Lost in Cyberspace (4#) -

An alluring mystery
blogger in Damascus . . .

disappears, leaving many questions behind.

Was the blog an elaborate hoax?

:: Esther Addley :: - - :: Jillian C York ::

# Silent marches have been called for today, to mark the second anniversary of Iran's disputed presidential election, while Mir Hossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karroubi remain under house arrest.

# Google is manipulating the search results
you see, a new report explains . . .

The "personalisation" of information being made available to you is under the control of Google, which is not really accountable to anyone. If anyone challenges Google, they can always claim the "secret sauce" defense: their technological methods are a trade secret.

The writer describes how some of this power works, but I can tell you about my experience, too:

Although I have been regularly providing commentary and analysis on the Amanda Knox Case, for example, Google does not list my blog entries on this topic.

They have not deleted my blog from their servers; instead, they have rendered it invisible in their search results.

If you go to Google Blog Search, you will not find my entries among those listed, because "personalisation" is just a fancy technological euphemism for censorship.

:: Read more by Eli Pariser.

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