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Archives for March 2005

Google autolink debate frenzy

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I’m too mired in book work to offer much besides pointers, but here are pointers galore on the important controversy over the Google toolbar Autolink feature — in which Google offers to overlay its own links to certain types of information that it finds on everyone else’s Web pages. In 2001 Microsoft proposed putting something similar right into its Internet Explorer browser, and Walt Mossberg and many others blew the whistle on it. Links should be considered part of the vocabulary of Web content; inserting links is tantamount to tampering with the content.

This time it’s been Dave Winer who’s been blowing the whistle insistently. Here’s Dave’s case against Autolink. The opposite point of view — it’s a tool, I should be able to use any tools I want once content lands on my screen! — is smartly summarized by Cory Doctorow here and here. Paul Boutin in Slate, and Tim Bray, also offer good, careful perspectives.

Me, I think the issue is fundamentally political more than technical; Google is now powerful enough that it needs to learn to tread more lightly in areas like this. My hunch is the Google-ites, encapsulated in their “let’s bring all the world’s information to light!” mission, simply had no idea what an ethical morass they have plopped themselves into. If the past is any indication, they’re nimble enough to step out.

Times 2, Journal 0

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Well, it’s official: The New York Times, having replaced William Safire with John Tierney, now has two dedicated “conservative seats” on its op-ed page. Meanwhile, as I wrote a month ago, the Wall Street Journal, having lost its sole token sorta-liberal, has…not replaced him at all.

The Times constantly takes brickbats from the right for its supposed liberal bias, but it’s clearly trying to find room on its opinion pages for a variety of perspectives. Meanwhile, the Journal, whose editorial pages list far further to the right than the Times’ lean leftward, doesn’t seem to think it need bother expose its readers to those who disagree with it.

These papers pretty much represent the U.S.’s two most important national dailies. When I beef about the Journal, I sometimes get e-mail from people I know (or don’t know) who work there, protesting that I shouldn’t hold the editorial pages’ neanderthal bias against the rest of the paper. And it’s true: I love the Journal’s feature writing, and a lot of its news coverage is fair and reasonably non-ideological. I would say exactly the same thing about the Times’ news pages.

Yet on the opinion/editorial side, the distinction couldn’t be more vivid, and it needs to be said, over and over again: One paper has a hubbub of different points of view, the other has a starkly uniform party line that is significantly off to the margins of the American mainstream.

That difference hasn’t seemed to filter very far into the blogosphere’s media-criticism memepool. Anti-Times noise is endemic here, whereas the Journal doesn’t seem to warrant more than an occasional snipe. Maybe that’s a sign of the Journal’s subscription-only self-marginalization; but Dow Jones has actually placed most Journal opinion-writing on the free Opinionjournal.com site, so I don’t think that’s it.

Rather, this is one more data point in the right’s campaign against the Times and other media institutions that it sees as impediments on the path to total reality control. The scorched-earth ground rules parallel the CNN/Fox argument. Conservatives jealously defend their right to own their own partisan media outlets, while loudly complaining that anyone still foolish enough to struggle for balance is hopelessly biased to the left.

Dosed

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Here’s a little tale of life in the 21st century.

As I suffered through a bout of the usual seasonal cold last week, I found that my supply of my remedy of choice — a generic over-the-counter combo antihistamine and pseudoephedrine (Sudafed) — was running low. As I ran errands, I searched for this variety on the shelves of local drug stores, but to no avail. Finally, this morning, at a Walgreen’s in downtown San Francisco, I found the precise medication, so I thought, gee, better stock up.

But when I plopped three boxes of “Walfinate D” on the counter, the checkout lady said, “There’s a limit of two on those.” She couldn’t tell me exactly why, but since all she wanted to do was ring box number three up separately, I didn’t pursue it.

Back at my desk, I decided to look for answers. I couldn’t remember how to spell “pseudoephedrine” so I just Googled “sudafed controls” and found this page, which pretty much answered my question: Pseudoephedrine is apparently a key raw material for the proprietors of meth labs, so the government wants to limit bulk sales.

First I was irritated that my need for cold relief was being made more inconvenient by the chemistry demands of speed freaks. Then I was delighted at how simple a matter it was, in these Google-powered times, to discover exactly why my cold medicine was considered a suspect substance.

My inconvenience was hardly severe. But if they try to ban my Sudafed, as the commentator on the above page proposes, they’ll have to pry it from my germy, sneezed-into hands!