10/4/03 - 10/24/03 A Virtual Conversation between Sergey Brin and Karl Marx [written in front of a real fireplace]: Karl Back in 1997 you wrote: "we believe the issue of advertising causes enough mixed incentives that it is crucial to have a competitive search engine that is transparent and in the academic realm." If search engines developed in the publicly financed "academic realm" (google) are going to be allowed to become for-profit greedy corporations, doesn't that make the "academic realm" just a Catch-22 illusion? Why should we finance making the egg, if we don't get to keep the chicken. Sergey: What the hell is this, I wonder which one of my brilliant Ph.D. employees agreed to this interview? How the hell do I answer this question without admitting I'm a sellout hypocrite who only gives lip service to ideals? Karl Mr. Brin, this being a virtual conversation, your thoughts are audible. Sergey: I protest, that is an invasion of my private dignity-- what's next?... you going to archive, and make easily accessible, every violation of my privacy that has ever taken place on the Internet? Karl On the subject of privacy and the "ownership" of reputation, Google has produced some of the industry's most "free speech unfriendly" user agreements... How do you justify this Draconian Censorship, when you are allowed to essentially "use" anyone's name anyway your algorithm likes? In other words, why should you be able to protect your secrets and reputation with a "user agreement" when you don't offer the powerless individuals "Googled" by your search engine a similar censorship mechanism? Sergey: Look, I have already admitted that I am a duplicitous hypocrite. The simple answer is the corporate tree doesn't grow far from the hypocrite seed. Karl "duplicitous" is this a concession that, contrary to all the publicly circulated mush, Google really is just another greedy corporation seeking to exploit its position of power to extort every possible dollar from a sucker public lost in a standardless sea of corporate-created, dysfunctional chaos? Sergey: If people had half a brain, you wouldn't need me to concede the fact. For years Google has maintained an infrastructure relationship with the overtly corrupt ODP. If any of you Einsteins were smart enough to ask the question "why," you would realize that there isn't any possible answer that wouldn't end the fantasy that Google has "intellectual integrity" or any devotion to the public interest. Karl So, in the end, you're just another bullshit artist. Sergey: Once the propaganda ball starts rolling, you don't even have to be an "artist". I mean when you get congratulated for providing internet users an incredibly inefficient-- really absolutely preposterous-- server-side calculator to people using a billion megagigaHz client-side PC, you are not really being held to much of a BS standard. Look at spam e-mail for Christ's sakes! No one is being required to be the Rembrandt of Bullshit. Karl So what will Google's next bullshit innovation be? Sergey: In the area of "search mechanics" we really have narrowed creative possibilities by creating a bunch of innerdependent advertising shams, so we are looking for new ground to soil. Some think Google should IPO and buy up some corporate diversity, but I'm thinking it might be better to develop some diversity as a company first. We weren't going to announce this until after the new year, but we've got an exclusive contract with Britney Spears to produce a line of "snack foods" that we are going to manufacture in the shape of her private parts. In a year's time "selling website accessibility" might only be a small subsidiary business of Google Foods Inc. Karl Now you have got me worried that someday--EVERYTHING--is going to be a subsidiary of Google Foods Inc. permanent link

9/23/03 - 10/3/03 Potholes in the Superhighway [or just one big depression]: This month marks the one-year anniversary of my powercons innovention. Looking back, it is a bit depressing to see the wasted time, and wasted enthusiasm. The really pitiful part is I still haven't fully realized how hopeless things are, and how pointless it is to keep trying. Although I have lived with failure all my life, I still don't like the bastard, and I can't embrace it easily... so on with the pointlessness. Search Industry News has pretty much completed its metamorphosis into Marketing Industry News. Looking past the redundant junk about how-why-and-where to buy keywords and how to rig your site to catch the most botts, and win the fishing-for-exposure contest-- there really isn't anything approaching rational commentary or discussion regarding how the Internet could or should be indexed. Somewhere around 1997 "Mapping the Internet" stopped being a science and it became the location promotion industry. Now the only thing "engineered" is the exposure-selling gimmicks of the different "search brands" and the idea of fundamental "infrastructure improvement" exist in no one's ( no one who matters that is) imagination. ----------------------------------------------------- I've decided to add a couple of new "marketing Blog" links to the links provided with the powercons toolbox. I'll add them sometime this week so maybe in a month or two I can perhaps extort out of the sites a reciprocal link. Another link/tool I'll be re-adding is a "whois" lookup --as easywhois.com still provides direct access to the whois database. chriseo.com -- sub-page link to a too short (I'am out) and too sweet, Blog review. searchenginelowdown.com -- The most cynical/critical of the available marketing blogs abakus -- More hash than re-hash. deemozwatch.org -- anything anti-dumboz is worth a link. ----------------------------------------------------- Google shafts blogger, adds gagging clause to Adsense -- Andrew Orlowski isn't exactly Mr. Facts. On the initiation of Googles Ad cents program the terms of service prohibited all discussion regarding the program. perhaps Google needs to give a formal burial to PageRank -- "Google buys search engine - PageRank™ RIP?" permanent link

9/16/03 - 9/22/03 Inventa Vu [it's like Eureka all over again]: It's true I hate Google, and I hate the sham business of "marketing"-- So why have I been thinking about pitching a plan to google that would convert my powercons innovation into an Ad-Better-Sense marketing tool. Why?... because without money or connections I am just "ranting in the wind" and have no hope of changing anything. The Idea: Looking over the mechanics of Googles ad sense program, it occurred to me that it could be easily adapted [using my powercons innovation] to pay content viewers rather than content providers. As viewers pay the price for advertising "having to look at it" and navigate around it, it seems reasonable that they be offered the opportunity to be compensated. A substantial advantage of this adaptation is that "contextual ads" could be served up recognizing the most important "context" of all, "user interest". Although it's only a lesser of evil worlds, it's nice to imagine a world where you are only exposed to advertising relevant to things like, your regional location, gender, occupation, hobbies... etc. A "Ad-Better-Sense" program would create many possible advantages, for example: by tracking ads based on what the user actually sees or clicks on, the current "problem" of pointless redundancy (same not-interested-ad every time you visit) could be eliminated. In short, I think there is opportunity for productive, "revolutionary" change-- the question is will "they" let opportunity from this side of the tracks, knock on any of their gilded, we-run-the-world, doors. If google won't go for it, maybe I can get Microsoft to add a subdivision under "Longhorn" ... Maybe Something like LongHornyCons. permanent link

9/5/03 - 9/15/03 B-acking Off [Rewalking my own footsteps]: Another year, another lament about another year of potential lost to pointless chaos. It has been a year since I started doing the "Blog thing" as an alternative to having my words deleted on control freak message boards. Sadly I can't say I have moved the issue of Rational-Noncommercial-Internet-Mapping one step forward, but I also can't say it has been a complete waste of time either... ok... I could say it, but I would rather not admit it. Just about everything I wrote a year ago, could be written again tomorrow. In truth the chaos has gotten worse and the Internet environment has become to progress and enlightenment what Agent Orange was to good health. The one bright side to this sad anniversary is that it has provided an excuse to re-read one of my favorite quotes. People who can write sentences like this "Conformance requirements are the expressions that convey the criteria to be fulfilled in an implementation of a specification". --have got to be direct descendants of Cro-Magnon Nerd. The truth behind this rhetorical bit of humor, is that unlike our social culture which was ruined by sleazy ignorant morons too lazy to buy clothes that fit-- the Internet was ruined by generally civilized "smart people" who no doubt really do know better. ------------------------------------- In search engine racketeering news: The outline of a pyramid starts to become visible: Contextual Advertising Shows Poorer Results than Expected Paid-search users need 3D glasses to glimpse the future permanent link

9/2/03 - 9/4/03 Are Search Engines Killing Spam [or are Spam engines killing search]: This "discussion" regarding www.engine-spam.com is only interesting for the view it offers into the mindset of the average SEO consultant. They really do think that having a "who can best engineer irrelevant aspects of web content for search engine rank, competition" is good for the Internet. Call this stupid "let's now deliberately add some misspellings" game what it is, a Giant Internet Productivity Tax. All honest, reasonably intelligent Internet users should be thoroughly disgusted that this nonsense is a part of Internet structure. For an investment of 1/100th of the time, energy, and money spent on the current demolition-derby "ranking races" we could have a streamlined, super efficient, very orderly information superhighway. But no-o-o-o... Instead, we confuse chaos with freedom and let the looters, the warlords, and the greedy opportunist define what the standards will be. It is a strange paradox that we have built one of the greatest inventions of our hard-earned progress from pond scum-- right in the middle of a scummy pond. Brilliant! Why don't we just re-legalize slavery and complete our devolution. permanent link

8/26/03 - 9/1/03 Page Rank Rules [turns #1 content into a pile of # 2]: Google has once again danced with its shittie page rank shoes on my in InMendham.com domain. The home page is indisputably a top 3 location [and arguably the best of the Web] for the keyword "Mendham" yet you will have to sift through nearly 80 google results to find googles first reference to the site [an archived sub-page listing for the town police department] The selling-out of Internet Search to exclusive capitalist control may eventually prove to be a fatal mistake for the open free internet, and the higher the corporate stakes are alowed to get befor sensible intervention the less chance there is for a successful social (political) rescue mission. When you consider that even e-mail disasters like the "sobig" virus are incapable of provoking sensible regulation of e-mail protocols, you realize that the Spam lobby has more political clout than the social interest, and that we are now slaves to an entrenched, financial/shyster interest. In other google-sucks news, in two months my google ad-nonsense account hasn't produced one penny of revenue. When google chooses to display ads on the included pages (various subject content) they are always "charity" ads-- of googles choosing --for which google feels no obligation to pay me to display. If google was the ethical company of popular reputation they would allow me to choose what default content --if any-- is going to be displayed if they can't find a relevant advertiser. To obligate me to give free solicitation to shyster organizations like the American Cancer Society [lying mortal enemy of all cigarette smokers] as a condition for participation in the program, isn't fair, necessary, or the act of an "ethical" company. --------------------------------------------------- In "Powercons" news: There were almost exactly 1000 downloads of the toolbox in the month of August. Most of that volume was the result of the initial listing of the toolbox at the tudogs software directory. Once again, the toolbox got a better write-up than the 4 out of 5 rating, but I'm not complaining. Another helpful link was posted at this myie2 message board There was a strange reversal in the popularity of the larger icon version of the toolbox. This month 60% of downloads were for the larger version-- in the past 70% of downloads were for the smaller icon version. Maybe visitors to tudogs are more likely to have had their glasses chewed by a dog? permanent link

8/19/03 - 8/25/03 From Bad to Worse [...to where's my fucking gun]: As if the inefficiencies of navigating the tacky billboard Internet wasn't enough of a life sucking experience. We now learn that billionaire Bill Shit-ware Gates is also Bill Zombie-ware Gates. The last three days I've been sent over 1500 Sobig.F virus (100k pif attachment) e-mail's from windows computers (primarily just one computer) "body snatched" into the service of evil. While I'm pretty pissed-off at the computer owner[s] who were stupid enough to allow their computers to become infected, and are apparently too stupid to realize they're infected machine is -still- harassing innocent [people not stupid enough to open a .pif e-mail attachment] bystanders. The real blame for this fuck-up ultimately should be dumped on the jackasses who invented the Internet/e-mail protocols that allowed the "openness" of deception. The fact that it should not even be possible for an e-mail/virus to be sent with a forged return address is logically obvious. What's also becoming obvious is "shyster-net" wasn't an accident. I don't know enough about the construction of e-mail headers to convert IP information into a useful address, but if you do, please tell this computer owner that their system is doing a good cyber imitation of Typhoid Mary [sending me 400 virus laced e-mail's a day] "from LT_JURISTEH (ool-18bd7728.dyn.optonline.net [24.189.119.40])" I asked Comcast/optonline.net to disable the account but that apparently did no good. permanent link

8/6/03 - 8/18/03 The Good Old Days [the rotten present, and the shitty future]: I have been doing some reflecting, trying to better understand what needs to happen for the Internet to realize more of its potential. I've also been thinking about my responsibility to be a more effective agent (advocate, promoter, instigator) for change. Those of us who know things are really broken (which should be anyone with a published e-mail address) are provided by circumstances with little ability to convert concern into productive action. Unfortunately, the problem of the Internet has nuances that prevent the "solution condensation" that provides easy choices and efficient, complete repair. That isn't to say, a complete fix isn't easy, or even obvious, it just hasn't been selected out of the chaos, by those who hold the power to set the agenda for what will receive coordinated public consideration. From how this new millennium is beginning, it is looking like it will start with the decade [or worse century] of "the half measure "-- where problems are attacked with any convenient club, but not effectively solved. Like the business plan of the underwear gnomes of South Park fame our strategy facing almost all problems seems to be critically flawed by a missing step "B". In Iraq and California the evil "what is" is blown up "step A" with the gleeful expectation that the "C" of a better world and better government will now just happen. (I suppose in the case of California, a winner-take-all election with 130 candidates does "technically" qualify as a step "B", but even the underwear gnomes are laughing.) Even in the dark, of a should-never-have-happened black-out every honest thinking person should be able to see that there is something very wrong with our approach to problem-solving. My own shallow "fix the Internet" strategy of "A" complain and provide "whatis" possibly a solution , "B" nothing, and "C" unrealistically expect things to change-- Lacks that all-important real-world practical element. I complain that the Internet has been set up to create a marketing competition rather than a quality content competition, and yet I have foolishly assumed that in the real world of control and power (politics), that the competition of ideas, is played on a more rational, level playing field. The fact is, the corruption of chaos smoke, and special interest bent mirrors that has the Internet decomposing in a sea of potential also infects the political system that must be used to fix the problem. It may be that the underlying brokenness that needs fixing first is the corporate controled media system we use to develop, scrutinize, and debate problems-and-solutions. Our self professing "fair and balanced" (FOX News) mass media isn't bringing "good things to light" (NBC/General Electric) because we have sold-it-out to circus ringmasters who see us all as nothing but born every day suckers and saps who will buy anything-- especially if its shiny and superficial and has a flag stuck in it. Unfortunately, too few of us are doing anything to prove the ringmasters perception wrong. permanent link

7/31/03 - 8/6/03 Watching google-watch Being Watched [a thin all-wet whitewash]: One should not expect "brilliance" from a goofball self-proclaimed google lover, and google-watch-watch DOTorg delivers no such brilliance. What this one-page-wonder of a website does deliver is dishonest, right wing, corporate suck-up commentary that shows the "chaos pimps" of Internet Marketing for the ignorant, lying, sleaze balls they are. If you think Internet Indexing is supposed to be a black marketing shit hole--then G double W is for you. Reassuring nonsense about how you, the Internet "public" of SEO spammers have, through google, created a more perfect Internet democracy are prevalent, and of course the solution mantra of "just buy some advertising" wasn't forgotten. The good news for google-watch is that morons watching the watcher provide plenty of free advertising. --------------------------------------------------- In google ad-nonsense news: The always fair and wonderful Google corporation has apparently deactivated my inmendham.com (Now ranked a merely irrelevant 20th, up from the preposterously invisible 40th on the keyword mendham) ad-nonsense account. They showed public-service ads for a couple of days, then showed actual Mendham related ads for a day or so, than nothing. Why?? who knows, and who cares? Personally, I've had my lifetime fill of lying corporate BullShit, and will not waste my time seeking an explanation. --------------------------------------------------- A couple of weeks ago I ran across these pretty good articles regarding the PDF file format: PDF: Unfit for Human Consumption PDF: Unfit for Human Consumption Part 2 I've always hated this file format with a passion, it represents the antithesis of what the Internet should be -- namely efficient. Back in the days when I was doing the official town site for the shittie ungrateful town in which I live. I had many, kind of contentious, discussions with the jackass Mayor about the user unfriendliness of this stupid file format. Inspite of providing the town with a free, very efficient Pearl script (of my creation) that could produce from a web page: fill-in-the-blank form, a very light .rtf file (with graphics) that could be consistently viewed and printed from almost any computer-- the dumb-ass Mayor could not see past the BS propaganda and insisted on paying Adobe to make on-line documents 10, sometimes 20 times larger than necessary. Coincidentally in a recent town blog entry I kind of prove the point. --------------------------------------------------- Danny Sullivan , Provides a link to my Powercons tool box in this month's search engine report (one of the best issues ever-- lots of good stuff) I thought the link would produce more traffic than it has, but I am nonetheless, very grateful. --------------------------------------------------- Another incomprehensible, and destructively distracting "Semantic Web" article. permanent link

7/29/03 - 7/30/03 Government CONTROL vs Corporate CHAOS [choose logic]: Andrew Goodman of traffik.com has generously [a penny is a penny] conceded that I "no longer seem quite as wacky as we might have thought". Unfortunately, the context of this concession is a pretty irritating mischaracterization of what I have, and do advocate. In his article Andrew "shades" his reference to me with the ambiguous implication that I support a Government Controlled Internet. This long standing rhetorical "red herring" exaggeration simplifies argument, but makes it meaningless, and for "entertainment purposes only" Andrew writes: But the specter of legislators infringing on the editorial rights of the publishers of website rankings is too grim, ultimately, for us to even imagine taking something like this lying down. It's a real 1984 scenario. legislators don't even have the honest integrity or "guts" to outlaw shameful, disgusting, lying Spam e-mail-- What indication is there, that any legislator, has any interest in regulating googles subtle "publicly invisible" manipulation of Internet access? To be clear I only advocate government involvement in guaranteeing functional internet infrastructure. Government should facilitate (if not provide) alternatives. The only obligation it should impose on capitalist enterprise is the obligation to compete with at least one honest provider. I simply argue that under some circumstances (industries susceptible to monopolization) government must provide the alternative in the form of a competing provider or in the form of a ALTERNATIVE parallel playing-field where honest rules and logical standards apply. A lot of people think Google's opinion is very often helpful to them, hence they continue to use the Google search tool. No one's holding a gun to their head. It's supply and demand. The gun held to the user's head is more of an no choice bomb. All would-be providers of search services are limited by gross inefficiencies built into the internets infrastructure. The fact is, to rationally index the Internet you have to first usefully (at least minimally) describe and categorize the content to be indexed. Simple Basic Information (subject, author, publisher, publishing date etc.) makes libraries easy to search. Basic information gives keywords context and it is an indispensable part of rational organization. Until the Internet incorporates that logic the only choice the public will have is the yellow or blue "happy meal / page rank" search gimmick. Oddly, when you work through the logic of hypothetical "search rankings sour grapes litigators," the new advertising programs available on search engines like Google serve to head off the complaint that public access is being blocked by a quirk in a research tool designed by a herd of diabolical nerds. If you bid high enough.... if "bidding" is such a good idea why don't we force residents who live on a street, to bid to have their street included on a road map. Why not make books bid to get into the library card catalog. Search engine "bidding" is nothing but a stupid, inefficient, big business conspired INTERNET TAX. it is a zero-sum-game that just burns gas and melts rubber but produces no constructive movement on the information superhighway. permanent link

7/11/03 - 7/29/03 The Foul Fragrance of Failure [This site stinks of it]: Google-watch has added a couple of new articles. This Blogometer page provided me with a depressing reality check. Apparently, google watch gets more page views in a day than this site gets in a month. Applying some logical math it will take me some 30 years just to be as irrelevant as google-watch has been for the past year. I suppose if I was and average person I would amputate this rotting piece of my social conscience.... but considering that the rest of my life isn't much less rotten than this site I might as well drag this dead appendage around a while longer. Now that Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOL and "The Blog Cartel" have nearly completed their marginalization of the Open-Public Interest-Information Superhighway, I guess I am going to have to learn to just accept the corporate controlled chaos or just quit Internetting. Facing the fact that I have to give up cigarettes [$7.50 a pack is too insane for me] has me already chronically irritable [and pretty pissed off at the American Electorate that has imposed this unconstitutional tax tyranny] Contemplating life, without cigarettes and the Internet seams an unbearably bleak prospect. On the subject of cigarettes and smokers rights--similar to my whatis effort to save the Internet--I am probably pointlessly attempting to fight [for three years now] a one-man legal battle against the State of New Jersey and it's unconstitutional taxation policies. Doing some internet research to support that effort, even I was surprised to learn how little the Internet has to offer on the subject. It seems impossible that tens of millions of angry people could have this low [and junkie] an internet profile. I would argue that if the Internet can't provide the means of viable group and information organization under the circumstance of what is in effect an 800% tax, it's impossible to reasonably claim that this "web" isn't catastrophically broken. --------------------------------------------------- In powercons news the promised middle of the month link from the industry insider apparently never happened... so it's looking like downloads will be down for July some 90 percent [barely over 200]. I haven't had time to do any significant upgrading over the past couple of weeks, and unfortunately, these recent download numbers are not encouraging me to find any time. permanent link