Fishburn Hedges

10.01.2011 | (2 comments)

In the world of search, few people dispute Google’s ubiquity.

“Search” implies a process, or a channel through which to find information.  It implies neutrality.

But in fact, some commentators suggest, Google may have transcended this benign function, becoming instrumental in the way in which we research and consume information and, by implication, interpret the world.

This may seem like a bold assertion, but consider the numbers of people who use Google as their primary, if not sole, portal for everything – from products and services, to gossip and directions. There is now a generation of school children who have grown up “googling” their way through their homework, and who feel more comfortable typing into a search bar than using an index.

Of course, searches of any kind can be biased. A researcher in library may have a particular bias towards certain sources, or be guided by a reading list that takes them in a particular direction. However, the idea of Google searches is that they are based on algorithms and, as such, find everything that it relevant, with the order influenced only by significance or authority (i.e. the ones with the most links etc.).

However, anyone familiar with SEO will know that this is not always an organic development. Although it may not be possible to control exactly where something appears in a Google search, it is possible to influence it to some extent.

There has also been considerable growth in paid-for content on Google. Micah White has written an interesting piece on how the placement of advertising around information diminishes the latter by commercialising the organisation of knowledge. The social, cultural and political implications of organising knowledge in this way - through key-word indexing by a corporate advertising agency with priority given to the highest bidder , rather than by holistic category - are significant.

In both cases (above the line and below it), attention and, often, financial backing, will give a particular source an advantage over others.

So the question this raises is this:

Has information become less objective as a result of Google being a commercial operation?

Well, if we had transitioned from a time when information was freely and widely available to all without interference, the answer would undeniably be yes. But as we know, education has previously been available only to a privileged a few and certainly not without the influence of political and religious agendas. Equally, information was available only to those with access to it, hidden behind financial, geographical and linguistic obstacles. 

In the West, commerce has replaced the Church and the state as the framer of information in the same way that free market capitalism has come to dominate social development more generally. Perhaps the idea of “objective” information is a misnomer; it has to come from somewhere after all.

Whether or not this is better or worse for us as citizens is up for debate, but what cannot be disputed is that far more of us than ever before can freely access information from multiple sources in less time than it takes us to open a book.

on 11.01.2011

Amy Wilson :-
Well, those are the problems, yes.

1) I would argue that no, they probably can't. Given that newspaper bias is generally better understood but still not fully grasped by many readers, it is unlikley that most Google users are aware of the mechanisms behind their search results. White also references some data (http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/2005-01-24-ads-vs-search-results_x.htm) which suggests that many users cannot tell the difference between paid-for and organic content as well, which is very worrying.

2) Arguably, users have as little influence over the structuring and presentation of information in Google results as readers of a book. However, the pro-Google, or rather, pro-internet view would be that the rise of user generated content occupying the same space has made "information" more democratic. This leads back to the problematic nature of "information" though, and whether objectivity is possible/ desirable.

on 11.01.2011

Alex Pearmain :-
Great post.

But, can't be seen in separation from:
1) Do those googling have sufficient understanding of the context in which they type (i.e. media literacy education for the 21st century, as we teach newspaper bias)
2) Are they operating in a claimte of freedom of speech which enables them to challenge the structuring and presentation of that information