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April 28th, 2011
12:56 pm - Would be Sidewiki Post
I recently tried to post the following comment in the Sidewiki page for Drone Zone on SomeFm. I think you will agree that this is hardly the nastiest commentary ever posted. No surprise there, I've been a fan of the channel for years. The post that my comment links to, links right back to Drone Zone, which is fitting because it is a post about Drone Zone, and I'm selling nothing, so this is definitely not spam. Yet, as one can see by viewing this screenshot of the Drone Zone page with corresponding Sidewiki page overlayed, that entry, which certainly was visible to me when I was logged into my account at Google, was not visible to those who were logged out of Google.
"This is the channel on Soma that I reviewed in this blog post (since relocated from Mog), in which I mentioned that I enjoy listening to it at the end of my day, having my computer sing me to sleep, as it were. Not that there's anything sad about that.
I noticed that after a few days of doing this, I got very strange dreams. 'Nightmares?', somebody will probably ask. Depends on how one feels about surrealism, I suppose; I didn't find them to be such, at all. I was left with the thought that if I were to encounter writer's block, leaving a pen and journal on a stand near my bed during one of those nights might be a good way to work past that.
That stand should be very near, if your experience is at all like mine was. I found that while the dreams seemed interesting as I arose, the memories of them evaporated as soon as my initial drowsiness passed. You don't want to wait until you feel up to walking across the room."
Google (or its alleged algorithm) didn't want people to see that comment, which would seem to have not met Google's quality standards. This becomes interesting, when one compares this comment to something that did meet Google's standards, in the sidewiki on another site, one belonging to a somewhat well known science fiction author named "John Varley". Mr. Varley doesn't think very highly of Sidewiki. Under the circumstances, I can't blame him. One need only look at a screenshot of some of the comments visible on the sidewiki for his site, today, to see why he might not be thrilled with this new feature. The courageously named "null" writes
"Hahahaha - John Varley can't deal with the internet. Suck it up."
"john shepard" adding
"buffalo bill - It puts the sidewiki comment on his site or else he gets the comment again."
"null" going on to ask
"Got.... Sidewiki?"
A silence of the lambs reference "john"? Really? If anybody was wondering why I use the name "john" in quotes, it's because at the time of this writing, "john's" link takes us back to a profile that hasn't been filled in, carrying the name of Joseph Flanigan's character from Stargate Atlantis, misspelled. The evidence would suggest that he hasn't come any cleaner than the other troll, about his own identity.
So, let's keep score. According to the so-called "sidewiki algorithm", a friendly comment from a fan about the experiences had during a visit to a site (and about how some of the visitors might get more out of their experience) doesn't make the cut, but childish, abusive taunts from a pair of anonymous cowards does. That's some algorithm you've got, boys.
I can see why Mr. Varley would be upset. Most people seem to have Google accounts, and these comments can be seen with anybody with such an account, who has installed the sidewiki button, so the functional difference between sidewiki and an add-on to Mr.Varley's site, one which he is not free to remove, is minimal. Some have tried to sidestep this point by saying that sidewiki isn't part of Varley's site, it's part of Google's, but that's a technicality at most. Regardless of where the data is being stored, it appears on the visitor's screen as something that looks like it's part of Varley's site, and that appearance is what determines the impact a posting will have. In effect, courtesy of its market share online, Google has been able to force an unmoderated guestbook on somebody who doesn't want one and shouldn't have to accept one. That's wrong.
I'm sure that one of those "small minds" of whom Emerson speaks ("consistency is the bugaboo of a ...") will speak of my hypocrisy as I write this, because I used a system about which I now express misgivings to make that arbitrarily blocked comment, but my objection is to the inability of the site owner to moderate the sidewiki for his site or to opt out of sidewiki, not to the existence of sidewiki. Had the owner of SOMA said that he didn't want my remark in the sidewiki for that channel, I would have been glad to remove it. He did not make any such request of me, and easily could have, even without a Google account, because my gmail address can be read right off of my Google profile; the comments were effectively kept off of SOMA's site by Google, not SOMA. Varley, on the other hand, has open stated that he doesn't want sidewiki comments, and is being taunted about this, using sidewiki. The two cases are not even remotely comparable.
At this point, I have no intention of ever using Sidewiki again, finding that its management seems to value trollage over content, on this service has been designed with so little regard for the privacy of the site owners, seemingly to appease the maniacs to be found in the "comment moderation is censorship" crowd. One might feel the urge to say something about this style of moderation on the Youtube video explaining sidewiki, but as with the Google company blog, comments have been disabled by those who would not let others effectively disable comments on their own sites, as you can see in these screenshots (1 | 2), leaving Google, in this case, telling the angry site owners to do as they say, and not as they do. While some might ask whether or not the user posting the video was speaking for anybody working for Google, the description on the profile itself, which I've screenshotted (1 | 2 | 3 ) is written in such a way as to leave no doubt.
"Learn more about Google Toolbar by watching our videos, or visit our Help Center at http://www.google.com/suppo..."
Our help center? Either this is a staff account, or somebody is impersonating Google, and would seem to have been allowed to do so since 2007, when this account was created. Youtube, itself, is said to only go back to 2005, so I'd think the staff would have had plenty of time to catch such an impostor, by now.
There doesn't seem to be anything honestly good to say about Google's performance in these incidents, so I've cut all links to Sidewiki, and am considering the possibility of removing the Google toolbar altogether. I hope those in the higher levels of Google's management team will consider removing those who've been doing so little for their better behaved users, and Google's corporate reputation, from their payroll, before any further damage is done, but am not hopeful that they will have the sense to do so. I am, however, as always, open to being pleasantly surprised.
On a more positive note, the advice I gave you about keeping the journal by your bed as you sleep to Drone Zone, however, remains good. I hope some of you will have fun with it.
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Current Music: Transformation by Synthetic Mind Decay on SOMA
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