Media
Related: About this forumGoogle wants to rank websites based on facts not links
The trustworthiness of a web page might help it rise up Google's rankings if the search giant starts to measure quality by facts, not just links
THE internet is stuffed with garbage. Anti-vaccination websites make the front page of Google, and fact-free "news" stories spread like wildfire. Google has devised a fix rank websites according to their truthfulness.
Google's search engine currently uses the number of incoming links to a web page as a proxy for quality, determining where it appears in search results. So pages that many other sites link to are ranked higher. This system has brought us the search engine as we know it today, but the downside is that websites full of misinformation can rise up the rankings, if enough people link to them.
A Google research team is adapting that model to measure the trustworthiness of a page, rather than its reputation across the web. Instead of counting incoming links, the system which is not yet live counts the number of incorrect facts within a page. "A source that has few false facts is considered to be trustworthy," says the team (arxiv.org/abs/1502.03519v1). The score they compute for each page is its Knowledge-Based Trust score.
The software works by tapping into the Knowledge Vault, the vast store of facts that Google has pulled off the internet. Facts the web unanimously agrees on are considered a reasonable proxy for truth. Web pages that contain contradictory information are bumped down the rankings.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22530102.600-google-wants-to-rank-websites-based-on-facts-not-links.html
marym625
(17,997 posts)This will piss off people who pay to be at the top of a search
jakeXT
(10,575 posts)New York Times Reports WMD Found in Iraq - US News
4 in 10 Americans erroneously believe US found active WMDs
No, Bush was not right about Iraq: How conservatives ...
marym625
(17,997 posts)Especially with the current push to whitewash history. The My Lai massacre never happened, don't you know?
jakeXT
(10,575 posts)For example, the site omits mention of the Fulbright hearings in the U.S. Senate, during which Secretary of State John Kerrythen a young Vietnam veteranasked, How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/10/10/pentagon-accused-whitewashing-history-vietnam-war-era
marym625
(17,997 posts)And it isn't counted as "truth" because of its omission, wouldn't that count as untruthful?
I was looking for a rec button on your reply. Too bad there isn't one.
leveymg
(36,418 posts)DU for a long time was ranked highly by Google. But, DU was recently Google-bombed by the RW after a post produced some adverse publicity for a tax prep company. The poster was essentially correct but got one detail wrong. Shows what professional PR firms can do to on-line reputation when something like this goes viral.
jakeXT
(10,575 posts)leveymg
(36,418 posts)Purges are rarely good for creativity or popularity.
Octafish
(55,745 posts)Pretty soon, it's down to a 99-1 noise to signal ratio and mission accomplished, baby.
ffr
(23,135 posts)I'd love to help make products like this "mature."
mrd777
(1 post)I like the idea, though.