Google 'Experiment' Hid Some News Sources from Consumers

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I’m shocked. Shocked, I te…ah…never mind.

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The Silicon Valley giant said on Wednesday that it had been “running a few experiments that will each reach about 1% of Google Search users in Australia.”

Sounds like a typical canary release or a dark launch. Experimental code can be released to a small, random set of users or servers and see if it’s an improvement before pushing the change to everyone. You’ve probably played a part in this as a user many times and never noticed. Advanced tech companies like Google, Amazon, or Facebook deploy small batches of new code constantly, and most people never notice.

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A small hiccup in a stream, a momentary glitch when fetching email, or a Web page not responding immediately can each be a sign that something is up. Especially if you can’t reproduce the problem.

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Isn’t that the way? Little at a time & then it gets released.

Experiment my fat, hairy backside! Google has been hiding a LOT of sites from searches. Since switching to duckduckgo I’ve found my searches to be far more fruitful. Especially concerning 2A items, but also news and current events.

(Such as Google and MSM trying to hide the hours long blackout at the Vatican, claiming it was a faulty camera. Guess who watched the lights come back on because he was up at that time. Yup, me.)

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These days it’s more like little releases all the time.

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Facebook started something similar since 2014 at least:Facebook's Experiment and Media Ethics | Time

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Just think StuxNet!

Had to look that up. Don’t care much about Iran, here in the states yeah it’s an issue… Sounds like every version of Windows I’ve had.