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Frank Pasquale

Behind the Filter Bubble: Hidden Maps of the Internet

A small corner of the world of search took another step toward personalization today, as Bing moved to give users the option to personalize their results by drawing on data from their Facebook friends:

Research tells us that 90% of people seek advice from family and friends as part of the decision making process. This “Friend Effect” is apparent in most of our decisions and often outweighs other facts because people feel more confident, smarter and safer with the wisdom of their trusted circle.

Today, Bing is bringing the collective IQ of the Web together with the opinions of the people you trust most, to bring the “Friend Effect” to search. Starting today, you can receive personalized search results based on the opinions of your friends by simply signing into Facebook. New features make it easier to see what your Facebook friends “like” across the Web, incorporate the collective know-how of the Web into your search results, and begin adding a more conversational aspect to your searches.

The announcement almost perfectly coincides with the release of Eli Pariser’s book The Filter Bubble, which argues that “as web companies strive to tailor their services (including news and search results) to our personal tastes, there’s a dangerous unintended consequence: We get trapped in a “filter bubble” and don’t get exposed to information that could challenge or broaden our worldview.” I have earlier worried about both excessive personalization and integration of layers of the web (such as social and search, or carrier and device). I think Microsoft may be reaching for one of very few strategies available to challenge Google’s dominance in search. But I also fear that this is one more example of the “filter bubble” Pariser worries about.
Read More »Behind the Filter Bubble: Hidden Maps of the Internet

Black Box Search vs. Black Hat Publicity Hounds

J.C. Penney was on top of the web world last holiday season, showing up at #1 for dozens of retail search queries on Google. Type “dresses,” “area rugs,” “bedding:” you’d get Penney’s items as your first search result. Had the venerable retailer become a “Wikipedia” of online shopping, reliably providing the “people’s choice?” Or was something more troubling going on?

The New York Times has related an excellent study (which I had worried was impossible to do) examining the issue. The study “suggests that the digital age’s most mundane act, the Google search, often represents layer upon layer of intrigue.” For J.C. Penney was using “black hat” search engine optimization, a definite no-no in search engine land.
Read More »Black Box Search vs. Black Hat Publicity Hounds