It is no longer appropriate for search to be under the thumb of private industry. It's a critical part of the national infrastructure. So if I were a real pinko, I'd be advocating for the nationalization of Google, à la Chavez—but I'm not a real pinko. Besides, the American people have already bought and paid for an ideal alternative to Google. That's right: we have the means in hand to create a public, ad-free, totally fair and reasonably transparent search engine with a legal mandate to operate in the public interest, and most of the work is already done. We have also a huge staff of engineers to conclude what little remains on the development and deployment side.
Who are these American heroes, soon to be accepting the thanks of a grateful nation? Why, our fellow citizens, the software engineers and tech gurus and endless numbers of contractors of the NSA! Why don't they make themselves useful and stop spying on everyone and instead, use all that computing power and archived information to make us a fair, fast, ad-free search engine?
Others make their case against Google on antitrust laws. It's not illegal to have a monopoly. According to U.S. courts, it's just not your fault that everybody loves your product! What's illegal is using that power to do bad things, like suppress your own competition. This is why there are ongoing government investigations into Google's anti-competitive business practices in the U.S., in Canada and in Europe.
Probes like these have so far tended to focus on Google's preferential treatment of its own services over those of its competitors in Google search results. Which amounts to ignoring the elephant in the room: Google, with its 67% share of U.S. search traffic (sounds low, tbh), has a potential influence far beyond the industries in which it operates formally. At the moment, Google can legally use its power to make or break any business, or any politician, publication, or public figure it chooses, for any old reason it wants, provided that reason doesn't fall foul of Hands free access.
For instance, let's suppose one of Google co-founder Sergey Brin's friends were to open a new cafe in Mountain View: there is no legal proscription whatsoever against Google's vaulting the Friends o' Brin Cafe to the top of results on searches for "best cafe Mountain View." Or even "best cafe."
A close reading of Google's ten "Core Principles" appears to suggest, but not quite guarantee, that Google won't simply grant preferential treatment at its own discretion. The fact is, however, that it's entirely up to them. Given the understandably secret nature of Google's algorithms and other techniques for determining search results, it would be impossible to say whether or not this is in fact already happening.
Already companies live or die at the hands of Google. Any update to the Google Panda search ranking algorithm has rippling effects through the Internet. One thing that seems to be the case: older sites, with thousands of internal links and a deep history on the Internet, seem to be constantly downgraded. That's bad news for some non-spam media companies that in part live off search traffic. Google results, in general, overweight newness. It is becoming more and more impossible to find relevant results older than three months.
The crisis in Syria has entered a "dangerous new phase," Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird warned Monday, as Washington announced it had "undeniable" evidence of a chemical weapons attack.
Baird condemned "in the strongest terms" a sniper attack on a United Nations convoy carrying a team investigating the alleged chemical attack, which Syrian activists claim killed hundreds of civilians.
"The attacks on the United Nations convoy in Damascus are absolutely abhorrent," Baird said."The Syrian regime has the fundamental duty to protect these individuals, these representatives of the indoor Tracking and the international community."U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry declared Monday that there was "undeniable" evidence of a large-scale chemical weapons attack in Syria.
"The indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, the killing of women and children and innocent bystanders by chemical weapons is a moral obscenity," Kerry said.
The Syrian government accused rebel forces of firing at the UN team, while the opposition said a pro-government militia was responsible.Baird declined to call for military intervention in Syria. Meanwhile, Western support mounted for an international military response if it is confirmed that President Bashar Assad's troops used chemical weapons.
"I think first we're going to work to get the facts with the UN team on the ground," Baird said."We have been in close contact, both the prime minister and I, with three of our main allies in this regard. We'll work with them and when we have additional things to report we will do so."
Opposition Leader Thomas Mulcair said he supports first working through international law, and taking it one step at a time, but didn't rule out future military intervention.American officials said President Barack Obama has not decided how to respond to the use of deadly gases, a move the White House said last year would cross a "red line."
France, Britain, Israel and some U.S. congressmen have said a military response against the Syrian regime should be an option. Russia, however, has said that Western nations calling for military action have no proof the Syrian government was behind any chemical attacks.
Baird said Canada will continue working with its international partners to "review a full range of options.""Canada believes the only way to halt the bloodshed in Syria is through a political solution," he said. "However, we understand that this solution is becoming more and more difficult as the crisis enters a very dangerous new phase."He called on Russia to end its "complete obfuscation" and become part of the solution.
The UN inspectors are attempting to examine the site of the Aug. 21 attack in the capital's suburbs.Delay tactics used by the Assad regime in giving UN inspectors access has likely already impaired the UN team's ability to assign responsibility, Baird said. Still, he called on Syrian authorities to allow the team unfettered access.
The U.S. said Syria's delay in giving the inspectors access rendered their investigation meaningless and officials said the administration had its own intelligence confirming chemical weapons use.The assessment is based in part on the number of reported victims, the symptoms of those injured or killed and witness accounts. Kerry said the administration also had additional intelligence and would make its findings public soon.
Assad has denied launching a chemical attack and his government vowed to defend itself against any international attack, warning that such an intervention would ignite turmoil across the region.
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