Comments on: Accountability in Web Search http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479 search for meaning Fri, 21 May 2010 18:23:31 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0-beta2 By: Russell Cole http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479&cpage=1#comment-13319 Russell Cole Sun, 02 Nov 2008 23:16:13 +0000 http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479#comment-13319 By dismissing my counterfactual, in which I compared the Wikipedia to Britannica, you have completely missed the point. I compared the two respective reference sources because one, Britannica, subscribes to the peer-review editing methodology, while the other, Wikipedia, does not. Whether you would exclude Britannica from your indexes on the basis that it is not free is entirely beside the point. The point of this counterfactual is to demonstrate that peer review, which is practiced by Britannica, does not necessarily result in the production of contents that possess substantially decreased rates of errata. Furthermore, because editing by the Wikipedia is decentralized, the Wikipedia corrects its errata at a substantially faster pace. This has been established by empirical studies, of which you appear to be ignorant. The most salient of these studies was conducted by Nature about a year and a half ago. You are certainly correct to say that anyone can edit and author the materials expressed in the contents of the Wikipedia. However, you must account for the fact that, once again, according to comparisons between the Wikipedia and Britannica, the Wikipedia, nevertheless, publishes contents with only marginally greater rates of errata. It is this point, that peer review does not necessarily result in the production of superior materials, that you need to address. By simply disqualifying the argument on a basis that is altogether irrelevant to the argument's soundness and its implications is merely a slight of hand that amounts to a thoroughly unimpressive rhetorical tactic. Even more disconcerting, you attempt to defend peer-review by stating that it has been used for centuries. You are quite correct. However, your polemic possess solely as its pillars of support, tradition and authority. Such defenses of an intellectual position might fair well in the deliberations of those who practice scholasticism. However, it fails to offer any convincing reason why those of us who are alternatively swayed by objectivism would adopt your thesis as credible. By dismissing my counterfactual, in which I compared the Wikipedia to Britannica, you have completely missed the point. I compared the two respective reference sources because one, Britannica, subscribes to the peer-review editing methodology, while the other, Wikipedia, does not. Whether you would exclude Britannica from your indexes on the basis that it is not free is entirely beside the point.
The point of this counterfactual is to demonstrate that peer review, which is practiced by Britannica, does not necessarily result in the production of contents that possess substantially decreased rates of errata. Furthermore, because editing by the Wikipedia is decentralized, the Wikipedia corrects its errata at a substantially faster pace. This has been established by empirical studies, of which you appear to be ignorant. The most salient of these studies was conducted by Nature about a year and a half ago.
You are certainly correct to say that anyone can edit and author the materials expressed in the contents of the Wikipedia. However, you must account for the fact that, once again, according to comparisons between the Wikipedia and Britannica, the Wikipedia, nevertheless, publishes contents with only marginally greater rates of errata.
It is this point, that peer review does not necessarily result in the production of superior materials, that you need to address. By simply disqualifying the argument on a basis that is altogether irrelevant to the argument’s soundness and its implications is merely a slight of hand that amounts to a thoroughly unimpressive rhetorical tactic.
Even more disconcerting, you attempt to defend peer-review by stating that it has been used for centuries. You are quite correct. However, your polemic possess solely as its pillars of support, tradition and authority. Such defenses of an intellectual position might fair well in the deliberations of those who practice scholasticism. However, it fails to offer any convincing reason why those of us who are alternatively swayed by objectivism would adopt your thesis as credible.

]]> By: Dr. Riza C Berkan, CEO http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479&cpage=1#comment-13313 Dr. Riza C Berkan, CEO Thu, 30 Oct 2008 17:27:50 +0000 http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479#comment-13313 Dear Russel Cole Good points. First, you have missed few important details. Britannica is a commercial entity. hakia uses librarian's recommendations for non-commercial entities. If you mouse-over CREDIBILITY column, it tells you along with a link for the criteria. So, most of your arguments above are not applicable. Second, the credibility (centuries old criteria) comes from peerview process and editorial control by experts. Wikipedia is not a peerreview or editorial environment. Anyone with any authority can change Wikipedia. For example, things written about hakia on Wikipedia are not accurate, and the moment we correct it, someone else takes it off. Who are these people to know hakia more than us? It is a joke, and happens frequently in every subject matter. Third, Google results are not democratic. If you think it is, you are in illusion. A few people in Google can change weights of the (black-box) algorithm for any reason. In your line of thinking, this is dictatorship who says "do no evil". No dictator in the history had this much power to control the flow of information with so little effort. But this is an analogy, and only used in response to your line of thinking. Last, you call hakia's practice a form of authoritarianism. No, we just separate results visually as to their editorial integrity recommended by OTHERS. If I had a bigger font for OTHERS, I would use it here. And these OTHERS have profession and expertise in this area. Consumers have a right to see this differentiation. Thanks for your comments. Dear Russel Cole

Good points.

First, you have missed few important details. Britannica is a commercial entity. hakia uses librarian’s recommendations for non-commercial entities. If you mouse-over CREDIBILITY column, it tells you along with a link for the criteria. So, most of your arguments above are not applicable.

Second, the credibility (centuries old criteria) comes from peerview process and editorial control by experts. Wikipedia is not a peerreview or editorial environment. Anyone with any authority can change Wikipedia. For example, things written about hakia on Wikipedia are not accurate, and the moment we correct it, someone else takes it off. Who are these people to know hakia more than us? It is a joke, and happens frequently in every subject matter.

Third, Google results are not democratic. If you think it is, you are in illusion. A few people in Google can change weights of the (black-box) algorithm for any reason. In your line of thinking, this is dictatorship who says “do no evil”. No dictator in the history had this much power to control the flow of information with so little effort. But this is an analogy, and only used in response to your line of thinking.

Last, you call hakia’s practice a form of authoritarianism. No, we just separate results visually as to their editorial integrity recommended by OTHERS. If I had a bigger font for OTHERS, I would use it here. And these OTHERS have profession and expertise in this area. Consumers have a right to see this differentiation.

Thanks for your comments.

]]> By: Russell Cole http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479&cpage=1#comment-13302 Russell Cole Mon, 27 Oct 2008 17:09:13 +0000 http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479#comment-13302 How do you decide what groups in society should be consulted when determining the knowledge claims, on the part of websites, that you consider to be credible? You seem to assume that librarians are not in possession of vested interests that might influence their identification of the websites that are deemed credible. For instance, since librarians have a professional interest in maintaining the impression that editing and archiving are best performed by centralized authorities - such as peer review - they would have an interest in promoting websites that generate materials according to processes that embody the same epistemic prejudices upon which the librarian profession is legitimated. Therefore, the librarian has an interest in promoting Britannica as opposed to Wikipedia. However, as studies, such as the one performed by Nature, are beginning to establish, the Wikipedia can produce materials that contain only marginally greater rates of errata, and the errors expressed in the Wikipedia's contents are corrected much faster. On a final note, you seem to suggest that Google has not implemented any instruments designed to weed out websites that have little credibility but, nevertheless, engage in SEO or PPC, allowing them to achieve high SERPs. This is patently false. Google has errected functions in its algorithms that penalized for practices, such as paid-for-links, and so forth. What is different between the practices of Hakia and Google is that Google is democratically inclined while Hakia lends itself to a form of authoritarianism. Russell Cole How do you decide what groups in society should be consulted when determining the knowledge claims, on the part of websites, that you consider to be credible? You seem to assume that librarians are not in possession of vested interests that might influence their identification of the websites that are deemed credible.
For instance, since librarians have a professional interest in maintaining the impression that editing and archiving are best performed by centralized authorities – such as peer review – they would have an interest in promoting websites that generate materials according to processes that embody the same epistemic prejudices upon which the librarian profession is legitimated.
Therefore, the librarian has an interest in promoting Britannica as opposed to Wikipedia. However, as studies, such as the one performed by Nature, are beginning to establish, the Wikipedia can produce materials that contain only marginally greater rates of errata, and the errors expressed in the Wikipedia’s contents are corrected much faster.
On a final note, you seem to suggest that Google has not implemented any instruments designed to weed out websites that have little credibility but, nevertheless, engage in SEO or PPC, allowing them to achieve high SERPs. This is patently false. Google has errected functions in its algorithms that penalized for practices, such as paid-for-links, and so forth.
What is different between the practices of Hakia and Google is that Google is democratically inclined while Hakia lends itself to a form of authoritarianism.
Russell Cole

]]> By: ranking http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479&cpage=1#comment-13295 ranking Sat, 25 Oct 2008 13:00:00 +0000 http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479#comment-13295 <strong>ranking...</strong> Wer Suchmaschinen erfolgreich nutzen will, wer erwartet, dass seine Seiten regelm ssig unter den ersten 10, 20 oder 30 Ergebnissen erscheinen, muss bei Seitengestaltung und Text- Erstellung die Arbeitsweise der Suchmaschinen wie auch die Ausdrucksweise... ranking…

Wer Suchmaschinen erfolgreich nutzen will, wer erwartet, dass seine Seiten regelm ssig unter den ersten 10, 20 oder 30 Ergebnissen erscheinen, muss bei Seitengestaltung und Text- Erstellung die Arbeitsweise der Suchmaschinen wie auch die Ausdrucksweise…

]]> By: Accountability in Web Search : thegameoflove http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479&cpage=1#comment-13292 Accountability in Web Search : thegameoflove Wed, 22 Oct 2008 14:12:48 +0000 http://blog.hakia.com/?p=479#comment-13292 [...] Original Dr. Riza C Berkan, CEO [...] [...] Original Dr. Riza C Berkan, CEO [...]

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