Just One Tiny Letter Separates Google From Gore (UPDATED)
of Noel Sheppard
Pity poor Noel Sheppard. Forced to scour the liberal media daily for socialist perfidy and Marxist inclinations to expose over at News Blusters, he now can’t help but find liberal shenanigans everywhere. The cashier at Red Lobster who said “here’s your change, sir” was making a not-so-veiled reference to Obama’s campaign slogan. Everywhere he looks, there are no-right-turn-on-red signs. (Why not just no turns on red, huh?). Then there was that mysterious image of Che Guevara on his breakfast toast last week.
So, you’d think that when Noel somehow or other got a hold of a copy of last week’s New Yorker, he would have found plenty of things to push him into a slobbering apoplexy just in the index alone (not to mention the cartoons!) without having to find this sinister plot in an article on Google.
Former Vice President Al Gore a few years ago advised Internet behemoth Google about “aspects of search quality.”
Such was reported by the New Yorker in its October 12 issue (subscription required).
By themselves, the following paragraphs from this 6500-word piece don’t mean much.
In other words: “Nothing in the article actually supports the liberal machinations I am about to reveal but that’s never stopped me before.”
However, given the ongoing concerns about Google’s political leanings and how its search algorithms might be manipulated to favor liberal news outlets over conservative points of view, the very idea that Gore might have had any input to this process is worrisome to say the least.
Those liberal search al-gore-ithms probably explain why the first site that comes up in a Google search on “Obama” and “Kenya” is a Wing Nut Daily article with the Kenyan birth certificate touted by Orly Taitz, D.D.S, CIPS®, J.D.
So, a few years ago, Gore raised some concerns about “search quality,” and then sat in Google’s office for three hours watching ten “search-quality researchers and specialists in charge of this part of the business” work on solving problems he shared with the company’s owners.
What were these concerns? Were they personally or politically motivated?
The article didn’t say
Does Noel Sheppard piddle in his pants? His blog post didn’t say. But, of course, we can only assume that he does. But, in fact, the article does say what Gore’s concerns were, but Sheppard, oh-so-conveniently omits that from his post. Gore is on Apple’s Board of Directors with a fiduciary obligation to the company’s shareholders, an obligation not to insist that the first result of every Google search returns the Wikipedia pages on Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin. Life isn’t a South Park episode where celebrities and political figures just randomly show up and say stupid things.
Honestly, I’m beginning to feel sorry for Sheppard. He’s really just on the verge of posting on his discovery that cereal names are another attempt to indoctrinate the nation’s youth with liberal ideas. You know, it’s just one small step from Fruit Loops to gay marriage. And don’t even get him started on Cocoa Puffs.
UPDATE: Well, it appears that Noel Sheppard took time off from seeing what socialist propaganda was spelled out by the letters in his morning bowl of Alpha-Bits to come over here and register a protest:
Tintin,
You stated in your piece, “But, in fact, the article does say what Gore’s concerns were, but Sheppard, oh-so-conveniently omits that from his post.”
Could you please specifically cite from the article in question exactly what Gore’s concerns were and then demonstrate that quote was not in the three paragraphs I included in my piece that came directly from the New Yorker story?
If not, would you please correct what appears to be a misstatement on your part?
Thank you.
Noel Sheppard
Dear, dear, this guy is a dimwit with serious reading problems. Noel, you didn’t mention that Gore was a director of Apple. That, as I say in the post, gives him a fiduciary concern. In case the term “fiduciary” is unfamiliar to you, and it may be unfamiliar to you as a guy who earns a living collecting wingnut welfare, it refers to Gore’s obligations to pursue the interest of Apple’s shareholders and not any personal interests. So, his concern was not “personally or politically motivated” as you naively wonder. His concern would have been fiduciarily motivated.
Here’s the reference to Gore as a director of Apple in the article which you didn’t mention. You just tried to make it look like he randomly showed up at Google headquarters ranting about the ManBearPig:
I think, Noel, that you now owe it to your readers to correct your error and to tell your readers that Gore is a director of Apple and not just some meddling liberal who showed up one day to fiddle with the Google’s search engine for his own personal reasons. Then you can go back to your bowl of Alpha-Bits.
Seriously, the way the right winghates Al Gore, you’d think he were still in office. Or that he had run for office in the past ten years. How many Democrats spent the 1990s in a tizy about Ollie North? Jesus.
Captain Crunch, on the other hand…
~
What were these concerns? Were they personally or politically motivated?
I am mystified why the Right Wing thinks it’s somehow sinister for an American citizen to discuss his business ideas with an American business.
Shredded wheat is the jew of liberal fascism.
And what’s so scary about Algore? NPP. Also.
[Does Mommy have to shine a light under their bed every night to prove there’s no monsters hiding there?]
OHMIGOD!
Erick Erickson’s head is going to explode any minutes:
Pelosi buys football team
Nancy Pelosi’s husband buys UFL team. Liberal bias!!!
He invented intertubes and teh Googlez? ZOMG!!1!!
Dear me, I completely forgot to put this on my list of ongoing concerns!
What I love about these assholes is the way they can’t stop riding the Loop-de-Loop of Concern.
To recommend a solution would invariably mean some sort of outside intervention in the Evil Google’s affairs,* which would be contrary to their More Free Market/Less Big Government ideals.
*Seriously, why Google? Is some sad little fuck checking Bing to make sure it doesn’t have liberal bias? And if so many of these fucks really are concerned that Google is set to put articles from The Advocate way up top, why not start their own search engine? Oh right, that would require actual skills.
Hey!! President Obama flies the first salvo in this year’s War on Christmas!
An email is going around that the Obamas will have no Christmas Tree at the White House!
Well played, Mr. President!
Tintin baby you’re back! I know I don’t say it much but man I love you, you’re the best for real for real, I would bear your child, etc etc. Oh but shit you posted a Noel Sheppard thing, man that’s a dick-shrinker for fucking real.
These poor conservative souls now top the endangered species list. Of course they can’t be saved since Dubbahyuh gutted the Endangered Species Act. Too bad.
The world is closing in on them like a ruthless predator and their tiny little brains just aren’t fit for modern living, I’m afraid. The well known liberal bias of the media, reality, the bible, the hordes of extremist lefties, the constitution, etc. is just too much for their feeble minds to survive.
I’m sure in a few generations there will be occasional siting of the remnant survivors in isolated and protected places in the south but overall their days are as numbered as the panda bear’s.
Even if their paranoid fantasies were true and Google would, say, deliberately discredit libertarianism by linking a search on “Atlas Shrugged” to some lunatic named Pam, Google is a private company subject to the Wondrous and Invisible Hand of the Free Market in the winger/glibertarian mythos, and should be free to do what they want. So just like they tell victims of meat packers pushing e-coli steak rubs, frustrated wingnut searchers can simply go elsewhere for their search engine needs, isn’t that how the song goes? Better yet, maybe some right-wing moneytits can provide for their own conservative search engine, where a search for pastry recipes will link first to Michelle Malkin’s denunciation of Dunkin’ Donuts’ nefarious Islamofascist activities.
If it’s so easy to tilt search results to bias for islamofascistcommunism, why not get some enterprising tea party boffins to set up a Conservagoogle to counter it?
The way that Conservapedia has turned the tide in the War of Online Wikis, you would think it was a no brainer… Get Scaife on the phone!
R. Porrofatto said,
October 17, 2009 at 17:23
Doh!
algorithms
Al Gore Rhythms
Today my alphabet soup spelled out “recycle”. So keep laughing, dirty fucking hippies.
Do I have to say it here, people? IT WOULD BE IRREPSONSIBLE NOT TO SPECULATE!!!11!!
Irresponsible, goddammit.
I believe the logic behind Google’s bias is based on the way they modify their logo for holidays and current events. Once or twice, it has been in favor of something deemed “liberal” like Labor Day or Spring.
Then the monkeys fly!!!
Reality, of course, has a liberal bias. In that conservatism has been thoroughly discredited by Reality.
Conservatives can only BE FAIL, Conservatism IS FAIL.
ohmygodohmygodohmygod
“J— said,
October 17, 2009 at 17:31
algorithms
Al Gore Rhythms
”
much as I admire him, i would NOT buy that album.
I’ve been googling trying to find a newsblusters expose on Dick Satan’s connection with Halliburton and Enron but shit can’t find nothing. Gore c’mon tweak this bitch so that these criminals can be exposed, this is supposed to be LIBERAL!!!!
The guy’s got a point. Every time I look up “George W. Bush” I get the story of a fucking idiot who did everything wrong. Liberal bias!
I believe the logic behind Google’s bias is based on the way they modify their logo for holidays and current events. Once or twice, it has been in favor of something deemed “liberal” like Labor Day or Spring
Why Spring? Faggy May flowers?
“Does Noel Sheppard piddle in his pants?”
I’m gonna say yes, but I’m sure somehow Its the liberal media’s fault.
This is just a hit piece. The telecos want to get rid of net neutrality so they can carve up the internet. Goggle opposes that because it would kill their business. Therefore they send their paid hacks to try to smear Google as “liberal”.
Oh you silly-billy libs! You actually think that thinking still matters?
Come ON now. “9/11 changed everything*” ring a bell?
Unpatriotic activities like understanding your own history, maintaining basic academic integrity or using logic & reason are a sure sign that you secretly support terrorism & want to make buttsex mandatory – I know it’s true because it’s in all these wonderful exciting books by these Coulter/Hannity/Beck folks ( Golly Mugwumps, I just bet it’ll be in that new book by that nice Palin girl too! ) … & people so smart they can write whole BOOKS would never tell fibs! Ami(t)rite?
[ /brainworm ]
——————–
*(except Dick Cheney’s Depends™)
Why Spring? Faggy May flowers?
Beauty, warmth, hope, wanton sexuality, etc.
Oh Lord, Mark, that is hilarious: “Andrew is a genius a couple times over”
Indeed, it must be very strange to be Bright Bart. A man of extraordinary vision and brilliance approaching to genius, he can’t get anyone to notice.
Also too compare newsbusters with Media Matters–no contest bitches!
I think Gore is entitled to control the internet. He invented the damn thing, didn’t he?
Andrew looks so dashing in that drawing, compared to the raving, unkempt loon I’ve seen in photos.
Granted, my own hair has a natural tendency to look like Breitbart’s when left to its own devices, so I can hardly talk here. Where’s the goddamn hair gel?
Rusty Shackleford said,
October 17, 2009 at 17:49
Why Spring? Faggy May flowers?
Beauty, warmth, hope, wanton sexuality, etc.
It’s true–they don’t like those things. Except the wanton sex…so long as it involves hookers,diapers,drugs and wide stances.
g said,
“Hey!! President Obama flies the first salvo in this year’s War on Christmas!”
“One of the chain emails circulating around in-boxes claims that “a friend at church who is a very talented artist” got a letter from the White House saying not to send any ornaments painted with a religious theme.”
“Just thought you should know what the new residents in the WH plan for the future of America,” concludes the email hoax. “If you missed his statement that ‘we do not consider ourselves a Christian Nation’ this should confirm that he plans to take us away from our religious foundation as quickly as possible.”
This makes the baby Jesus cry.
WTF! Assholes.
J— said,
algorithms
Al Gore Rhythms
FTW!
Life isn’t a South Park episode where celebrities and political figures just randomly show up and say stupid things.
You say that like it’s a good thing….
mikey
mark f said,
ohmygodohmygodohmygod
“James Taranto profiles our friend Andrew Breitbart and lets Andrew speak for himself in “Taking on the ‘Democrat-media complex.'” Among other things, Andrew is the founder Breitbart News as well as the sites Big Hollywood and, most recently, Big Government.”
“Andrew is a genius a couple times over, with an instinctive sense of how to turn the power of the left back on itself. Discussing the strategy he employed to roll out the James O’Keefe/Hannah Giles videos of ACORN at work, Taranto quotes Andrew: “This plan wasn’t just a means to defend against the media’s desire to attack the messenger. It was also a means to attack the media and to expose them . . . for the partisan hacks that they are.”
“Taranto enters qualifications on Andrew’s “harsh” judgment, but Breitbart’s understanding of the modus operandi of the left in its media extension is one of the keys to his success. Andrew expands on his purpose in rolling out the ACORN story: “If they think that Acorn or the Democratic Party or the NEA or the Office of Public Engagement is the primary target, they couldn’t be more wrong. It is the Democrat-media complex. It is the mainstream media.”
I changed my name from gocart to TJ to make a joke but I kind of like the name Teenage Jesus.
This is simply a handy excuse to not know anything, and to make up their own shit. The media is liberal. Academe is liberal. Now the most convenient and simple research tool ever devised is liberal.
Perfect. If you can discredit every potential source of facts and knowledge, you needn’t know anything at all.
From Bruce Springsteen to Lydia Lunch. Interesting transformation there.
Speaking of one tiny letter, if you ever make the mistake of typing “googles” instead of “google” in your browser, you end up with this. Better animation than that Ox vs. Rat travesty, though. (Not that that’s hard.)
An email is going around that the Obamas will have no Christmas Tree at the White House!
Of course not! I myself am getting together a Kwanzaa Baobab just like the one that they’ll have at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Who is Lydia Lunch?
“An email is going around that the Obamas will have no Christmas Tree at the White House!”
I heard that the Clinton’s hung condoms on their Christmas tree, it was in a book and everything, so this is sorta an improvement or something.
“This is simply a handy excuse to not know anything, and to make up their own shit. The media is liberal. Academe is liberal. Now the most convenient and simple research tool ever devised is liberal.”
Reality is liberal.
I believe the logic behind Google’s bias is based on the way they modify their logo for holidays and current events.
Oh, it’s much, much worse than that. Those nefarious bastards at Google, probably at the personal urging of AL GORE!!! have made their logo a mind bending tool! Oh the subtle perfidy!
Lydia Lunch is the infamous hothead/hottie behind Teenage Jesus And The Jerks.
Let’s see, Jesus was born about 2000 years ago… so that would make him, ummm…(carry the 3) mmm I’d say about 11 in god years.
“Let’s see, Jesus was born about 2000 years ago… so that would make him, ummm…(carry the 3) mmm I’d say about 11 in god years.”
16 you fucking heathen!
Splitter!!!
Tintin,
You stated in your piece, “But, in fact, the article does say what Gore’s concerns were, but Sheppard, oh-so-conveniently omits that from his post.”
Could you please specifically cite from the article in question exactly what Gore’s concerns were and then demonstrate that quote was not in the three paragraphs I included in my piece that came directly from the New Yorker story?
If not, would you please correct what appears to be a misstatement on your part?
Thank you.
Noel Sheppard
“Let’s see, Jesus was born about 2000 years ago… so that would make him, ummm…(carry the 3) mmm I’d say about 11 in god years.”
16 you fucking heathen!
See, the joke works better.
“This plan wasn’t just a means to defend against the media’s desire to attack the messenger. It was also a means to attack the media and to expose them . . . for the partisan hacks that they are.”
These guys are great, because they don’t really have a principle to stand on – you know, that little idea of objectivity. They just want partisan hacks that are partisan in THEIR way.
Which is it, Noel? The article didn’t say?
Or you now need a retraction from Tintin because you quoted the article where it did say?
You can’t have both, even if you are a republican pants-pisser.
~
Conservagoogle is coming.
Gore invented the Al Gore Rhythm for Google, as J pointed out. Lay off him man!
I’m waiting for Conservareality.
Could you please specifically cite from the article in question exactly what Gore’s concerns were and then demonstrate that quote was not in the three paragraphs I included in my piece that came directly from the New Yorker story?
Because if the concerns were somewhere else in the article other than the three paragraphs I included, that doesn’t count, because I totally left it out accidentally on purpose, and I can’t be held responsible for that.
Tintin,
So, your contention is that Gore was voicing concerns to Google on behalf of Apple. And you conclude that from exactly what? Because he’s on the board? Because Schmidt recently resigned his position on Apple’s board, and there’s now some speculation that other Google advisers will also have to resign from Apple’s board?
But Schmidt’s resignation was in August, and according to Auletta, Gore voiced his views about search quality to Google a few years ago with no further specificity than that. So how do you connect THOSE dots? Where in Auletta’s piece did it say that Gore was representing Apple’s concerns about search quality to Google? It didn’t!
What you have done here is exactly what you’re accusing me of: you’re making an assumption that the concerns Gore expressed about service quality involved Apple. Yet, the piece doesn’t say that, does it? You’ve just inferred it.
Also, contrary to what you implied in your original blog, I DID state in my piece that Auletta didn’t say what Gore’s concerns were:
“What were these concerns? Were they personally or politically motivated?
“The article didn’t say.”
As such, Tintin, it is you that are jumping to conclusions, and I that stated that Auletta didn’t tell readers exactly what Gore’s concerns were.
One final note, and them I’m off to my Alpha-Bits: Gore became a Google adviser in 2001. He was appointed to Apple’s board in 2003. As such, since Auletta didn’t supply a date as to when Gore’s search quality concerns were expressed to Google, we don’t even know if he was even on Apple’s board at that time.
Have a nice day.
ns
[Tintin adds: Oh, ferchrisakes, Noel, the Auletta article says that the meeting that you find so nefarious occurred “several years ago.” Gore has been a director at Apple since 2003. Unless “several” means “more than six” Gore would have been a director at the time. And you’re being disingenuous by refusing to acknowledge in your post that Gore is a director at Apple.]
So, wait…why the fuck would Google want to do this in the first place? It would involve a fair amount of resources to execute and they’d potentially wind up alienating tons of users. Plus, it’s not like Google holds all the information in the world or is the only search engine in the game. And folks in the information management biz talk about search quality all the time–it’s not some weird code term lefties came up with for their sooper sekrit plan to brainwash the masses into changing their light bulbs and buying Priuses because Google told them to. Furthermore, why am I trying to assign logic to this guy’s argument when there are pot brownies to be made?
Jeff,
If you had taken the time to either read my article or Auletta’s, you would know that beside the mention of Gore being a Google adviser early in the piece, the paragraph’s I cited were the only reference to the former Vice President:
“Other than a mention early in the piece about his being a ‘longtime Google adviser,’ this was the only reference to Gore.”
Back to my Alpha-Bits!
ns
By the way, Noel, while you’re here making bizarre assumptions about the evil liberals who live under your bed, there are actual real, substantial concerns about Google’s privacy policies and copyright and intellectual property issues regarding Google Books that liberals are fighting against on behalf of everybody, even you, but just keep fucking that chicken.
I do appreciate the wingnutosphere’s ability to fervently advocate contradictory ideas, Noel Sheppard.
I: Al Gore invented the internet! HAR HAR HAR!!!
II: Oh noes, Al Gore is in charge of the internet, we’re all gonna DIE!
I: President Obama is a wimpy metrosexual from Kenya! HAR HAR HAR!!!
II: Obama is the Marxist Fascist Uber-HitlerStalin, and he’s going to put us all in camps, and we’re all gonna DIE!
I: We conservatives are manly examples of the Randian superman, and we will take back our country!
II: Rush got dropped from his Rams NFL ownership group by his fellow bidders, so it’s all no fair and BOO HOO HOO!
In conclusion, your site sux, as does your writing, wingnut welfare whiner.
~
I myself am getting together a Kwanzaa Baobab just like the one that they’ll have at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Remember that it has to be made from decommissioned weapons.
…good luck getting this into the living room (let alone squeezing the presents under it)
So how do you connect THOSE dots?
for practice
However, given the ongoing concerns about Google’s political leanings and how its search algorithms might be manipulated to favor liberal news outlets over conservative points of view, the very idea that Gore might have had any input to this process is worrisome to say the least.
That’s a lot fallacy and unsupported assertion for one little argument.
When you Google for [google political leanings search manipulated], you encounter a screenful of links to and copies of Mr Sheppard’s article. When you add the search term [-Gore] to exclude them, all that’s left are articles on Google-bombing.
Google is filtering its output to suppress the ongoing concerns about its political leanings and its manipulation of search algorithms! Wake up people!
Tintin, please be careful to only leap to conclusions that support the Liberal Masterminds R Controlling the Intrawebs conspiracy theory.
Thank you.
It is disturbing and distressing that Democrats are allowed to work.
So the very convincing response to Tintin is
(a) There are no bits in the article that tell us what Gore’s concerns were; AND
(b) I did too include those bits in my piece!
Face, it, we have been pwned by logic.
Shorter Noel: I’m a humorless dweeb, and you pissed in my Alpha-Bits. WAAAAAAA!
Wow, Noel, step back on that breathless syntax a little bit. It’s hard enough figuring out what the hell you’re talking about, in between all the tacit assumptions you make that only make sense if you live on Planet Wingnuttia, without having to parse a writing style that would embarrass one of the schoolgirls from Twain’s “Eloquence and the Master’s Gilded Dome.”
Besides which, if you don’t like Google’s political leanings, you can do what I do with Faux Snooze, the National Pissed, and the Moonie Times — go somewhere else. Of course, only liberals are supposed to change the channel, right? — conservatives are supposed to whine and throw temper tantrums en masse until the media and its gatekeepers fall into ideological line.
Oh, forgot, you probably believe that the media is liberal, too, even though you have a media job, because Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage and Melanie Morgan and Brian Sussman and Ann Coulter and Ross Douthat and Joe Klein and Bill O’Reilly and Lou Dobbs and Sean Hannity and Michelle Malkin and Dennis Prager and Don Imus and Laura Ingraham and Hugh Hewitt and Oliver North and G. Gordon Liddy and Alan Keyes and Mike Gallagher and Robert Novak and Peggy Noonan and Rupert Murdoch and Steve Forbes and Larry Kudlow and Matt Drudge and David Frum and David Horowitz and Jonah Goldberg and Tucker Carlson and everybody on Clear Channel and Sinclair told you so, right?
Way late to the party here, but has anybody noticed the double standard here?
Of course, Algore™ is on Apple’s board, so that’s a double whammy; but every Apple computer you see on TV (and that’s 95% of them at least) still has to have a sticker covering the Apple logo, after the avalanche of hate mail the networks got for every visible one, after Apple contributed $100,000 to the No on 8 campaign. That was a year ago and the stickers are still in place. Ever see a sticker covering a Dell logo on TV?
Google contributed at least as much if not more to the No on 8 campaign, and yet you have to go to the fringes of the wingnuttosphere to find all this Google-hate. What’s the double standard about? Is Algore™ the reason?
(P.S. Love Al-Gore-ithm! Connect the dots, sheeple!)
Al Gore Rhythm!
Who could ask for anything more?
So, Noel …
You folks fascinate me sometimes …
Your initial post and your several comments here make me think you couldn’t possibly be smart enough to brush your own teeth or tie your own shoes or get safely across the street on your own. To say nothing of actually sitting at a keyboard and stringing a few random nonsequitors together for a blog post.
(None of this is meant as an insult, by the way. Just an observation.)
So, are you sitting at home, with dirty teeth and untied shoes, dictating to an intern provided by the Cato Institute? Perhaps the intern does your teeth, and you wear slippers, and then he drives to your workplace and you dictate to him there?
The possibilites are endless!
Much more likely is that you are an unconscious master of sophistry and various logical fallacies, and that doesn’t really interfere much with your basic motor functions.
Well played! I’d say you have done very well with your obvious limitations. Not as well as Sara Palin or Rudy Giuliani, but that gives people like you and Michelle Malkin and Glenn Beck something to aspire to.
Mmm, update pwnage.
Perhaps when one responds to snark, one might do well not to be blatantly disingenuous & self-contradictory while doing so.
Naaaaaaah! Just do what this guy did, wingnuts!
Just like Iraq, it’s a SLAM-DUNK!
Al Gore Rhythm
Al Gore Music
Al Gore my girl
Who could google any Al Gore!