Buzz Off, Google!

OR

the Terror of Social Networking

A few days ago I read a headline that made my heart jump, if only for a second (I've become quite cynical since Google has become a part of my life):

Google to Make Gmail More Social

For a brief second I thought - hoped against hope - that Gmail was to FINALLY make itself more presentable. Because I am social enough: I know how to communicate, both online and offline, with people I want to socialise with; I still know how to read and write, so I don't need Google to do it for me (as I am sure - mark my words! - that will be their next development).

What I want is to be able to reply to messages without having to drag the (literally) entire history of the conversation in tow; what I want is to make my friends partake in some of the beauties I find online without having to send every blasted picture as an attachment.
I also like nice backgrounds, nice fonts, etc. - you know, superfluous bourgeois aesthetics like that.
(And yes, you can do that with other email clients.
But we are talking about Google and Gmail here - and Gmail is actually one of the most freequently used email applications nowadays.)

As I said, I only entertained such hopes for a fraction of a second - the time it takes my idealistic faith in people and progress to die these days.

As it turned out, the "more social" feature was yet another useless gadget, intended to promote - or rather, cash on - "social networking" (an epidemic condition that is afflicting all too many websites, includes some that I would never have thought capable of stooping that low).

And today, as I logged in, I was greeted by a screen prodding me to "check out" the Buzz.
I didn't and won't.
But here's what it is supposed to achieve:

"Everything in one place Follow your friends and get recommended buzz from others — all within Google Mail."


What does "everything in one place" mean?
Are they actually implying people's social lives (or just life in general) have gotten so small and two-dimensional they can be kept tidy and controlled via a gadget?
(I believe they are implying that.)

And what the heck does "follow" mean, in the first place?
I already know what my friends are up to - as much as they want me to know about their activities. The same goes for their "following" me.

And I get all the "buzz" I need from people I actually care about, both online and offline. Why should I care about the "buzz"(whatever that means) of people I don't even know?

According to a very recent poll, most people are more or less"okay" with Buzz.
Around 17% "love" it.
Around 7% "hate" it.
(The results are changing all the time, so be sure to check the current results.)

If you are one of those who hate it, here's what you can do about it:

Turn off Buzz or remove Buzz updates from your mailbox

(Hint: just look at the very bottom of your Gmail page.)

That should help you to ignore it - which is always the best policy, especially when money (in return for your attention) is involved.


I bet you're left with the feeling that I actually hate Google.
I don't; it doesn't mean enough for me to hate it.

I despise it, and that's not a word I use lightly.
I despise it because it has stooped down to the lowest common denominator - in exchange for money, naturally - and is now even contributing, very actively and quite consciously, to the dumbing down of the world. (See also Google's Goggles ogling at you.)


But of course, the Buzz and Gmail's idiotic attempts to get "more social" are only the top of the iceberg.
More on that in the near future.



P.S. And don't forget to check for occasional edits.
If you know me... you know me. ;)

Google: the dumbed-down machine

Google may be the nro. 1 search engine in the WWW world, but that doesn't mean it's getting any smarter.
(N.B. Speed and an ever increasing number of "conveniences" do NOT equal smart).

After having noticed, a while ago, that it keeps pushing all sorts of "alternate" spellings, treating you as a potentially dumb creature who cannot spell (and, honestly, who could blame them...?) and thereby forcing you to use quotation marks around single words, I now discovered it doesn't obey the - (= exclude) command anymore.
For example: tonight, I tried to find pages containing a number of specific words (relating to magic), but knowing the words in question were likely to appear on pages discussing games and/or Harry Potter, I took care to exclude any pages that contain references to games and/or Harry Potter. I did it the usual google-way I had used countless times in the past ten years or so: I put the - (minus) command before the undesired terms. Like this: -game, -games, -potter.

Guess what? It didn't work. In fact, the terms game, games, Harry, Potter were displayed in BOLD within the search results.

I know what you're probably thinking: that I somehow made a mistake and did not include the proper command. I don't blame you. Even though I have used such commands countless times before, I thought so too. So I checked, rechecked, (re)checked again, rewrote the search terms... nope. I am being served games and Harry Potter (in bold!) whether I want it or not. In order to exclude the unwanted terms, I had to use the special "advanced search" page. (There it worked.)

If you ask me, the secret of Google's success is that it keeps closely in touch with the ever-changing "times".

Does that mean, for example, that it keeps track of the needs of those who search for information in "minor" (please, don't be a google - note the quotation marks! :) languages, trying to adjust itself to their specific lingustic requirements, thereby improving their search experience and thus promoting the democratic ideal of knowledge accessibility for all?

No. It means that it is adjusting itself solely and exclusively to the "special needs" of those who can't spell. Worse than that: my latest experience - having my express commands flatly disregarded - makes me think that Google is striving to establish itself as an electronic to-go-pundit among those who also can't think for themselves. Now that's a mighty stride to take... alas, the direction is all wrong.

And yes, there seem to be myriads of illiterate, unthinking citizens around who might really need a hand or two to put 2 and 2 together.

It's blatantly neglecting the others -those who can spell AND think for themselves, and in more than one (even more than five or six) language at that - what I find objectionable and, to a certain degree, even morally corrupt. It smacks of fascist anti-intellectualism and/or disregarding all but the more muscular thugs of the international socio-political arena.
(If it weren't so, don't you think their customer service would actually be a service - not some anonymous and unresponsive machine?)

If you understand French, you may be interested in this 50-minute documentary called Google: the Thinking Machine.

It's a catchy title for a piece of journalistic work, I suppose (I should know, I have spewed quite a few pieces myself)... even if it does make you suspect that their next motto might be something along the lines of "let us do your thinking for you" or "we think, so you don't have to"...

But beyond the smart facade, there is little to substantiate the lofty claim.

Then again... the same goes for most of the current educational systems (both formal and informal), it seems. Poor use of language and even functional illiteracy have become so prevalent that they are fast affirming themselves as a sort of norm, even.

Learn to read, people. I mean, proper books. It's the only way to learn how to write properly.
And keep reading. And reading and reading.
Fahrenheit 451 may be coming to a neighbourhood near you.


P.S.

Ha! I just noticed: I used "google" as a noun.
Now, that must be a first... ;)



EDIT (10. II. 2010)

See also Google's Goggles ogling at you.
You might also like: Going, Goeing... gone.

An Experiment (please ignore the post)

A good friend of ours (whose posts we've borrowed on one or two occasions) was discussing certain political issues with us the other day, and she mentioned that one - just one - of the posts in her blog does not show through Google search even several YEARS after having been posted.

Is it really just a coincidence that the post contains thoughts that some overzealous watchdogs might consider "politically incorrect"?

Is it?

We'll see soon enough, I think.
Because we're reposting the post here, if only for a few weeks - long enough for Google to crawl over it.


P.S.
It worked - within minutes.
We still don't know why the original blog post is being ignored, though.

But that's not the main point of this post scriptum... A few minutes after posting this, the forget-me-not who really forgets not (like, anything!) said: "Say... isn't it May 29 today? The anniversary of the Fall of Constantinople!"

So it is.
And, believe it or not, it is a synchronicity.

Don't you just love it when that happens? ;)

"The Holy Wisdom has left the building"

In case anyone doubted it, the vocal (and in their patent irrationality almost touching) demonstrations by the Turks have now irrefutably demonstrated that their country - I mean Turkey, not any of the European countries hosting their emigrants - would indeed be an undesirable addition to the EU.

The Turks are bitter with "Europe" for expressing its concerns about Turkey as a candidate for the EU and for, shockingly, even pointing out Turkey's attitude towards its citizens of Kurdish nationality.

Furthermore, Turkey is opposed to the EU basing its frame of unity on Christianity as a value reference point. It doesn't really matter whether this is true or not. It's the underlying principle what matters.

Each and everyone of the current EU members is a secular state, with a well-defined constituional separation of Church and State. So is the EU, as a sum of its components as well as an autonomous structure.

So, what is there for the Turks to fear? If Turkey is really a secular state (not that Ata Turk's reforms were really all that beneficial for the country in the long run), why should it fear a political structure loosely - and nominally - based on values such as unconditional forgiveness and equal "charity" towards everyone?

I can only speculate what the answer could be. Islam would not have equal standing in the allegedly christocentric EU - right?

Wrong.
All religions - in fact, almost all cults (with very few notable exceptions) - have equal standing in the EU: that is, no real "standing" at all. (Which might be precisely the cause of many troubles this attitude was supposed to prevent - but more on that on some other occasion...)
If anything, non-Christian religions are more shielded than any of Europe's cultural and (especially) religious traditions.

A glance at the crowds on Istanbul's streets makes it obvious that Turkey's outrage (?!) at the Pope's announced visit to Istanbul, the ex-Constantinople, is indeed clearly based on religious grounds, denying the country's nominal secularity - and casting a sharp shadow of ridicule on its own claims against the alleged religious basis of the EU structure.

Furthermore, there's loud talk of reverting the "Aya Sofia" (a name phonetically adapted from the Greek Hagia Sophia, the 'Holy Wisdom'), which was made into a museum by Ata Turk, to its former role of mosque. Of course they fail to mention that it became a mosque only after the 1453 Turkish occupation of Constantinople; before that, since 637, when it was completed, it was a Christian church - in fact, the greatest and most revered one of all Christian churches.

They are only "making a point", of course. And that point should be taken by the EU; it should be taken very seriously.

Turkey would like to join the EU either

(a) for economic reasons only (and I am sorry to disappoint all of you, cynics, but merely economic allegiances never stand the test of time)

or

(b) with some other purpose in mind - and if so, you bet it isn't "multicultural coexistence".

I am somewhat saddened by the politically correct silence of the EU, although I wouldn't expect it to react in any other way. There is a huge elephant in the middle of the room, and nobody is speaking about it. When I was in school (not very many decades ago), we still knew and dared to mention that "elephant". I am not sure that today's school children do.

Let's mention the name of that historical monster: it's the Turkish invasions and bloody excursions into Europe.

There is enough material about them on the web - though not nearly enough to convey even half of the horror that they brought to the European population of the 15th, 16th and 17th century (and in certain parts of Europe even later).

I wish the textbook stories about the Turkish invasions were exaggerated; for a long time I thought they were.
Now I know history and so I know better: they weren't exaggerated. The impaling of babies and toddlers in front of their parents' eyes, the raping of women regardless of their age and condition (including those who had just given birth), the disappearance of thousands upon thousands of people, of entire villages, reduced to slavery or horrific death, are - much to my sadness - NOT a legend, not a lie, not even an exaggeration. They are the historical truth - a truth that my ancestors had to live with, day in and day out.

Is Europe entitled to reproach (not that it does) atrocities to Turkey, considering its own bloody past?

Yes, it is - precisely because of its own bloody past.

Europe has been chastised by its own wars and aggressions, and has learned from them. By acknowledging its own history, it has transcended it.

No such thing seems to have happened in Turkey. They have apparently not been chastised, not by themselves, not by anyone else. They have chosen to forget their subhuman war "tactics" (as well as the many defeats that the unarmed peasant and town populations had inflicted upon their great army by means of pure wit and self-preserving unity, before the Turks' final defeat in 1683).

They have chosen to forget all that; and no official voice from Europe has ever reminded them of those unpleasant facts.

I mention such "ancient" history because the Turks themselves have now, rather short-sightedly, chosen to poke into the embers of "ancient" history.


Furthermore, the Turks' apparent genocidal tendencies were horrifically confirmed by their effective genocide of Armenians as late as 1917. And they still are being confirmed to this day, by their treatment of the Kurdish people.

I can certanly understand that Europe fails to mention the Turkish invasions of the past centuries. It would be rather awkward to do so - even though the disingenuous, double-faced attitude of Turkey towards history would make it perfectly justifiable.

What we, the peoples of Europe, absolutely should not tolerate, by remaining silent, is the fact that the EU - and the USA - have failed to even properly acknowledge the Armenian genocide of 1915-17 and even before that. That is an unforgivable and intolerable distortion of history by omission, by silence.

As for the Kurds, God bless them, the Turks don't like to hear about them or, much less, about their treatment of them and other "minorities". That's not going to change.
Which means that "we" have to.
Or else, it means that we are going to condone genocide, past and present, and invite an unrepentant thug into our living room.

In my opinion, the EU should definitely change its official attitude towards Turkey.

I certainly changed mine.

If asked to vote for or against Turkey entering the EU, until a few weeks ago I would have abstained. In the name of honesty, impartiality and good will, I would have refrained from voting, for I really didn't know whether Turkey's joining the EU would be a good idea, either for the EU or for Turkey itself.

As from today, this EU citizen's vote in that matter would be a definite NO.

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