First the background on “Don’t be evil” as reported by Wikipedia:
In their 2004 founders’ letter prior to their initial public offering, Lawrence E. Page and Sergey Brin explained that their “Don’t be evil” culture prohibited conflicts of interest, and required objectivity and an absence of bias:
Google users trust our systems to help them with important decisions: medical, financial and many others. Our search results are the best we know how to produce. They are unbiased and objective, and we do not accept payment for them or for inclusion or more frequent updating. We also display advertising, which we work hard to make relevant, and we label it clearly. This is similar to a well-run newspaper, where the advertisements are clear and the articles are not influenced by the advertisers’ payments. We believe it is important for everyone to have access to the best information and research, not only to the information people pay for you to see.
And now this surprising screen cap I’ve been sitting on for awhile. While WUWT was the top result, the user is given the option to block WUWT results forever in Google Chrome:
That screencap is from April 22nd, 2011.
ADDED: Some folks suggest it was solely the use of the “f word” in search that triggered it. If so, why is there no block option for Lucia’s the Blackboard?
I ask readers to try getting that message to pop up searching for specific titles on Real Climate or Climate Progress and other pro AGW sites. I tried and could not back then, though it is possible the algorithm has changed in the month since I tried. I’ve also noted that once you ignore the “block all results” option, it does not appear again (for that website).
Your experience may vary, I’m only reporting mine and it appears that once you have a look at the content you get the offer to block, the option goes away. So I can’t repeat it without doing a reinstall and registry cleanse.
[ADDED: Reader Jeremy was able to get the same result with RealClimate, see here so it is good to see that it is not specific to WUWT, though that still leaves the graph below]
What prompted me to publish this screencap today? I needed confirmation that something was afoot.
Steve Milloy of Junkscience.com dropped me an email about his article Climate cleansing: Google to censor skeptics? where he quotes this from the Yale Climate Change Forum:
——————————————————–
The Yale Forum on Climate Change reports that,
… Google leads people to accurate information about climate change. Fifty-two percent of the 980 sites [returned by a Google search on climate change-related terms] contained clear statements in line with the vast majority of peer-reviewed climate science evidence. For example, if you had searched for “climate change myths” in early May, you would have found this Environmental Defense Fund site, which says, “The most respected scientific bodies have stated unequivocally that global warming is occurring, and people are causing it.”
And Google may be willing to fix this problem for the alarmists. The Yale Forum goes on to state:
Meanwhile, can search engines do a better job of pointing the public toward credible sites?
A Google spokeswoman, who insisted on anonymity because she is not a Google executive, said the company is always looking for ways to improve results. “Last year, we made 500 changes to the algorithm to improve search quality,” she said.
————————————————————————————-
So, it appears if you can’t beat them, censor them. I hope I’m wrong about that, but this graph below suggests that my traffic has been impacted by changes in search engine algorithms, Google of course being the lions share.
Here’s my Alexa search driven hits to WUWT, note the step change in mid 2010, perhaps one of those “500 changes to the algorithm to improve search quality” was implemented then:
Source: http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/wattsupwiththat.com#
ADDED: Some commenters suggest “lack of interest” in climate issues as the reason for the sharp drop, compare the number of search related visits at RealClimate.org then:
The blocking option might be a one shot deal, but the step change and continued lower results (for WUWT search hits) concern me. I had a large traffic spike in December 2010, related to the COP16 climate conference worldwide interest, but no corresponding large uptick in search hits.
UPDATE: Harold Ambler points out in comments his story about what happened when ClimateGate broke, and Google’s search lagged well behind Bing at the time:
http://talkingabouttheweather.wordpress.com/2009/12/02/google-gate/
As I stated on another site, I no longer use Google for Climate searches. I think it was in one of your articles about the time of Climategate, where the comment was made that Bing brought up much better hits than google. it was then I realized they had already started doing that – this latest is just their dropping any pretext to objectivity.
Agreed. For a while, some time back, this site was coming up at the top of searches when I would Google a phrase or quote form a WUWT article. I was impressed. I supposed it meant that WUWT was getting high traffic and high search results, thus making the site prime real estate for Google and their ad machine. Apparently profit motive and “do no evil” take the back seat when it comes to pushing progressive agendas.
The following google search : http://www.google.co.uk/#sclient=psy&hl=en&source=hp&q=real+climate+watts+up+with+that&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=29fe7f6f85cbb9ba
Gives block options for both your site and real climate. This new feature is probably algorithmic and not specifically targeted at ‘deniers’.
Does it only work for Chrome? I use Firefox and I don’t have the option to block any search results.
I use Bing.
It is more likely a feature to deal with content farms and scrapers, crowd sourcing the use of ‘block this site’ to bias overall search rankings.
http://glasskeys.com/2011/05/05/how-to-remove-content-farm-sites-from-google-search-results/
REPLY: OK how do I get around it? – Anthony
Thank you for pointing this out in your typically fact-based way. If that chart were inverted and labeled “global temperature,” Michael Mann and Rajendra Pachauri would be shouting “Incontrovertible proof!” from the rooftops.
Seriously: this is scary. For you, for us, for the public. Ultimately for Google, because it shreds their cred. And without that, they are nothing. Between this kind of “kindly smothering” and “nudging,” and the exposure of their enablement of privacy erosion, they are under new pressure. I hope they respond as conscientiously as their slogan suggests. But their slogan implies a dualism: either “don’t be evil” or else “be evil.” The problem is, as Edmund Burke showed us, “all that is required for evil to triumph, is for good men to do nothing.” So not being evil is not enough. You have to work to be good.
I use Bing. Not because they’re better, or I’m in love with MS necessarily. They’re just the best “not Google” search engine at the time.
But, most of the time, I know what I’m looking for anyway, and where to go.
This needs watching but I think you need some more information before suggesting this “feature” is specifically targeting WUWT. It also appears to be broswer feature rather than google.com.
I assume this is what they talk about here: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/new-chrome-extension-block-sites-from.html
Wuwt still shows up as #1 for that search for me (currently on an iPad).
This is potentially really scary, but let’s not jump to conclusions!
The problem is likely at Google much as it is at many newspapers. You have people with a certain world-view who sincerely believe they are out to make the world a better place who decide to “make a difference” by advancing that view through their work.
The problem comes in when what they believe to be true might not actually be true. Some people are likely to suppress or censor information that is counter to their own world-view as it calls their entire belief system into question. If they could be wrong about climate, maybe they are wrong about a lot of other things, too.
Heck, next someone will be telling them that they are all wrong for buying that “fair trade” coffee.
http://www.nationalpost.com/todays-paper/Fair+trade+coffee/4782606/story.html
Thankfully, I do not get the blocking option either (pre-Chrome). Maybe they didn’t bother to implement the feature for older systems, knowing that old folks like me generally don’t limit our knowledge to initial results from a search engine anyway.
Truly, though — that screenshot is pretty evil.
Blocking was an experimental extension to chrome, they must have made it live. Really this is nothing to freak out about as a specific attack on your blog.
REPLY: it also happens in Firefox, I don’t think it is that specific Chrome extension – Anthony
I don’t think there is a way to get round it. You can trigger it for any site, seems to be relevancy related.
http://www.google.co.uk/#sclient=psy&hl=en&source=hp&q=google+is+really+awesome&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&fp=29fe7f6f85cbb9ba
Allows you to ‘block google.com’ for one of the results on the first page..
REPLY: Doesn’t work for me. No options to block presented. But the more troubling problem is the graph I presented. – Anthony
The good news is it is just a feature to allow visitors to improve their search experience by rejecting results from sites of the user’s choice. /sarc
The bad news is for that feature to be offered, Google will have had to already decided the site is a candidate for mass rejection.
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/03/hide-sites-to-find-more-of-what-you.html
Not surprising for the single most evil enterprise on the internet.
Basically, you’re screwed, Anthony. Google, having made up their mind about your site, is sharing their opinion with others in a clever example of passive aggression.
Personally, I’d like to reject all results from ExpertsExchange as it is an extremely annoying site that, based on google results, has every answer to any question except you can’t see them unless you open an account with them. It is a search engine bunny trail.
The Google reject option is present only if you are silly enough to have a google account *and* are actually logged in. One more strike like that should be grounds for having your computer confiscated. When you have a google account and are logged into that account your life is like an open book and Google has scanned every page. That, my friend, is evil.
Don’t be evil depends upon what you consider to be evil.
It may well be that climate skeptics are now considered “evil”
Obviously the freedom of the internet is going to be compromised.
I use bing.
I think that’s just a “filter block” for the immediate search results… the opposite is the “More results from wattsupwiththat.com »”
the question would be is a permanent block or temporary, long-term or short-term.
At least you are in good company: http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j237/hausfath/Screenshot2011-05-20at120214PM-1.png
REPLY: Ah good to know. Thanks Can you tell me how to replicate that? Update: tried all three browsers again, cannot get it to occur. – Anthony
1) First time i heard Google’s “Don’t Be Evil” mantra i though, “Yeah, as if…”….
2) When the warmist fanboys decide to see nothing, hear nothing, they cut themselves off from reality and finally make the full scale transition to a cult (Rule number 1 in a cult is to control the information the cult members get). This will weaken them further. Wholesale descend into mass madness RSN.
Climate blog gives me WUWT on page 2.
Climate skeptic gives me WUWT on page one, item 6.
I have a dev channel chrome, with the blocking extension installed for the same blocking expertsexchange reason as dp and the option is presented to block docs.google.com and google.com. Did you log into your google account before searching?
As for the Alexa rankings, you would be better off using a dedicated web stats system. They use a pretty dodgy sampling method..
I’ve started using dogpile (no joke!)–the good part is that it is neither Google nor Bing–both of whom are owned by less than stellar companies when it comes to ethical behavior.
I’m checking out Bing.. Who do these guys think they are. I guess there the geeks at school trying to be hip.. Whats is it called, “Cool by Association”
Is this the first casualty in the UK of the Carbon Tax.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/may/20/tata-steel-job-losses-yorkshire-teesside
Construction slump and carbon costs blamed for 1,500 steel job losses
No “Block” option for me when I execute that search. Latest Chrome in use.
Perhaps the good ethical google has been abandoned and is now to stand for
Global
Origin
Of
Gloomy
Lies
Evil!!
The power to corrupt – needs congressional examination methinks or wider exposure via competitors, perhaps a Bing sponsored contest for words linked to name!!
Some evidence 🙂
http://yfrog.com/h8rakp
The top Googlegate story (as counted by Google):
http://talkingabouttheweather.wordpress.com/2009/12/02/google-gate/
How long until the algorithm is rewritten to change this?
Anthony,
It could be that sometime mid 2010 was when the climate issue ceased to be important to a lot of people or all the people who were interested in Climate had already found and bookmarked your site so they didn’t need Google anymore to find you. (I like to be a glass is half full kind of guy.)
A Google search for “F-word Fusillade” using Chrome has WUWT in first place and a option to block on every site returned. Same Google search using Firefox gave me the same sites, but without the option to block.
I like the idea of an option to block a site if you have the option on every site.
Ryan Robers sed:
“I have a dev channel chrome, with the blocking extension installed for the same blocking expertsexchange reason as dp”
Sites like that are the justification for using studly caps:
ExpertSexChange.com
ExpertExchange.com
Either way the site is a bad joke.
I Googled “google site block” and found this entry at the Google Help forum. The following is from the “Best Answer” to the posted question:
I’m using Yahoo for searching. It’s not as good as Google, but I stopped using Google when you point out that they were actively sponsoring Alarmist propaganda. I made Yahoo the default in Safari and Camino (the two browsers I use on my Macs).
RockyRoad, I think Dogpile is a compilation search engine, which therefore also incorporates Google and Bing.
/Mr Lynn
DaveS-Tata is the Erstwhile Mr. Pachauri involved in that…..
So the “block” option probably comes up when the hit contains something that might be indicative of dirty sites (“trans”, “f-word”, …)?
I did a highly scientific comparison between google and bing, searching for “friday funny” and “climate” together. Google listed three WUWT pages on top, and offered to show more. Bing topped with only two WUWT pages… 🙂
I don’t have this site bookmarked so I search for it on Google every time I want to read this site. At least on this computer. I have it bookmarked on my other one.
I have noticed that about a year ago when i searched i had to suddenly type “watts up with” in order to get the result i want….before i could simply “watts u” and get the result.
Now it again only takes typing “watts u”
I no longer use Google for anything.
I can’t trust them and there are other search engines.
really?? No offence, but this is ridiculous.
When I google “wuwt fword”…. I get a block site option.
When I google “wuwt climate”…. i dont.
When I google “skeptical science crap” I get a block site option.
When I google ” skeptical science models” I dont…..
Do you see a pattern?
Even if I google “skeptical science wikipedia” for some reason I get the option to block WIKIPEDIA!
REPLY: Actually no, I checked that, I don’t think f word was the trigger. Lucia’s Rank Exploits page which started the whole F-word (well actually Tobis did) thing did not have that option for blocking, and she also had “f-word” in the post. – Anthony
Did the same search on a danish version of chrome. WUWT was 1st choice, but no option to block anything.
I don’t think it is coincidence that the blogpost that caused the “block this site” query was the “F-word Fusillade”. Post.
Perhaps the censorship was not climate related and your complaint is off target.
REPLY: Actually no, I checked that, Lucia’s Rank Exploits page which started the whole thing did not have that option for blocking, and she also had “f-word” in the post, I’ve added a screencap in the body to illustrate.- Anthony
Something changed between 2010 to 2011 as the graph displays. The question is what happened. The step change is so dramatic that you may be able to pinpoint the day it happened.
Where this would lead, I am not sure but it may be worth investigating.
Let communist journals like nature keep the skeptical studies out of it and et voila most published studies comes from crazed climate communist hippies.
What ever the newly developed googleniztas does is to make sure they don’t come under attack from the crazed climate communist hippie parade for using all that electricity they use. And of course they also want green subsidizes. So it’s like a win-win for them.
Anthony. I had a strange feeling something was going to happen today, and it has!
I’ve found the first real tangeable evidence of environmentalists flipping from “too much fossil” we’re all doomed, to the opposite “too little fossil fuel we’ve all doomed”.
OK, one snowflake doesn’t make global cooling, but where one leads, others will not be far behind!
At last evidence of eco-rats fleeing the sinking ship
Which is why, as a consumer, I don’t use anything Google – or Apple. I really wish “cumquat” would come out as an alternative to both! 🙂
If Google wants to block a “content farm,” they should block Real Climate. That site is so full of B.S. that I have to wear rubber boots when I stop by.
One action could be to create a mirror site on Google’s Blogger. I have noticed that some recent visitors have come by way of such broad search-terms and phrases as “circular reasoning in attribution of climate change”, and “climate change” to the Impact of Climate Change site, and that new posts are searchable within minutes of being published.
wow! thats pretty bad.
Google=Big Brother
OMG read this from the download site of the personal blocklist program!!!!!!!
“The personal blocklist extension will transmit to Google the patterns that you choose to block. When you choose to block or unblock a pattern, the extension will also transmit to Google the URL of the web page on which the blocked or unblocked search results are displayed. You agree that Google may freely use this information to improve our products and services”
I bet what is happening is that all of the “warmists” are downloading the extension and then blocking your site!!! this gets back to google so they lower your site results in searches! \sarc
I’m sorry…but I lost some respect for this site today.
While I’m not supporting Google here, perhaps it is the difference
between using the “F-word” and Blackboard’s using “F word” or “f word”?
Although, that doesn’t explain everything.
REPLY: I tried all variations of F-Word climate, f-word climate, “F words” climate and Lucia’s site still got no offer to block – Anhtony
Now I may be wrong, but wasn’t the president of google quoted as saying ‘deniers’ should be treated as criminals? I seem to remember this around the time of Climategate. I also remember entering “climategate” in google for quite some time afterward to see if it was true that the word would not register. It was true. Nary a mention of it in google or the MSM for at least a week, if I recall.
I used to like Google once, and used to support their products until very recently. I have since stopped using an Android based smartphone and ended up getting an iPad instead of my originally preferred Android based tablet. I do not use Google’s search engine and removed Chrome from all of my computers.
As for search options that allow for a modicum of privacy, I use the following:
https://ixquick.com/
http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/scraper.htm
Google is like that character in Toy Story 3 “Lotsa Huggs.” One of the best villains ever in a children’s movie.
It surely can‘t be a matter of naughty words. If I type “Grattan disdain” in a Google-search, a post by me (wherein I describe her using the c-word—and I don’t mean cancer) appears, on my computer, at the top of the page.
Anthony, search on google is being personalized. your searches will differ from mine
or anybody elses. must see
http://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bubbles.html
The fact is, Google has long stopped to be a search engine company and has become a gigantic personal information collection and profiling, advertisement and marketing database company.
Google has been screwed up for long now.
For example, I just searched for ‘global warming’ on Google. In the first instance, globalwarmingheartland.org showed up in the first few links. Since I have Instant search turned on, the moment I actually pressed ‘Enter’, I get a slightly different set of results and globalwarmingheartland.org is gone. It does not show up on the results page. I just checked on 4 other systems and I am unable to bring up globalwarmingheartland.org in the results searching for ‘global warming’.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/50716889@N00/5739969073/sizes/l/in/photostream/
Maybe everyone who was searching has found you Anthony. I guess (not just the privilege of climascientologists) there were a large number of people milling around who had no real focus, web-wise, until this site became high on page one of results for many of the varied topics contained herein. 78 million hits, and counting, is not too shabby 😉
I think this follows a pattern. Some of us are persistent and believe that our strength in numbers will defeat this junk eventually – we stick around, in varying degrees of interestedness. Most people have neither the resilience, or time, to carry on after they realise that the whole thing is agenda driven control freakery and think they are powerless, so drift away or hope it will sort itself out. The churn rate would keep a certain level of visitors even if they were constantly being refreshed as some joined the war and some fell off the end.
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_107337052636523&ap=1
and
DaveS says:
May 20, 2011 at 9:08 am
No. It was what they planned all along. Shift production to India and cash in on the carbon credits. Worth a lot more than they paid for the company.
The blocking feature doesn’t seem to always work. Maybe it hasn’t been rolled out to all servers, or maybe at times the servers forget your state.
1. You have to be logged in to Google. (your account name will be shown in the upper right)
2. You do a search, follow a search result link, then come back to the search results page.
3. The “Block this site” will appear in the search results.
3a. Blocked sites are visible somewhere in your Google account management.
http://www.geekwithlaptop.com/google-block-site-enhancing-search-accuracy
Personally, I’ve always been partial to Ask.com (the old “Ask Jeeves” site), because they were the fist to allow more than a single word search (could input full sentences, and get results).
So, to check there, I put in the statement “F-word Fusillade”. You came up as number one. No option to block.
kadaka (KD Knoebel) seems to have the answer. On Firefox, I can get the block message on any site by clicking on it, then going back to the search. It offers that option every time on every site I tried.
Google explains what they’ve done in this video.
In summary, they rolled out a change last May that attempts to detect “content farms”, i.e. sites that contains many references to other sites rather than original content, and reduce the search rankings for these sites.
I would guess WUWT, with a LOT of references to other sites, got hit by this change.
I wonder if there’s a component of being bitten by your own success.
My http://wermenh.com/pame.html is one of the top web pages on the Pamela Smart murder case. (If someone told me during the trial I would have that page, I’d tell them they were nuts. I might have paid more attention to the trial though.)
After one Google algorithm change the Hampton NH library page moved ahead of mine, which was a bit annoying because the library site just had a list of links. I eventually concluded that Google liked the short, focused, lotsa references to her name and that my page was longer, covered more people and topics, and overall was more dilute.
I wonder if the same is happening to WUWT. Where a post used to get 30 comments, it now gets 100 or more. The overall page is now a lot longer than it used to be and if you’re searching for a phrase from the original post, the “quality” of the hit may be reduced due to the other text on the page.
I haven’t checked other sites, but with climate change losing ground as an important problem, I’d expect (hope, even) that fewer people will be looking for climate change stories. Perhaps you can add some references to Lindasy Lohan or Dominique Strauss-Kahn on each page. 🙂
As for Pame, I figured I’d just wait for the next algorithm change and a few months later I was back above the library. These days Wikipedia, the official pamelasmart.com page and other new stuff scores higher. I keep the last update date in the title, so that helps. And my page is still #1 for searches for “Pame Smart”.
Does not surprise me one bit. I have read a least half a dozen accounts of Google manipulating search results to reflect the left wing political agenda. Some may remember the Bush-Kerry election when Bush searches literally started with a page of results implying Bush was a recognized mental deficient. Google later said it may have been an employee error. There have been a bit of those “errors”.
Well, here’s a screenshot of my search results for “F-Word Fusillade”.
OK… This does work (though not in all browsers.) One way to get this block all search results is to do a google search, click on a result wait about 10 seconds and then hit the back button on your browser.
If your browser is one that it works in, it will give you the option to block. I tried this in FireFox using a seach on the evil word “puppies”. I went to the first link http://www.puppyfind.com, waited 10 seconds and then navigated back to google using the back button. I then had the option to block all results from http://www.puppyfind.com.
Here is what Google has to say:
http://www.google.com/support/websearch/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1210386
Although it is a personal block list, Google does look at the lists you create for “inspiration” as to what sites are causing most problems for people.
The recent changes they made, which removed (or at least de-rated) a large number of garbage sites that always appeared high in the listings was based in part on results obtained from these lists.
Google appear to have two conflicting problems – 1) they want to make money from the search engine, and do so by forcing “answers” to the top of the list, and into that annoying sidebar. 2) The need to generate relevant results.
Number 2 is affected by people gaming the system, that is partly what the block lists are about, it give you some personal control, and it is also a source of information on what people are finding to be worthy of blocking. Unfortunately, number 2 is also affected by number 1. Google’s efforts to cram the page with paid results is rapidly making the Google search engine a pain to use.
Much as I hate Microsoft, and know darn well that once its established it will become 1000x worse than Google, I am sorely tempted to use Bing.
I expect the rankings will fall as the debate wanes. It’s actually a good sign, unless we want simply enjoy arguing over the senseless “science” of climatology.
There are plenty of Science, technology issues to discuss here.
The Google block feature should contain a feature to easily reset. Since it doesn’t, those who use it are intentionally biasing their search results. Maybe they get what they deserve. The strong survive, and the weak…….
Interesting, in my case WUWT is the 4th for the term ‘climate blog’. The first 3 are: Real Climate, Climate Progress and Climate Audit. WUWT is followed by World Climate Report – a skeptic site again.
I reject any type of personalisation because I would like to see as many viewpoints as possible. However, Google rankings are different by geographic region and web browser language.
And lest you thing http://www.puppyfind.com was somehow considered a content mill or otherwise objectionable, I was also able to do the same with searches where I clicked through to http://www.whitehouse.gov, http://www.huffingtonpost.com, http://www.realclimate.org and http://www.nasa.gov. I’m pretty sure Google doesn’t have much against any of those sites.
Not that I think a strongly left-leaning Google wouldn’t engage in censoring results (“climategate” does look suspicious,) but let’s look at other possibilities.
Google has been trying hard, for years to get “spammy” sites out of its index. They had a recent major update (Panda) that was supposed to help along those lines. Some innocent sites were hit, some junk survived, but a fair amount of junk was cleared out. Junk that anyone would agree is junk, regardless of their political leaning.
At the time G stated that it was interested in looking at crowd sourcing junk and “not junk.” I expect the “block this site” is part of that, as shown by the comments above with Real Climate blocks.
Now what if we get a bunch of energetic activist types, who realize the implications of this, who load up their Google Chrome and then make it a point to block WUWT or any other “not approved” site whenever they get a chance? That would raise a lot of flags at G central. Until the flags are cleared it seems that there is a chance there might be a penalty associated with rankings.
Also, it might be that people, becoming convinced that Warming (Gore’s version, anyway) is a scam, just aren’t searching on climate related stuff as much as before.
Google trends: climate
Global Warming – note the el nino spikes in that graph.
climate change – Note the huge (cherry picked) downward trend since the el nino spike of early 2010.
G would look like it was censoring/blocking, when it was doing no such thing. The problem with crowds determining what’s Ok is that you need honest crowds. The concept would probably work well with gardening sites, but badly with political sites.
As far as ranking for “climate blog” or related phrases, why should WUWT rank for those? Few people link to WUWT with that phrase and there’s nothing in the domain name or header which says “climate blog.”
Personally I’d take it as a compliment. Think of it this way. Google are nothing if they loose their reputation. So the most important thing to google is their reputation …Yes?
No! Making a small adjustment to your ranking seems to be far more important to google. So by definition your website is more important than the most important thing of google … it reputation which makes you almost by definition the most important website in the world, ranked by the biggest search engine.
As I said, that’s one hell of a compliment!
I quit using google long ago, when it broke that they were going along with China’s censorship campaign (which they more recently recanted). Startingpage.com uses google’s search engine, but keeps no tracking data for your searches. Bing is used as well. I was recently in the market for a new phone, and the Android phones are phenomenal, but I couldn’t bring myself to support google. Don’t care for Apple either. I’m not a Microsoft fan, but they’re the lesser of three evils, IMO. It’s not as great as the other two, but I have a phone I’m rather happy with, an HTC.
OK – here it is without the href tags:
I just tried typing “clima” sing Firefox w/Google search and got
http://i51.tinypic.com/33e4tol.jpg
I get an almost identical list when using Bing but it is a popup menu that disappears before I can capture it.
The Google search for “f-word fusillade” gives:
http://i51.tinypic.com/xwrid.png
Bing doesn’t even come close.
I did a Google search for WUWT and your site was first in the results. It did not give me the “block all…” option . I opened your site and then hit the back arrow in my Firefox browser and the block site message appeared. I tried other searches and got the same result.
I stopped using Google search engine several months ago after making a few test searches that indicated built in bias. It seems obvious that Google has politicized most of its products. Bing seems similar but somewhat less offensive. I switched to Alta Vista.
I limit my use of Goggle software to minimum, that is Maps and Earth.
I have just returned from the Fiji Islands in the South Pacific where WUWT was not available but Climate Etc and Roy Spencer were. I had interpreted that the Fiji Government blocked this site. But, just maybe Larry Paige and his “Do no evil” motto, now reflects his acquired status in world affairs so censorship of alternative sources of information for the Climate Change consensus is just his way of keeping evil people from accosting the Climate Change mantra. Just a speculation of course. Fijians are very interested in Climate Change as their former volcanic and now island nation will be swamped by future rising sea levels. It is currently raining during the “Dry Season” so the sugar cane is benefiting. And the USA “owes” them dollars for previously poisoning the atmosphere with CO2, and they are waiting for their reparations check, at least the Fiji Government is. Their current sources of information are the Fijian Government and those that are working, their unions. Those Fijians living on remote islands and distant villages are dealing with Typhoid Fever and don’t seem to have very good internet access so their concerns are strictly local, not global. However, tourists and Fijian Government officials can access Climate Change information from consensus blogs as well as read the Fijian Sun newspaper which lifts climate news from selected Australian sources. As the internet does provide alternative information, especially regarding Climate Change, blocking WUWT; ie, controlling access, is a good way of focusing the argument and not cluttering the minds or confusing people with ideas like “It ain’t necessarily so…”
I personally hate those content farms and am grateful for the feature from that point of view.
How evil can Google be? As you know, Google owns Youtube now. Apparently they have been responding positively to the governments to remove unwanted content, just like they do in China.
Take a look at this site: http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/governmentrequests/
They also remove certain key words from their search engines apparently in order to reduce or eliminate traffic to certain sites.
I tried that Google Chrome search and had no blocking option come up.
Why should anyone be surprised by the suspicion that Google is quietly, slyly altering the outcome of anti-AGW searches. They did build a team of 20 spin doctors to help promote the AGW position. After William Connolley became the “Minister of Lies and Misinformation” at Wikipedia by single-handedly editing over 5000 articles it is not unreasonable to expect a similar but subtler scenario at Google. Choosing Bing is no better with Gates firmly in the warmist camp. There couldn’t be any pressure from Obama? Nah.
The problem with allowing permanent blocking on Chrome is that some people use internet cafes.
Before performing an experimental search on Google clear out your cookies, cache etc. I have found that previously clicking sites I interact with places them higher on the results page. I cleared out cache, cookies etc. performed the same search and down they went. That was my experience using Explorer though I now use Firefox.
I have known for nearly four years that Google “filters” your search results of certain subjects so that your top two or three pages of search results will give you “liberal” websites and stories.
Let’s not forget that WUWT was blocked from Facebook too. That seemed to be a result of ‘guerilla protests’ where individuals FB users were tagging WUWT as inappropriate with the intent of censoring your views. If we allow Google’s executives the benefit of doubt, there IS the possibility that the ability to block WUWT and NOT Pro-AGW websites is a result of another kind of ‘guerilla protest’.’ Essentially Chrome users have the ability to block WUWT because it is currently tagged as a potentially being content farm. I am further postulating that WUWT is tagged as a content farm because a small group of people (possibly at google or not) have a grudge against you and knowledge of how to game the system.
When Google tells me their motto is “Don’t be evil”, what does that *really* mean?
Are they telling me that they strive to not be evil themselves? -or-
Are they telling *me* not to be evil? -and furthermore-
Who gets to define “evil”?
Personally, I view Google’s statement in the same light as “Trust me.” Neither engenders much trust or confidence in their true motivation. And neither really means anything except “You must watch me very carefully.”
Cheers!
When climate gate broke we saw alarm bells going off and we saw the powers that be jump into HIGH gear. They started to circle the wagons to save CAGW. I remember how incredible it was to see Arnold Schwarzenegger just days later saying that CA has a good solid plan to go ahead with carbon trading. (in other words, pretend everything is ok, and we going ahead!).
Up in Canada, right after climate gate, Google started playing views of Al Gore with ONE CLICK from the main Google page. These videos would play WITHOUT me even having search anything! So, one click form main Google main page, and out pops Al Gore!
(I am not kidding, and I was SO shocked by this, I recorded it for history:
The above is a precious video during that special time when climate gate broke. We all remember that special time, but it also exposed so many people in the wrong way and their true colors. I mean, if the popular press is so behind AGW, then why would not a search engine like Google do the same? I do not believe that in ANY other time one mouse click from the MAIN Google page would START a video of propaganda in this fashion.
So, this was A RARE chance in history when these folks showed their true colors and thought they could sweep this under the rug and nullify climate gate. Note that Al Gore is a special advisor to the Google board of directors.
Albert D. Kallal
Edmonton, Alberta Canada
Look at the list of people Obama wanted to see here:
http://www.californiabeat.org/2011/02/17/president-obama-to-visit-the-bay-area-thursday-for-meeting-with-tech-leaders
Google is on the list. Note also, now blogs are beginning to use a Facebook-based identity checker. I may have to set up a spare computer that never visits my Facebook account. It’s getting harder to be anonymous these days. Rataliation for stating what you really think is a fact.
Espen says:
May 20, 2011 at 8:43 am
I assume this is what they talk about here:http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/new-chrome-extension-block-sites-from.html
Wuwt still shows up as #1 for that search for me (currently on an iPad).
This is potentially really scary, but let’s not jump to conclusions!
From your link Google says:
“We’ve been exploring different algorithms to detect content farms, which are sites with shallow or low-quality content. One of the signals we’re exploring is explicit feedback from users. To that end, today we’re launching an early, experimental Chrome extension so people can block sites from their web search results. If installed, the extension also sends blocked site information to Google, and we will study the resulting feedback and explore using it as a potential ranking signal for our search results.”
Effectively, this approach is looking for a crowd-source blocking. There are those who would use this type of un-checked voting to repeatedly vote to block a site they consider ‘the opposition’. I would expect some to even be willing to avoid any checks at multiple voting that Google may attempt to put in place. Therefore, Google would block WUWT – and probably may even agree with the blockers – claiming that it was a ‘neutral algorithm’ but hope nobody notices the impact.
To my mind this just shows completely inept, less than logical thinking by Google developers. Nevertheless, having found that the outcome is to reduce traffic to ‘opposite viewpoints’ the managers of Google will continue to allow it. Wait till closer to the election when Republican candidates will find themselves blocked by Google.
Evidently success has gone to their heads to the extent they feel they must direct and restrict the information we seek so we can make better decisions.
Google is now acting like the liberal MSM that not only filtered the news but explained it to us to justify the news they delivered.
I cannot think of a more arrogant and pardon the expression jackass decision by Google. Bing is looking better for the availability of drop down choices and speed.
If you want the best search engine, and the one that google is supposed to have stolen, try http://www.altavista.com/ . It was developed by Digital Equipment Corporation software engineers years ago and is still the best.
I know that search results can be skewed by “google bombing” where a simple script is used to repeatedly search a specific site to skew the search ranking to the bombers advantage. I don’t think for a minute that the warmistas are above this behavior.
I am not very internet savvy – just enough to get by. So if this thought is wring, I apologise in advance.
If one went to a search engine ‘home’ page and then searched for WUWT – would it ensure that WUWT keeps getting search hits? and thus ‘up’ the search rankings?
I don’t visit many websites and use my drop down address bar menu to ‘recall’ the WUWT site – I’d be happy to do a ‘search’ everytime if it helps – yes, I know I’m only one person, but I do check the site a few times a day (usually).
Microsoft used to be referred to as the evil empire.
“Don’t Be Evil” doesn’t mean don’t do bad things; it means don’t turn into Microsoft.
Anthony, I think you and others have valid reasons to fear Google. They have the means to control what people are seeing/thinking, and they’ve proven since their first interaction with China that they stand for nothing other than themselves. They broke their “dont be evil” right away when they realized they would have to compromise on free speech in order to get access to China’s market. They’re slimy and clever and they control the worlds information hub. Yes for all those reasons we should watch them closely.
That said, I don’t think we have anything on them yet, given what you’ve shown in this post.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0511/54951.html#ixzz1MpsSPzcK
Clinton wants some kind of UN or Federal agency to ‘police’ and correct internet rumors. Cass Sunstein is another one who has expressed similar thoughts.
I gotta believe that AGW is the biggest ‘rumor’ target they have in their sights because the estimated yearly carbon trading market is said to be worth $20 trillion a year. Given that many of our major banks (most that control our federal reserve and hence, our government) have carbon derivates ready and stand to profit from carbon trading by other means, I think we are essentially hosed. I don’t see us winning this issue, no matter how many holes we find in the climate science.
sources:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=21070001&sid=ar0X_FWXo1ag
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084585&http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1084585
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2010/01/16/lawrence-solomon-better-off-with-bing.aspx
I’m sorry – but comparing GOOGLE and GOOGLE CHROME are like comparing a VW – Bug with VW-Ultra Sedan. Ya they both are made by Volkwagon … but ….
If you actually (and I did) a Google (non-Chrome) search – you will find this “Block” feature – NOT PRESENT!
Why?
Google Chrome is just that – FULL FEATURED – the “Block” is not “censorship” anymore then Parental Control is ‘censorship’ or Spam Block, is “Censorship”.
With your private features you get to “make the call” … Before we cry “Foul” – make sure it is! Google and Google Chrome are not the same software .. it’s called “Chrome” for a reason .. more power, more INDIVIDUAL features, etc …. this is not “censorship”.
FINE PRINT – > This deals with my searching these with GOOGLE – I do not own Google Chrome as I have no use for it. But when I looked on-line
T Boone Pickens hypocrisy… He sold his wind farm stuff and then complaints about Obama’s energy agenda…
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110520/ap_on_bi_ge/us_pickens_obama
I guess tax dollars subsidies did not flow his way to make a profit with wind…
I just did a google search for “Climate Blogs” and WUWT was the 6th listed. Climate Audit was number 1 followed by Real Climate, Climate Progress, another hit on Climate Progress, a couple more sites that are to some particular article and then WUWT.
I did the same on Bing and WUWT doesnt make even the first 6 pages….
What’s up with that?????
Youtube/ Google caught censoring videos at government request. Read the article and click the links included for yourself and see the youtube censorship screen come up.
QUOTE:
‘In a frightening example of how the state is tightening its grip around the free Internet, it has emerged that You Tube is complying with thousands of requests from governments to censor and remove videos that show protests and other examples of citizens simply asserting their rights, while also deleting search terms by government mandate.’
Continue reading here:
http://www.infowars.com/government-orders-you-tube-to-censor-protest-videos/
On my version of Chrome there’s a site rating icon just to the right of the address bar. For WUWT it’s greyed out because of “too few votes”. Surprised me. Over to you guys…..
I do not use Google for anything anymore. Personal boycott.
You guys can help by checking out google labs and using +1 searching
Boycott Google permanently.
Using startpage.com for over a year now. Boycotting YouTube as much as possible too. Don’t do business with evil. Bing = Microsloth + evil.
I recommend these guys:
vimeo.com
blip.tv
naturalnews.tv
prisonplanet.tv
AS of 7:05 pm EDT I obtained a text “copy” of the following
when I enter “WUWT” in the Google search box:
You’ll note the “show more results” and the “show all results”
utilities essentially hide just how many
available varied topics and entries the searcher might see at
first glance.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
I’m running an HP Pavilion with Windows XP2,
with “NoFlash” engaged, popup blockers on high,
and an old utility I’ve migrated from computer to
computer called Naviscope as an ad/site/ad key
word blocker. I use Zone Alarm (free) and the
internal Windows firewalls.
I have http://wattsupwiththat.com/ listed as one
of my “Trusted sites” under the security section of
the “Internet Properties” as part of my Internet
Explorer settings.
I’ll try using “Watts Up With That” as a search string
next on Google.
At 7:50 PM EDT, using the string:
Watts Up With That
got tons of links to, and about WUWT.
Ixquick.
Bing is better.
Set it to your default search engine for 1 week. At the end of 1 week I am certain that you will switch like I have and many others have too.
Cheers!
Have you considered talking to Google and asking them what is going on?
Let me speculate wildly (which seems to be the fashion right now).
Much of the content on WUWT also appears elsewhere. You reprint essays from other sites and many sites reprint original material from WUWT. It is possible that you look, to the Google Robot, like a content scraper. That would certainly push down search rankings.
Of course, it may be nothing of the sort. It may easily be that Google are favouring “right-thinking” sites like Real Climate. But I think that a discussion with Google would be a good starting point. If they’re being evil, it won’t help — but it probably won’t hurt. If it is just a mistake, they will quite possibly fix it.
That’s my $0.02 worth.
Using Google Search on say “TARDIS” clicking a link and returning to the search results allows you to eliminate the particular domain from your search results as well.
When logged in at the bottom of the search results preference page there’s a section on blocked sites, with a Manage Blocked Sites link, where you can remove one or more of the up to 500 sites in the blocked sites list or add links to be blocked manually.
You have the ability to censor your own search results, in general usable to qualify results to remove ‘noise’. The danger inherent there is in not being remembering that you blocked a site and later count on not finding it as presenting some authoritative result.
“Sites will be blocked only for you, but Google may use everyone’s blocking information to improve the ranking of search results overall.”
It would seem to block groups sharing common interests not held by Google Search users at large there should be a tool to alter the gestalt view of the blocking filter by voting things up. There may be an expectation that users of Google Chrome subscribe to the Don’t Be Evil mind set and aren’t expected to act capriciously.
That might not be a valid view when one considers organized efforts to delete emails from public records.
Ditto what Mosher said.
Google is personalized, and so it shows us what we want to see.
After the positive reinforcement, it suggests purchases taylored to our desires.
Test of: Willis Eisenbach (no quotes) on Bing.com 110520_21:53 CDT
Through an ISP from Tabasco, Mexico
1. minx.cc/?post-295147 (huh? This one is first here, too?)
2. ace.mu.nu/archives again the “nitpicky demands”
3. roniteisenbach com
4. sweetness-light com
5. climateaudit org 2009 12 09
6. bishophill.squarespace com 2011/2/26
7. bishophill.squarespace com 2011/3/23/
8. www blueoregon om 2010/10
……“go to http://www.wattsupwiththat.com for fun if you have the guts.”
9. algorelied com p=3294
First WUWT:
10. wattsupwiththat.com/2010/03/31/18010 “Trust and Mistrust”
…. Again: how ironic?
(Note, I did this same search with Google.com.mx 30 min before.
First WUWT was #19. List should be posted above, but has not yet appeared.
Just tried “f-word fusillade” on Google and the first suggested string was … “f-word fusillade.” WUWT’s “Friday Funny” post was the first hit. No suggestions for blocking. I use Firefox 4.0.1.
Apparently the results are indeterminate at this time.
Google.com.mx search: Willis Eisenbach
From a hotel in Tabasco, Mexico 110520_21:10 CDT
1. minx.cc/?post=295147
2. ibloga blogspot com 26 Nov 2009
…..(#1 and #2 same snipit: “the guy making all this trouble with his nitpicky demands to see data and methodology (as he is legally entitled to…”)
3. climateaudit org /peter-brown… 18 oct 2008
4. dailybayont com 27 Nov 2009
5. www guardian co uk /extinction 7 Mar 2010
6. sweetes-light com 3 Mar 2010
7. http://www.mitosyfraudes org enero 1 ,2010
8. algorelied com 27 Nov 2009
9. ilovecarbondioxide com 2009
10 http://www.domotica us 16 Jun 2008
11 bishophill.squarespace com 26 feb 2011
12 tech.groups.yahoo.co/group/climatechangedebate/ 29 Ene, 2008
…
17 http://www.blueoregon com 12 Oct 2010. “Go to wattsupwiththat.com and read…”
First WUWT reference:
19. whatsupwiththat.com 2 Dec 2010 “Testing… Testing…” [how ironic!]
Wow. I would not have believed it if I did not see it for myself.
Search pages and screen capture saved.
Why am I thinking of the word “unperson” now?
So the good news is even without honest search results you are getting millions of hits a day. You are not the first and won’t be the last as the politicization of search get fined tuned. It will happen to other search engines as well once they become more popular.
Bill Clinton now wants a Ministry of Truth for the internet. Sound familiar? Only approved stuff will be found by searches is my guess as to how they will implement it.
The way around it is to use other alternative media to spread the site directly to others. Stuff like Facebook, Twitter etc. Good old bumper stickers and T-shirts are not bad either. You will need to be creative at getting the site’s name into the public mind.
Bing.com Anthony Watts
110520_23:14 CDT
1. www likedin com /pub Victory Painting LLC
2. au linkedin om Sydney Area
3. linkedin com /pub YSL New York City
4. www facebook com Join Facebook….
5. uk linkedin com /pub
6. www myspace com killin’ em’ with kindness since 1985
7. wattsupwiththat.com Former meteorologist ….
8. www mitosyfraudes org Marzo 20, 2009 WUWT. Maldivas
9 en wikipedia org /wiki /surfacestations
10. ibstudios memso net Steampunk Girl…
11 wattsupwiththat com same as #8
12 en-gb facebook com kyle m watts
13 (a repeat of #8)
14 (a repeat of #9)
15 (a repeat of #10)
16. www desdeelexilio com 2010 01 27 temperature global
17. www neuroscience ox ac uk “Membrane neuroreceptors”
18. en Wikipedia org disambiguation
19. www2 bioch ox ac uk Professor
20. www zoominfo com people Watts_Anthony…..3905
[Bing does not impress me as an alternative to Google]
Have used startpage.com for a while now which is a compilation search engine using all the others so is marginally slower, but I can’t read much in a few milliseconds :p
Search for ‘climate friday funnies’ gave WUWT as first four entries.
It also does not register IP address.
Google censorship is rampant as far as I am concerned.
Google “global cooling” and you get 3,230,000 hits.
Bing “global cooling” and you get 15,600,000 hits, about 400% more hits.
Lots of Google-sifting going on!
google themselves being the biggest “content farm” in the universe!
some months ago, google took away the “search within results” feature, which was the only good reason to use them in the first place. despite the anger of researchers in particular, who were using that feature to good effect, google claimed it wasn’t actually a feature that functioned the way everyone using it knew it to be functioning, but in some entirely unreal way that made it an unnecessary and dispensible feature.
no-one on the forums i visited believed them.
Evil.
Deadman says: May 20, 2011 at 9:50 am
It surely can‘t be a matter of naughty words. If I type “Grattan disdain” in a Google-search, a post by me (wherein I describe her using the c-word—and I don’t mean cancer) appears, on my computer, at the top of the page.
True, Michelle Grattan was totally incorrect on a number of other occasions, difficult to see it at the time as journalistic licence.
I see you have escaped censure with other naughty words also.
http://deadmanturner.wordpress.com/about/
In fact I am surprised that you state you live in Tasmania (Australia).
Brave statement. But then having quolls as parents probably saves you.
All Right All Right ‘Ants’ piece was hilarious. Thanks for that.
bikermailman says:
May 20, 2011 at 10:38 am
I quit using google long ago, when it broke that they were going along with China’s censorship campaign…
Same here.
I retract the post on May 20, 2011 8:16pm. I misspelled “Eschenbach”
Google.com.mx Willis Eschenbach
110521_0253 CDT
1. scienceblogs com 9 Dec 2009 “W. E. caught lying…”
2. www youtube com Part 1 Negative feedback
3. wmbriggs com blog p-2197 answers to 14 + 2
4. climatewft blogspot com 28 Feb 2010 “gets mad” at J Curry”
5. pipl com directory
6. wattsupwiththat com Between Wind and Water
7. camirror wordpress com 25 Nov 2009 FOI Request
8. lanuevaedaddehielo blogspot com 10 Mar 2011
9. www realclimate org 20 Jan 2005
10. omniclimate wordpress com 24 Nov 2009
11 www youtube com Part 1 Negative feedback
12. www oarval org Termostato Junio 14 2009
13 www exxonsecrets org personfactsheet id=1320
14 www 123people com
15 climateaudit org 23 Nov 2008 Can’t see the Signal (Author: W. E.)
16. www anenglishmanscastle com 8 Dec 2009 Cen England Temps
17. www thegwpf org 14 May 2011 Black box of Choc
18. wattsupwiththat com 2009 12 8 Darwin Zero
19. www skepticalscience com 30 Oct 2010 Comparing IPCC and peer-reviewed…
Another good reason for NOT using Google Chrome
Another search engine is .
It’s claim to fame is not tracking and recording your IP address, and selling them to advertisers etc. For more than the default 10 search results, change the settings in the Advanced settings webpage.
Stephen Rasey says: May 21, 2011 at 1:12 am
No need, we knew that and self-corrected. As hopefully Willis did!
I have avoided using Google for a while. My issue is that it stores all the information about your activities. The reason is to target advertising but they have been known to ‘cooperate with the authorities’. I have no idea if Chrome or Android does the same.
In Europe Google gained notoriety when it was discovered that while their cars were photographing street scenes they were also checking all the wifi connections and recorded unsecured ones! They claimed it was innocent but why on earth would they do that?
Further afield, it was discovered that iphones stored all the phone’s movements [and presumably yours] for up to a year. Again it was declared as an innocent feature, but why do it in the first place. Android does the same but on a limited scale – the last 50 mobile masts and 200 wifi networks.
While all these may be done for innocent reasons, and most people have nothing to hide, it is still creepy to have your life monitored. Also, once collected it can fall in to the hands of less innocent people. It strikes me that a lot of this information is exactly what the US government would want.
Even when people mean well they may decide ‘for your own good’ to change or limit things. For example the co-founder of Wikipedia was being interviewed on the BBC about his fight with the Chinese authorities, complaining that they wanted to censor and remove items that they disagreed with, yet this hypocrite was doing exactly the same thing on Wikipedia when it came to skeptical views on Global Warming.
Dominant businesses run by idealists can be a problem when it comes to dealing with people with different ideals or outlooks, and it must be a constant temptation to try and ‘push’ these people towards their own idealogy ‘for their own good’.
To correct the comparision, here is the Bing result.
Bing.com Search Willis Eschenbach
110521 0315 CDT
1. www linkedin com … /935 Chief Retiree
2. oarval org /Termostato Junio 14 2009 Thermostat Hypoth.
3. www mitosyfraudes org /calen10 /Termostato
4. www mitosyfraudes org /calen11/ Salven a los Atolones
5. plazamoyua com 2011/03/04 no-se-trata-de-mi
6. scienceblogs com 2009/12 concocted a cooling trend for Darwin
7. climatewtf blogspot com 2010/02/28 “gets mad” at Curry
8. www zoominfo com Amateur Scientist
9. www spoke com Construction Mgr.
10. wattsupwiththat com “one of the joys of writing..”
11. wattsupwiththat com 2010/08/11 “Of Rice and Men”
12. www theblogmacracy com referral to “cowboy scientist”
13. www theblogmacracy com 2009/12/30 on complexity
14 arthur shumwaysmith com “Not Spagheti”
15 climateaudit org 2009/11/25 FOI Request
16 www exxonsecrets org /personfactsheet id=1320
17 www grist org /member 11837 “AGW supporter’s hatchet job”
18 wmbrigs com p=2197 Mr E responds to statistician.
19 climaterealists com id=7408 Dear Googlefolk.
20. camirror wordpress com 2009/11/25 FOI Request.
I just did a yahoo, google, bing, and dogpile search for climate blogs. Dogpile was the only one that brought up WUWT on the first page of listings.
Possibly off topic, but Google apparently really does censor search results when someone convinces them to do so.
http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/hgq68/yes_google_does_censor_search_results_sometimes/
I would like to try a controlled experiment to count hits sometime.
D. Patterson said “Another search engine is .
It’s claim to fame is not tracking and recording your IP address, and selling them to advertisers etc. For more than the default 10 search results, change the settings in the Advanced settings webpage.
Is what???
Dave Worley,
yes its personalized. Again i’ll suggest that people use the labs version of google and start hitting the plus 1 for WUWT.
Or for Bing, folks need to “like” the posts that feature wuwt. that feeds Bing
Happy to report, I only use Sheriff BING, bing, BING!!! Ricochet Rabbit search engine nowadays.
At this time, I think there are many otherwise well-educated and good-intentioned people who see objection to Climate Change abatement policies in the same light as primitive people would once have viewed the objections of a successful farmer to sacrificing his best animals to ensure good weather as required by their local revered expert in the occult. I suspect that many of our leading social media are still dominated by people with this outlook.
Google is total EVIL. They definitely have an agenda. The effectiveness of google search engine is diminishing each month in favor of more paid hits and propaganda driven material.
http://video.ted.com/assets/player/swf/EmbedPlayer.swf
[reply] Check your link Richard. RT-mod
I’ve decided to keep book on some google search results just to see what changes over time. I’m also in Mexico this week, so comparing .com and .com.mx might be interesting.
Here was a search with a couple of bizzare twists….
Google Search:
Eschenbach GISS after seeing it in a current climateaudit post
Date: 5/22/2011 Tabasco Mexico ISP
1 climategate tv 19 Jan 2011 RE WUWT
2 www stripes com 15 Apr 2011 Eschenbach hospital
3 wattsupwiththat com 11 Aug 2010 More Gunsmoke “Very good effort, Willis…” is this a snipet from a COMMENT? YES! To Thomas Aug 11, 2010 at 3:47 a, about the 7th down. WUWT???
4 groups google co ug W.E. comments on Australian GISS data
5 regator com Willis on Giss Model E
6 groups google com alt military Eschenbach hospital
7 www fmhealthcare com hospital
8 tamino wordpress com 14 May 2011 Fake Forcing
9 utahclimate org 12 Aug 2010 GISS temp manipulation RE WUWT
10 thegwpf org 14 May 2011 Black Box of Chocolates RE WUWT
11 climateaudit org 15 May 2011 Willis on GISS Model E
12 www wikio com 19 May 201 McIntyre has followed up
13 eo wikipedia org (spanish)
14 www gmls eu /beitraege Eschedbach C., pdf
15 pipl com directory W.E Estimated sensitivity of Hansen’s GISS II
16 www youtube com 28 March 2010 (German)
17 wattsupwiththat com 25 Mar 2010 GISScapades
18 www unusualbookmarklets com 21 Mar 2011 Open letter to Dr subra suresh Watts Up with That
19 scienceblogs com 9 Dec 2009 W.E. caught lying about temp.
20 citeseerx ist psu edu /viewdoc Elizabeth Eschenbach Road Decomm
Comment #3 a WUWT link, but the snip is from comment #7. Anyone seen that before?
#1, #5, #9, #10, #18 are definately second sourced pages back to WUWT originals.
RE: steveta_uk says: May 20, 2011 at 10:03 am
The hypothesis that Google has seriously goofed in its “content farm” algorithms should be considered seriously.
How about this in relation to filter bubbles and your normal selections setting up bias in your further searches.
http://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bubbles.html
“Richard Holle says:
May 22, 2011 at 12:10 pm
How about this in relation to filter bubbles and your normal selections setting up bias in your further searches.
http://www.ted.com/talks/eli_pariser_beware_online_filter_bubbles.html”
Good link Richard. Precisely the issue.
Stephen Rasey says:
May 20, 2011 at 8:09 pm
You might want to spell his name right and search for |Willis Eschenbach|.
The first hit at Bing and Google was Deltoids’s “Willis Eschenbach caught lying about temperature trends”. Google lists a cluster of three WUWT posts after that, Bing listed one.
Reply to
Richard Holle + Dave Worley: RE: Filter Bubbles
Filter Bubbles may play a part, but this is something much more basic going on.
Take for instance today’s (May 22, 2011 at 10:58 am)
#1 hit to climategate dot tv [A] It is copy (with link back) of at least the first three paragraphs of
[B] Delingpole’s 2011.01.18 Warmists: ‘We can’t win the game, so “ at blogs telegraph co uk Delingpole Linked with full attribution to
[C] Willis’s 2011.01.15 WUWT Unequivocal Equivocation
How does any algorithm weigh [A] ahead of [B]?
My search was for “Eschenbach GISS”
“GISS” is not found in either [A] nor [B].
It just so happens than “GISS” is in [C]. So it should have been ahead of the others.
Yet my search returns [A] as #1, but neither [B] nor [C] in my top 20.
[A] is not using attribution as often as it should (check out their copy of Smoking Gun at Darwin Zero… I will not give them the satisfaction of a link.)
Figuring out Watt content is original and what content is copied from third hand sources is hard to do. I’ll give Google that. We wouldn’t be happy with link farms being listed as #1 either.
But Google’s miss here tells me that Google Goofed
This isn’t a filter bubble issue. I think it is an anti-link-farm-algorithm gone awry.
Anything I can help with to see if there is a country difference? I gave up Google 3 years ago, but can search from here. Seems to me you have an older problem because your graph also shows a drop just about Climategate time in Nov 2009. I would have expected a rise.
Disturbing fact: Web sites brought up by Google search blocked. I put in a Google search for “Global Warming” on May 25th. One of the sites the search brought up was called “Global Warming Hoax: News.” I clicked on it but got the following message: “You don’t have permission/access on this site. Additionally, a 500 internal server error was encountered while trying to use an error document to handle the request.” I went back to the beginnings and then I noticed small blue print below the search entry: “Block all http://globalwarminghoax.com/”
This is a total outrage and someone at Google had better have an explanation for that.
REPLY: The problem has to do with a javascript on the page (probably the scroller) being misidentified as a trojan by AV software – They need to fix the problem on their web page, Google is not at fault. – Anthony
I’m with Kath (May 20, 2011 at 9:48 am );
I use Scroogle ( http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/scraper.htm );