So what was that all about?

[zubeneschamali]

In case you're wondering what I was asking you to do earlier in the week with the "ground" thing...

So you might have heard about this little disagreement going on in New York about a proposed community center/mosque on the site of a former Burlington Coat Factory.  Setting aside the politics of the whole thing, I saw this blurb about how typing "ground" into Google resulted in an automatic completion of "ground zero mosque" before any other phrase, including just plain "ground zero".  Then someone pointed out that it seems to depend on where you are, and I thought, aha!  I know people from all over the world who could do this little experiment for me so that when I talk in class later this semester about how Google is not the neutral, taken-for-granted search engine that we all assume it is, this would be a great illustration that the results you get depend in part on where you are:



Obviously, it also depends on what you have recently searched for, and the phrase "ground zero" can mean a lot of things beside the site of the former World Trade Center in NYC.  Keeping that in mind, here's the results, sorted roughly by distance from Manhattan.

1	2	3	4	5	Location
ground zero	grounds for sculpture	ground zero mosque	ground beef recipes	groundhog	Bronx
ground zero	grounds for sculpture	ground zero mosque	ground beef recipes	groundhog	New Jersey
groundhog	ground beef recipes	ground zero mosque	ground zero	ground turkey recipes	Cincinnati
ground beef recipes	groundhog	grounded for life	ground zero mosque	ground zero	Indiana
ground beef recipes	ground turkey recipes	ground zero mosque	ground zero	grounded for life	Chicago
groundhog	ground beef recipes	ground zero mosque	ground zero	grounded for life	Chicago
ground beef recipes	ground zero omaha	ground zero mosque	groundhog	ground zero	Omaha
ground beef recipes	groundhog	ground zero	ground turkey recipes	groundhog day	Ontario
ground beef recipes	groundhog	ground zero	ground turkey recipes	groundhog day	Alberta
groundwork	ground zero	groundhog day	grounded theory	ground elder	Scotland
ground zero	ground zero 2010	groundhog day	ground zero festival	grounded theory	Utrecht
ground force	ground zero	ground bound	ground link	ground control	Portugal
ground beef recipes	ground zero	ground turkey recipes	ground zero mosque	groundhog	Norway
ground zero	grounded for life	grounded theory	groundhog day	ground zero audio	Oslo
ground beef recipes	ground zero	ground zero mosque	ground turkey recipes	groundhog day	Baden-Württemberg
ground effect	groundhog day	ground zero	ground parrot	grounded theory	Queensland
ground zero mosque protest	ground zero	ground zero mosque	ground zero ship	grooveshark	Sydney
ground beef recipes	ground zero	ground turkey recipes	ground zero mosque	ground control	Sydney

Don't know that there are any grand conclusions to draw here, but it is interesting.  Thanks for your help!

Comments

[aleo-70.livejournal.com]

Interesting. Clever experiment.

I had heard, somewhere, that Google weighted its search responses to your locality and possibly to previous searches (although I can't recall having ever searched for 'ground' or any of the above listed derivatives).

What happens with the same search parameter in different search engines other than Google? Although I guess now that would be rather moot as the argument over the mosque is perhaps not as current as it was when you started this.

[zubeneschamali.livejournal.com]

There obviously isn't enough data to make it a rigorous study, but it's just...interesting. I'm also fascinated by the wide variety of locations that people are coming from.

[mangacat201.livejournal.com]

*cocks head*

why that is very odd indeed... I'm especially intrigued by the grooveshark.
What i find very baffling indeed though is the fact that no matter where, all of these are composites... whatever happened to the ground we walk on?? Too simple?
Cat

[zubeneschamali.livejournal.com]

Hmm, good point! I'm guessing that Google's auto-fill feature is looking ahead and assuming that you're searching for more than one word at a time. *shrug*