidly downhill for the Post from there, with
their now giving credence to serial Google hater Robert Epstein's
ramblings.
Epstein -- a psychologist by trade -- is an interesting character.
He's a big promoter of the concept that what we all really need is
governments regulating search engines and search results. You know,
the same governments that are cracking down on free speech around the
world and extending surveillance into every aspect of our lives --
including right here in the USA. Governments in some cases that
demand search results censorship when those results aren't favorable
to their rulers. Governments promoting Stalinist and Orwellian "let's
blot out history!" concepts like the hideous "right to be forgotten."
Those governments. Take a look, they're all around us, pretty much
getting worse every day. Epstein wants them in control of our
information as well.
Robert Epstein's hatred of Google appears to date back to when he
became upset that Google search results were tagging his website as
possibly being contaminated with malware -- because, well, ya' know,
uh, they indeed were so contaminated.
Epstein apparently became concerned that Google was able to warn
people away from sites that might ruin computers, seemingly based on
his bizarre reasoning that helping to protect people's systems was
just too much power.
Now the Post is providing real estate to Epstein's latest tirades, his
theory that if Google suddenly turned evil, they might be able to
theoretically alter the outcomes of close elections.
Ah, the magic "if." We're in big trouble "if" President Obama goes
mad and launches a nuclear strike. We're up the creek if our brakes
fail on the freeway at 70 miles per hour, or if our dogs suddenly turn
on us and rip out our throats.
I'm reminded of a wonderful old episode of the original 1964 series
"The Outer Limits," about a humanoid robot falsely accused of
murdering his creator.
The robot -- Adam -- is intelligent, knowledgeable, gentle, and with
good will toward all. But in an attempt to prove he's a killer -- to
try demonstrate an "if" and that it's theoretically possible for the
robot to be dangerous -- the government *modifies his circuitry*
to purposely trigger a violent outburst.
In the end, as he's being escorted away calmly to be dismantled, he
sees a little girl about to be hit by a truck, and cheats the
executioner by allowing himself to be crushed in the process of saving
the child.
Web firms like Google and most others, who exist by virtue of
providing services that users value in an environment where
competition is usually just a click away, have every reason to want
search results and other information to be as useful and honest as
possible.
For anyone to postulate such firms secretly morphing into the
functional equivalent of James Bond super villains is nonsensical, and
to argue that government regulation of search results and information
availability would be anything other than a disaster is at the very
least ignorant, and perhaps purposely deceptive.
On the other hand, we already know that governments around the world
seem hell-bent on devaluing and even crushing civil liberties, while
increasingly tightly controlling information for their own benefits.
The last thing we need is government controls over the firms that have
become our gateways to the very knowledge helping to empower us to
make our own decisions about our lives and our world.
All the wacky "ifs" that anyone can imagine aren't going to convince
us otherwise.
"If" you get my drift.
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein (lauren@vortex.com): http://www.vortex.com/lauren
Co-Founder: People For Internet Responsibility: http://www.pfir.org/pfir-info
Founder:
- Network Neutrality Squad: http://www.nnsquad.org
- PRIVACY Forum: http://www.vortex.com/privacy-info
- Data Wisdom Explorers League: http://www.dwel.org
- Global Coalition for Transparent Internet Performance: http://www.gctip.org
Member: ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
Google+: http://vortex.com/g+lauren / Twitter: http://vortex.com/t-lauren
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800 / Skype: vortex.com
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