In the wake of the Florida school shooting, Google decided to take a stand. The gatekeeper of the Internet decided to filter shopping searches that included the term “gun.” It didn't go so well.
Early Tuesday morning, Internet shoppers started noticing and documenting the digital gaffes. Users received error notices when they searched for glue guns and water guns, toy guns and airsoft guns, nail guns and nerf guns. The algorithm is apparently so strict that even the color "burgundy" triggered an error because it includes "gun" in the spelling.
This set off something of a parlor game on social media. Turns out, adults don’t like it when faceless bureaucrats try enforcing arbitrary restrictions — federal, corporate, or otherwise.
Casey “Stable Genius” Smith found that Google now censors “Laguna Beach."
Google disables shopping search for any query where the string "gun" appears... even if it's inside a none gun word, such as laGUNa
pic.twitter.com/Hk04BUPKGC
— Casey "Stable Genius" Smith (@x0x0x00x0x0)
February 27, 2018Technousayt observed that the beloved Tom Cruise film about beach volleyball, “Top Gun,” also could not be found.
KingPrewyoko noticed that a search for American hard-rock super-group Velvet Revolver did not return any results. Neither did searches for the Sex Pistols, the Indianapolis Colts, or the word “trifle."
Here are three examples of brands affected by the filtering of words related to 'gun' by
@Google.
In addition, Google has either not adjusted the filtering for the word 'rifle' or the company really dislikes a certain English dessert. ????
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— ♔ Prewyoko (@KingPrewyoko)
February 27, 2018The benevolent nanny nerds at Google quickly began cleaning up their mistake. Many of the search terms had been restored by the early evening, but not before an important lesson was learned: Attempts to coddle adults will always backfire.
More at:
http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/go...rticle/2650230
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