Goolag
Posted on 01/13/2024 8:54:58 AM PST by Twotone
Google has established itself as the arbiter of "truth" in the digital age. The company controls the flow of information and can amplify or bury stories on a whim. Its leaders have given themselves god-like powers over shaping human opinion. So when they change their rules over what information they can censor in a "Sensitive Event" scenario, it's worth examining closely.
If you’ve ever advertised with Google, you might have received this email yesterday:
Dear Advertiser,
In February 2024, Google will update the Inappropriate content policy to clarify the definition of Sensitive Events.
A "Sensitive Event" is an unforeseen event or development that creates significant risk to Google's ability to provide high quality, relevant information and ground truth, and reduce insensitive or exploitative content in prominent and monetized features. During a Sensitive Event, we may take a variety of actions to address these risks.
Examples of Sensitive Events include events with significant social, cultural, or political impact, such as civil emergencies, natural disasters, public health emergencies, terrorism and related activities, conflict, or mass acts of violence.
Examples of what we prohibit (non-exhaustive):
•Products or services that exploit, dismiss, or condone the Sensitive Event, including price gouging or artificially inflating prices that prohibits/restricts access to vital supplies; sale of products or services which may be insufficient for the demand during a sensitive event
•Using keywords related to a sensitive event to attempt to drive additional traffic
•Claims that victims of a sensitive event were responsible for their own tragedy or similar instances of victim blaming; claims that victims of a sensitive event are not deserving of remedy or support; claims that victims from certain countries were responsible or deserving of a global public health crisis
What does this mean? Google — quite reasonably — doesn’t want to sell ads about certain things. If you peruse Google’s inappropriate content policy, you’ll see a long list of things advertisers tend to shy away from: animal cruelty, derogatory content, sexually explicit content, and then the oddly specific “hacked political materials.”
Likewise, the Sensitive Event rule is — at least on the surface — quite reasonable, because Google doesn’t want to be seen as profiting from a tragedy.
As far as I can tell, the Sensitive Event policy has not changed appreciably since 2021. In April 2019, it was limited to “Content that may be deemed as capitalizing on or lacking reasonable sensitivity towards a natural disaster, conflict, death, or other tragic event.”
In September 2020, the policy was expanded in response to COVID: “Content that potentially capitalizes on or lacks reasonable sensitivity towards a natural disaster, conflict, death, public health emergency, or other tragic event.”
By October 2021, it had been expanded to two full bullet points:
Ads that potentially profit from or exploit a sensitive event with significant social, cultural, or political impact, such as civil emergencies, natural disasters, public health emergencies, terrorism and related activities, conflict, or mass acts of violence Ads that claim victims of a sensitive event were responsible for their own tragedy or similar instances of victim blaming; ads that claim victims of a sensitive event are not deserving of remedy or support
And that’s the policy that exists today.
So what is actually changing in February? On the surface, there doesn’t seem to be any change, but let’s look closely.
In the current policy, Google doesn’t give a “dictionary definition” of what it considers a Sensitive Event. Instead, it defines a Sensitive Event by what’s specifically prohibited.
Under the new policy, Google is using a much broader interpretation of a Specific Event and even giving itself broad leeway to address those events:
A “Sensitive Event” is an unforeseen event or development that creates significant risk to Google's ability to provide high quality, relevant information and ground truth, and reduce insensitive or exploitative content in prominent and monetized features. During a Sensitive Event, we may take a variety of actions to address these risks.
It then uses the old definitions as examples of what constitutes Sensitive Events:
Examples of Sensitive Events include events with significant social, cultural, or political impact, such as civil emergencies, natural disasters, public health emergencies, terrorism and related activities, conflict, or mass acts of violence.
Do you see the difference? Under the existing rule, an ad capitalizing on a natural disaster is specifically banned. Under the new rule, an ad capitalizing on a natural disaster is merely an example of what is banned, and what is actually banned is left to Google’s own interpretation.
Specifically, "an unforeseen event or development that creates significant risk to Google's ability to provide high quality, relevant information and ground truth …”
In other words, Google is creating a broader policy to “reduce insensitive or exploitative content in prominent and monetized features” for content that doesn’t match Google’s definition of “ground truth.”
What can we take away from this seemingly minor rule change? My read is that Google foresees an unknown event that the company wants to have the ability to restrict the flow of information around.
In plain English, Google doesn’t know what’s coming exactly, but it might be something previously unconsidered by Google’s lawyers, and Google wants to be able to restrict what information is presented about that event.
If there is a known, and thus planned, event, it is by definition not a black swan.
“The company controls the flow of information and can amplify or bury stories on a whim.”
An utter crock of sh!t.
Google control ONLY the Google platforms and feeds.
Look, we are reading THIS article and Google didn’t censor it.
And that's where he impairs his credibility. If Google had representatives at Davos, they know what's planned.
The NSA has to keep track of the dissenters. If you use any Google product, you can be identified. And if you don't, you are really on the suspect list.
Goolag
They were talking about a pandemic before 2020, so yes they know something.
It’s easy to predict things when you’re helping to make it happen.
Google is an algorithm. If people type in Black Swan enough times, they enter an echo chamber.
Black swans will come. You won’t predict it. But when it happens you will say, “yeah…thats about right.”
People need to relax a bit. 2024 is going to be a long slog. We need to pace our drama.
“development that creates significant risk to Google’s ability”
IOW a sudden outbreak of truth telling.
Its pretty much consensus across the political spectrum that this year is going to hairy and strange.
Trump is the black swan event either way. Either the dems take him out or he wins. either way its a black swan event for someone somewhere.
for example nancy pelosi expressed elite democrat opinion recently when she said that anyone who understands knows there’s just no way that Trump wins this year.
If he wins—its a black swan event for her crew—because it happend byo of some unforseen event.
I think everyone knows the DS has some $hiite planned for us this year.
I believe it reasonable to expect that Google has representatives at Davos, and they do know what is planned.
Plans do not usually work out quite as expected. So, it would be also correct to say that "Google does not know what's coming exactly". They really do not know - exactly.
What they do know, is that they will clamp down hard on anyone saying things they do not want said after "somebody does something, somewhere". What they probably know is that a large number of very nasty things are in the planning stages and some of those projects may go forward to execution. What they don't know which ones will be selected and proceed to completion.
Google is going to support the Deep State sponsors who created them.
But they can make it un findable for others
A "Black Swan" event invariably turns out to be something that can be predicted (or even was predicted by some person on the fringe), but people refuse to look for it.
People have been talking about this everyday for weeks to months now.
There is nothing unforeseen about it.
It’s just bastardizing the term to sound hip or relevant.
Google Will Stop Providing Law Enforcement Data on Which Users Were Near a Crime
https://time.com/6539416/google-location-history-data-police/#:~:text=Alphabet%20Inc.’s%20Google,the%20vicinity%20of%20a%20crime.
“But they can make it un findable for others”
No they can’t.
Lots of so called Conservatives live in denial and live under the illusion of “Can’t Happen Here” but the thing is it is happening in every aspect of life in these United States...What was considered Conspiracy yesterday is fact today...
"Ads that claim victims of a sensitive event were responsible for their own tragedy or similar instances of victim blaming; ads that claim victims of a sensitive event are not deserving of remedy or support"
It depends on who you are. The October 7th attacks were known by Hamas, but nobody else expected anything on the size and scale of what Hamas planned.
More importantly, nobody, not even the Israelis themselves, knew the ferocity with which Israel reacted. The Israeli population collectively said "ENOUGH!" and the government had no choice but to go in heavy and hard to eliminate what they now see as an existential threat.
So this Black Swan was planned, but scale and scope, and the intense reaction make it a Black Swan.
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