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The Googlization of Everything
The publisher gratefully acknowledges the generous support of the General
Endowment Fund of the University of California Press Foundation.
The Googlization of Everything
(AND WHY WE SHOULD WORRY)
Updated Edition
Siva Vaidhyanathan
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
Berkeley Los Angeles
University of California Press, one of the most distinguished university presses in the United States, enriches lives around the world by advancing scholarship in the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. Its activities are supported by the UC Press Foundation and by philanthropic contributions from individuals and institutions. For more information, visit www.ucpress.edu.
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
© 2011 by Siva Vaidhyanathan
First paperback printing 2012
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Vaidhyanathan, Siva.
The Googlization of everything : (and why we should worry) / Siva Vaidhyanathan.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-520-27289-7 (pbk : alk. paper)
1. Google (Firm). 2. Internet industry—Social aspects.
3. Internet—Social aspects. I. Title.
HD9696.8.U64G669 2010
338.7’6102504—dc22
2010027772
Manufactured in the United States of America
20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This book is printed on Cascades Enviro 100, a 100% post consumer waste, recycled, de-inked fiber. FSC recycled certified and processed chlorine free. It is acid free, Ecologo certified, and manufactured by BioGas energy.
For Jaya, who is learning to be patient in a very fast world
It does not break wills, but it softens them, bends them, and directs them; it rarely forces one to act, but it constantly opposes itself to one’s acting; it does not destroy, it prevents things from coming into being; it does not tyrannize, it hinders.
Alexis de Tocqueville
CONTENTS
Introduction: The Gospel of Google
1. Render unto Caesar: How Google Came to Rule the Web
2. Google’s Ways and Means: Faith in Aptitude and Technology
3. The Googlization of Us: Universal Surveillance and Infrastructural Imperialism
4. The Googlization of the World: Prospects for a Global Public Sphere
5. The Googlization of Knowledge: The Future of Books
6. The Googlization of Memory: Information Overload, Filters, and the Fracturing of Knowledge
Conclusion: The Human Knowledge Project
PREFACE
Google seems omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent. It also claims to be benevolent. It’s no surprise that we hold the company in almost deific awe and respect. But what do we gain and what do we lose by inviting Google to be the lens through which we view the world? This book describes the nature of that devotion as well as a growing apostasy, and it suggests ways we might live better with Google once we see it as a mere company rather than as a force for good and enlightenment in the world.
We may see Google as a savior, but it rules like Caesar. The mythology of the Web leads us to assume that it is a wild, ungovernable, and thus ungoverned realm. This could not be further from the truth. There was a power vacuum in the Web not so long ago, but we have invited Google to fill it. Overwhelmingly, we now allow Google to determine what is important, relevant, and true on the Web and in the world. We trust and believe that Google acts in our best interest. But we have surrendered control over the values, methods, and processes that make sense of our information ecosystem.
This book argues that we should influence—even regulate—search systems actively and intentionally, and thus take responsibility for how the Web delivers knowledge. We must build the sort of online ecosystem that can benefit the whole world over the long term, not one that serves the short-term interests of one powerful company, no matter how brilliant.
Still, questioning the role of Google in our lives and the faith we have in it is not easy. Google does much good and little direct harm to most people. And I did not expect to be the person to do this job. From the early days of personal computers, I counted myself among the champions of all things digital and networked. I saw great transformative, democratizing potential in the technological changes of the past three decades. In the 1990s—heady days of global prosperity, burgeoning freedom, and relative peace—I saw in digital networks the means to solve some of the problems we faced as a species. Back then I took seriously the notion that the world had stepped beyond the stalemate of the Cold War and had settled on a rough consensus on competitive open markets, basic human rights, and liberal democracy—even if the road to those goals was still long and rocky in much of the world.1 I assumed digitization would level the commercial playing
