Old News is Bad News?
Apparently all that technology at Google hasn’t been perfected yet. On Monday, Google News, which is driven by a very advanced bot posted an old article about United Airlines (UAL) from 2002. The Problem? Well, at that time the airlines were still reeling from 9/11, and UAL was in the process of filing for bankruptcy. The news spread like wildfire, and UAL’s stock price plummeted 75% from $12 down to $3. After news of the SNAFU, the price rebounded back up to around $10, which still was a loss of over $300 million…oops.
The folks over at Google News actually run their own blog, and they have a detailed explanation of what happened. In a nutshell, an old article with an unclear publication date (lightbulb: put the date on articles!) wound up becoming tagged as popular on the Sun Sentinel website, which is owned by the Tribune Company (also owner of my beloved Chicago Cubs). Tribune is placing all the blame on Google by saying they haven’t changed the link in years; however, there is evidence to suggest otherwise. It seems likely that the recent anniversary of 9/11 must have triggered this old story to get a plethora of new hits, which started this whole fiasco.
For those that would like to delve deeper, The Register has a good synopsis of the post-goof story. I also have to give props to Computerworld for their story.
This mishap really shines the light on the potential impacts of misinformation, and how they are magnified greater than ever due to the internet. My mother sent me a link the other day to an article discussing the potential for legislation that will severely limit the freedoms those in South Korea have come to expect on the internet. Lee Myung-bak, the president of South Korea, is sensitive to this issue in light of the recent unfounded claims about imported U.S. beef being of the worst quality, suciptible to Mad Cow Disease, and that South Koreans are somehow genetically predisposed to aquire said disease! These stories ultimately led to the near ouster of Lee Myung-bak after he approved the reimportation of U.S. beef earlier this year.
A little side-note: Korean beef is horrible. It’s funny that they’re scared of our beef, because the quality of U.S. beef is 1000 times better (personal opinion) than Korean and/or Australian beef, which is what they also import a lot of. In the grocery stores there, the same cut of beef would be 2 or 3 times more expensive if it was Korean rather than Australian (U.S. beef was banned when I was in Korea).
So remember, don’t believe everything you read…well, unless it’s coming from me.
Comment by Joshua on 12 September 2008 at 9:15 am:
Jay, good post. do you think google should have liability to shareholders for screwin’ up? I don’t, but just wondering.
Are you going to post that story about the cocaine use by the U of I Catholic?
Comment by JayBandit on 12 September 2008 at 9:26 am:
I don’t think Google really is at fault here. The one article goes into detail discussing how it is really poor management of information by the Sun Sentinel, and therefore the Tribune Company.
No, I don’t care about that story. Kevin broke it, he can write it. I have others I’d post before that.
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