“People are so afraid of Google now.”
August 30, 2017 6:44 AM Subscribe
Did Google discipline a think tank it helps fund? A New America researcher praised the EU for scoring a massive judgement against Google, then NA's leader threatened to boot his job and team, according to Kenneth Vogel. As New America (previously) CEO Anne-Marie Slaughter (previously) put it, “just THINK about how you are imperiling funding for others.”
Lynn has since started a new nonprofit. (SLNYTimes)
(via)
Lynn has since started a new nonprofit. (SLNYTimes)
(via)
If only there were some sort of aphorism that could have warned us about absolute power and corruption!
posted by Celsius1414 at 7:41 AM on August 30, 2017 [7 favorites]
posted by Celsius1414 at 7:41 AM on August 30, 2017 [7 favorites]
TIRED: "Well, the tech giants might be assholes, but at least they're our assholes."
WIRED: "They're not our assholes, and they never were."
posted by tonycpsu at 7:58 AM on August 30, 2017 [10 favorites]
WIRED: "They're not our assholes, and they never were."
posted by tonycpsu at 7:58 AM on August 30, 2017 [10 favorites]
BrentButt:
Google motto 2004: Don't be evil
Google motto 2010: Evil is tricky to define
Google motto 2013: We make military robots
It bothers me that in 2004 I basically anticipated that Google would a) win, and b) immediately become creepy and evil in ways just like this, and I never wrote it down publicly and I never tried to make anything of it because goddamn how often does a goddamn teenager turn out to actually have figured stuff out? I was reading about epistemic closure and extremism in 2009 because it seemed like it might be relevant down the line and no-one was talking about it!
Anyway I'm looking into collective bargaining and unions so let's hope that gets big in 5 years
posted by Merus at 8:09 AM on August 30, 2017 [22 favorites]
Google motto 2004: Don't be evil
Google motto 2010: Evil is tricky to define
Google motto 2013: We make military robots
It bothers me that in 2004 I basically anticipated that Google would a) win, and b) immediately become creepy and evil in ways just like this, and I never wrote it down publicly and I never tried to make anything of it because goddamn how often does a goddamn teenager turn out to actually have figured stuff out? I was reading about epistemic closure and extremism in 2009 because it seemed like it might be relevant down the line and no-one was talking about it!
Anyway I'm looking into collective bargaining and unions so let's hope that gets big in 5 years
posted by Merus at 8:09 AM on August 30, 2017 [22 favorites]
Don't worry, I read a report from the Page-Brin Institute for Corporate Ethics and it concludes that Google did nothing wrong and in fact is the most ethical company in the world.
posted by Sangermaine at 8:34 AM on August 30, 2017 [6 favorites]
posted by Sangermaine at 8:34 AM on August 30, 2017 [6 favorites]
Hey, Hal - tell me about signaling.
posted by hawthorne at 9:32 AM on August 30, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by hawthorne at 9:32 AM on August 30, 2017 [1 favorite]
Really, this just confirms something that's been rumored for some time - Google money to think tanks and PIRGs comes with strings. What's been problematic has been the pretending that this isn't the case.
posted by NoxAeternum at 9:47 AM on August 30, 2017 [2 favorites]
posted by NoxAeternum at 9:47 AM on August 30, 2017 [2 favorites]
New America's response doesnt really deny anything, but sounds really indignant. So double plus confirmed.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:58 AM on August 30, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:58 AM on August 30, 2017 [3 favorites]
Zephyr Teachout (the chair of Lynn's new group) has an op-ed in the Washington Post on the controversy:
It is time to call out Google for what it is: a monopolist in search, video, maps and browser, and a thin-skinned tyrant when it comes to ideas.
The imperial overreach of Google in trying to shut down a group of five researchers proves the point that the initial release from Open Markets was trying to make: When companies get too much power, they become a threat to democratic free speech and to the liberty of citizens at large.
The Washington Post, of course, is owned by Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, which has its own monopoly issues.
posted by Cash4Lead at 10:45 AM on August 30, 2017 [9 favorites]
It is time to call out Google for what it is: a monopolist in search, video, maps and browser, and a thin-skinned tyrant when it comes to ideas.
The imperial overreach of Google in trying to shut down a group of five researchers proves the point that the initial release from Open Markets was trying to make: When companies get too much power, they become a threat to democratic free speech and to the liberty of citizens at large.
The Washington Post, of course, is owned by Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, which has its own monopoly issues.
posted by Cash4Lead at 10:45 AM on August 30, 2017 [9 favorites]
My quirky perspective is that Google behaved worse in pressuring (either overtly or subtly) New America to fire the Open Markets team than it did in the supposedly exclusionary conduct Open Markets was upset about. I've looked at the antitrust case against Google in search again, and again, and again -- this is literally my job as a professor of Internet law -- and every time I've concluded that search users would be worse off, sometimes much worse off, if the critics had their way.
But these are really important questions, and someone has to raise them, and it's deeply troubling when the people who raise them get fired for raising them. So boooo Gooogle.
posted by grimmelm at 11:26 AM on August 30, 2017 [11 favorites]
But these are really important questions, and someone has to raise them, and it's deeply troubling when the people who raise them get fired for raising them. So boooo Gooogle.
posted by grimmelm at 11:26 AM on August 30, 2017 [11 favorites]
The ousted Open Markets folks are setting up their own org called Citizens Against Monopoly.
In a sign that this organization is either a.) already obscenely wealthy, b.) is not long for this world, or c.) is trying to make some sort of strange point, the "contribute" button is buried at the very bottom of the page.
posted by NBelarski at 12:05 PM on August 30, 2017
In a sign that this organization is either a.) already obscenely wealthy, b.) is not long for this world, or c.) is trying to make some sort of strange point, the "contribute" button is buried at the very bottom of the page.
posted by NBelarski at 12:05 PM on August 30, 2017
Ms. Slaughter is a war criminal. favored war on Iraq and Libya. She is a well-spoken apologist for whatever side of the bread is buttered for her. Her policies result in the deaths of innocents with no measurable gain for any freedoms. Libya, Syria and Yemen are examples of where the roads she supposedly paves with good intentions lead to. Criminal.
posted by SteveLaudig at 12:18 PM on August 30, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by SteveLaudig at 12:18 PM on August 30, 2017 [1 favorite]
From Wikipedia: In 2003, Slaughter stated that the impending Iraq invasion might be viewed as "legitimate," apart from the question of whether it was illegal, if intervening countries: (a) found weapons of mass destruction, (b) were greeted as liberators, and (c) went back to the UN immediately. Slaughter subsequently concluded publicly that, according to these criteria, the invasion had been illegitimate.
Doesn't sound like a huge support of the Iraq war to me. You wanna support some of your claims before you start throwing 'war criminal' around? Maybe cite what law she's broken in the Geneva code?
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 1:34 PM on August 30, 2017 [6 favorites]
Doesn't sound like a huge support of the Iraq war to me. You wanna support some of your claims before you start throwing 'war criminal' around? Maybe cite what law she's broken in the Geneva code?
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 1:34 PM on August 30, 2017 [6 favorites]
Matt Stiller of Open Markets: Google Tried To Shut Us Down. But We'll Never Stop Fighting
Fundamentally, monopoly power is political power. It lets a small group of people exercise control over a much larger group, which results in both extremes of wealth inequality and extremes of political corruption. It is why anger is bubbling up in most Western democracies, regardless of the voting system or safety net — we are all dealing with the same monopoly institutions.
What Google did, in attempting to silence my colleagues, was in fact a call to action. It is a call to action for all of us, as citizens, to take back our democracy. We must begin a new era of trustbusting, of public utility regulation, of free and open commerce, and of citizen engagement in our political and commercial spheres.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:07 PM on August 30, 2017 [1 favorite]
Fundamentally, monopoly power is political power. It lets a small group of people exercise control over a much larger group, which results in both extremes of wealth inequality and extremes of political corruption. It is why anger is bubbling up in most Western democracies, regardless of the voting system or safety net — we are all dealing with the same monopoly institutions.
What Google did, in attempting to silence my colleagues, was in fact a call to action. It is a call to action for all of us, as citizens, to take back our democracy. We must begin a new era of trustbusting, of public utility regulation, of free and open commerce, and of citizen engagement in our political and commercial spheres.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:07 PM on August 30, 2017 [1 favorite]
What's really awesome in all of this is watching other, older monopolies screech out, "yeah, sic' 'em!" while getting so much less press for their shitty practices of buying fake studies. And it's not just oil and tobacco. It's beloved companies, or rather their trade associations. But we're used to that. They don't say outright that they're trying to be ethical; they jsut let us assume that from their branding.
Google deserves this attention.
Google doesn't solely deserve this attention.
posted by pykrete jungle at 8:25 PM on August 30, 2017 [4 favorites]
Google deserves this attention.
Google doesn't solely deserve this attention.
posted by pykrete jungle at 8:25 PM on August 30, 2017 [4 favorites]
Barry Lynn in the WashPost (warning: Javascript paywall): I criticized Google. It got me fired. That’s how corporate power works.
posted by nicwolff at 12:24 PM on August 31, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by nicwolff at 12:24 PM on August 31, 2017 [1 favorite]
fwiw...
-The problem with networking, New America edition
-Should Amazon be broken up? (acast|stitcher)
-Monopoly Rents and Corporate Taxation (Wonkish)
-Market concentration can benefit consumers, but needs scrutiny
-why monopoly power might be disinflationary
also btw...
-The problem with networking, New America edition
-Should Amazon be broken up? (acast|stitcher)
-Monopoly Rents and Corporate Taxation (Wonkish)
-Market concentration can benefit consumers, but needs scrutiny
-why monopoly power might be disinflationary
also btw...
- A reason rent-seeking is so hard to get rid of: the rents get priced into the system so ending them screws ppl over
- The single most important question about single-payer plans: How much are you going to pay doctors?
So what's going on here is the media are petitioning Congress for dispensation to form an otherwise-illegal news cartel so they can Build the Paywall and Make Google Pay For It or something along those lines... The Google/FB duopoly storyline, and Google's reaction to it, are thereby motivated.
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 12:36 AM on September 1, 2017
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 12:36 AM on September 1, 2017
Josh Marshall of TPM has a great post about what it's like as a publisher to work with Google -- not that he has a choice, as he explains. The story about TPM potentially losing half its revenue because Google can't tell the difference between publishing hate speech and reporting on it is especially unnerving.
posted by Cash4Lead at 6:34 AM on September 1, 2017 [3 favorites]
posted by Cash4Lead at 6:34 AM on September 1, 2017 [3 favorites]
This is good, too: Yes, Google Uses Its Power to Quash Ideas It Doesn’t Like—I Know Because It Happened to Me
Google never challenged the accuracy of the reporting. Instead, a Google spokesperson told me that I needed to unpublish the story because the meeting had been confidential, and the information discussed there had been subject to a non-disclosure agreement between Google and Forbes. (I had signed no such agreement, hadn’t been told the meeting was confidential, and had identified myself as a journalist.)
It escalated quickly from there. I was told by my higher-ups at Forbes that Google representatives called them saying that the article was problematic and had to come down. The implication was that it might have consequences for Forbes, a troubling possibility given how much traffic came through Google searches and Google News.
posted by Cash4Lead at 10:34 AM on September 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
Google never challenged the accuracy of the reporting. Instead, a Google spokesperson told me that I needed to unpublish the story because the meeting had been confidential, and the information discussed there had been subject to a non-disclosure agreement between Google and Forbes. (I had signed no such agreement, hadn’t been told the meeting was confidential, and had identified myself as a journalist.)
It escalated quickly from there. I was told by my higher-ups at Forbes that Google representatives called them saying that the article was problematic and had to come down. The implication was that it might have consequences for Forbes, a troubling possibility given how much traffic came through Google searches and Google News.
posted by Cash4Lead at 10:34 AM on September 1, 2017 [1 favorite]
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Some scholars cried foul at being included in the Campaign for Accountability report.
Google's response to the report.
There were definitely some shady cases. For example, a paper published without any disclosure of funding even though the author had received substantial payments from Google to organize symposia on the topic in question.
I think academia-at-large needs to adopt medical research's broad conflict disclosure rules (example disclosure form [pdf]).
posted by jedicus at 7:33 AM on August 30, 2017 [10 favorites]