On Mon, 29 Jul 2013, Karen Coyle wrote:
> Unfortunately, now that Google is a behemoth it will be extremely hard to
> present an alternative ... if you want to opt out of being tracked as
> you search.
Let's try a positive point-of-view: being a "behemoth" makes Google a
clear target, and people can be made to pay attention to the potential
deleterious effects of being tracked-- like subpoenas from NSA, obedience
to subpoenas from NSA, irritating and pointless advertising, or NSA itself
becoming a for-profit corporation.
The obvious alternative would be to start thinking about alternatives.
One possibility would be to present a non-profit search engine that makes
for-profit searching that relies upon spying into people's lives
inefficient, threatening and impractical. After all, the Internet started
in the non-profit world.
Libraries and Universities are currently repositories of information and
cognizant of the value of the Web for locating information. Who better to
*collaboratively* develop non-profit search engines?
I wonder how tied up in a catch-22 situation academics is willing to
become-- afraid to provide non-profit public services for fear of
retaliation from corporations protecting profits and disabled from
independent research by political actions cutting off public support.
The train *has* left the station-- but it's course, and the next stations
can be designed in the *public* interest.
jgm
John G. Marr
Cataloger
CDS, UL
Univ. of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM 87131
jmarr_at_unm.edu
californiastop_at_hushmail.com
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Received on Mon Jul 29 2013 - 12:32:30 EDT