Weird

Weird seems to be one of those “Words of the Day”.

Last night, something occurred to me along those lines.

Often, when I warn people about the propaganda they consume regularly via Google, they mention something peculiar (or weird?) — that if they click on something, or type something into Google’s search box, that the propaganda engine will show them that kind of information for a long time. I find this weird, probably because I am quite unaware of it … because I no longer use any of Google’s so-called services.

People mention this so often, that I am inclined to observe it as the usual response. What I find peculiarly weird about it is the behavior it seems to lead to. Since most people are quite fanatical believers in Google [1], they cannot seem to fathom that life without Google might be not only possible but even quite pleasant. Instead, they cling to Google like Linus clings to his security blanket, [2] Therefore, instead of abandoning the propaganda engine, they refrain from clicking on anything of typing anything weird into search box. They do realize that doing so is sort of like confessing something to the Pope of the Internet. [3] They worry about the repercussions of such confessions, Yet they apparently have little or no qualms at all about making an apparently innocent confession every now and then.

For example, I have a friend who quite regularly barks a few words into his phone to get a radar image depicting the chance of rainfall in the area. This reminds me of a researcher I knew in the voice recognition field who often joked that he had adapted his own speaking to optimize the results, but I am also aware that the voice carries lots of information regarding the psychological state of the speaker, and this is a field of research that actually garners a lot of interest.

What I find odd about all of these things is the degree to which people feel secure about giving information to Google. Most people do not even realize they are doing so … pretty much all the time. And they even (supposedly) agree that the company can use all that information (although I doubt that they realize that Google is using that information to manipulate them. [4]