No point beating around the bush when it comes to yet another advertising network knocking on our door. This was a quick reply I just fired off, and I might as well put it on this blog so there’s another place I can copy it from, since I’m likely to call on it again and again. I’m sure we can’t be alone in online publishing to feel this way.
The original reply named the firms parenthetically in the last two scenarios but I’ve opted not to do that here. I have blogged about it, so a little hunt here will reveal who I’m talking about.
Thank you for reaching out and while I’ve no doubt you’re at a great company, we have a real problem adding any new ad network. The following pattern has played out over and over again in the last 25-plus years we have been online.
We add a network, so far so good.
The more networks we use, with their payment thresholds, the longer it takes for any one of them to reach the total, and the longer we wait for any money to come.
Add this to the fact we could get away with charging $75 CPM 25 years ago and only fractions of cents today, the thresholds take longer still to reach.
Other things usually happen as well:
We’re promised a high fill rate, even 100 per cent, and the reality is actually closer to 0 per cent and all we see are “filler” adsâif anything at all. Some just run blank units.
We wait so long for those thresholds to be reached that some of the networks actually close down in the interim and we never see our money!
In some cases, the networks change their own policies during the relationship and we get kicked off!
I think the problems behind all of this can be traced to Google, which has monopolized the space. It probably doesn’t help that we refuse to sign anything from Google as we have no desire to add to the coffers of a company that doesn’t pay its fair share of tax. Every email from Google Ad Manager is now rejected at server level.
If somehow [your firm] is different, I’d love to hear about you. The last two networks we added in 2019 and 2020, who assured us the pattern above would not play out, have again followed exactly the above scenario. We gave up on the one we added in 2019 and took them out of our rotation.
Hoping for good news in response.
You know the US tech giants have way too much power, unencumbered by their own government and their own countryâs laws, when they think they can strong-arm another nation. From Reuter:
Alphabet Incâs Google said on Friday it would block its search engine in Australia if the government proceeds with a new code that would force it and Facebook Inc to pay media companies for the right to use their content.
Fine, then piss off. If Australia wants to enact laws that you canât operate with, because youâre used to getting your own way and donât like sharing the US$40,000 million youâve made each year off the backs of othersâ hard work, then just go. Iâve always said people would find alternatives to Google services in less than 24 hours, and while I appreciate its index is larger and it handles search terms well, the spying and the monopolistic tactics are not a worthwhile trade-off.
I know Google supporters are saying that the Australian policy favours the Murdoch Press, and I agree that the bar that the ACCC (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission) has set for what qualifies as a media business (revenues of over A$150,000 per annum) is too high. So it isnât perfect.
The fact Google has made a deal in France suggests it is possible, when the giant doesnât whine so damned much.
Plus, Google and Facebook have been dangerous to democracy, and should have done more for years to address these issues. Theyâve allowed a power imbalance for the sake of their own profits, so paying for newsâeffectively a licensing payment that the rest of us would have to fork outâat least puts a value on it, given how it benefits the two sites. No search? Fine, letâs have more ethical actors reap the rewards of fairer, âunbubbledâ searches, because at least there would be a societal benefit from it, and since they arenât cashing in on the mediaâs work, Iâm happy for them to get a free licence to republish. Right now I donât believe the likes of Duck Duck Go are dominant enough (far from it) to raise the attention of Australian regulators.
Facebookâs reaction has been similar: they would block Australians from sharing links to news. Again, not a bad idea; maybe people will stop using a platform used to incite hate and violence to get their bubbled news items. Facebook, please go ahead and carry out your threat. If it cuts down on people using your siteâor, indeed, returns them to using it for the original purpose most of us signed up for, which was to keep in touch with friendsâthen we all win. (Not that Iâd be back for anything but the limited set of activities I do today. Zuckâs rich enough.)
A statement provided to me and other members of the media from the Open Markets Instituteâs executive director Barry Lynn reads:
Today Google and Facebook proved in dramatic fashion that they pose existential threats to the worldâs democracies. The two corporations are exploiting their monopoly control over essential communications to extort, bully, and cow a free people. In doing so, Google and Facebook are acting similarly to China, which in recent months has used trade embargoes to punish Australians for standing up for democratic values and open fact-based debate. These autocratic actions show why Americans across the political spectrum must work together to break the power that Google, Facebook, and Amazon wield over our news and communications, and over our political debate. They show why citizens of all democracies must work together to build a communications infrastructure safe for all democracies in the 21st Century.
Postscript: Alex, who maintains three spaces on NewTumbl, can still see my “missing” five posts. In addition, NewTumbl has responded and it’s believed there was a bug. More on that here.
This is interesting: talking to Bii on Twitter, who is also a NewTumbl user, I discovered that he canât see my last five posts on NewTumbl.
I sent him a permalink (using the recommended NewTumbl method) to my last post there, but he gets a 404.
In fact, the newest post he can see is my sixth-to-last. And itâs interesting to me that of the last five, three were critical of NewTumblâs moderation system.
This reminds me of Google Plus, which used to hide my posts that were regularly critical of Google.
Bii would kindly prefer to give NewTumbl the benefit of the doubt though my thoughts jumped immediately to censorship. The last five posts are all public.
Top: The way my NewTumbl blog is supposed to look, in its top left-hand corner. Above: What Bii sees, with the last five posts hidden. Coincidentally three of them are critical of NewTumbl.
Like I say, my blog posts here have a pretty good audience, and the first one on NewTumbl comes up very high when one searches for that site. You do not want to be playing these games.
To think, I was so supportive of that place.
For the sake of completeness, then, here are the three critical posts, which have been excerpted before.
November 27, 2020 Do the mods here know their own rules?
Had a couple of modelling shots marked M by the moderators here and I cannot understand why. I had them marked O.
Thereâs no nudity (M) but they contain sexy or sultry imagery (O). Do the mods here know their own rules?
See for yourself: this was the latest. As this is a US site, maybe I should use The Handmaidâs Tale for guidance? I hear itâs a big hit over there. This is after a post with the word w*nk (literally written like that, with an asterisk) got marked as M.
November 29, 2020 See you at my blog gallery
That was pretty simple. Iâve put the New Image Gallery plug-in from A WP Life on to my main blog. And since that blog gets an average of 700 views per post (and the viral ones getting six figures), Iâm betting that whatever I put there will get more eyeballs than here. For those interested, itâs at jackyan.com/blog/2020/11/november-2020-miscellaneous-images/. [Postscript: the galleries can be found at jackyan.com/blog/category/gallery/.] New entries will be added on a monthly basis. Itâs not as cool as NewTumbl but Iâm going to be interested to see if itâs as enjoyable as what Iâve been doing here.
I wanted in all sincerity to see NewTumbl grow but as @alex99a-three and others have seen, some moderating decisions have been questionable. I know first-hand that Wikipedia is a place where true expertise, that of professionals, is not welcomeâfounder Larry Sanger has said as much, which is why he left. The late Aaron Swartz echoed those comments. And here, if professionals are being overruled by people who are not at the same level, then Iâm not sure what the point is. I feel Wikipedia has no point, and my own dissatisfaction with it led me to create Autocade, and thereâs a sense that, in its very real wish to make sure it could keep up with its growth, NewTumbl is heading down the same path.
I donât begrudge this siteâs founders for adopting the approach they did in post moderation. In fact, I think it was very clever and itâs a great way for NewTumbl to punch above its weight. However, in practice the absence of an appealsâ system doesnât work for me any more. I totally get that they havenât the resources. So maybe I will return when they do.
As @constantpriaprism pointed out, Dean is not really present these days, either, so one big drawcard to NewTumblâits transparencyâis now also missing.
And itâs those of us in the F and O spacesâpeople that NewTumbl said they wanted to encourageâwho seem to be bearing the brunt of puritanical moderating. Iâm guessing we are being sidelined by people who donât have the context (e.g. Alex has posted some really innocent stuff) or knowledge outside their countries. Both Alex and I (if I may be so bold as to guess his intent) have been marking as F or O things that were safe for us on prime-time TV when we were younger. I use the same standard with imagery and language.
To confirm this lack of knowledge, I read one comment which absolutely highlighted that one moderator had no idea what they were doing, advancing what I felt was a particularly weak argument. In that case, a newspaper front page was taken down and marked as M. You have to ask yourself: if a word appears (censored) on a newspaper front page, then itâs probably not M; and if a word is used on prime-time television without bleeping, then itâs also probably not M. There are other words which may be adult in nature but are commonly used that even Mary Whitehouse would be fine with, but you just know that with the lack of knowledge that some display here, youâre going to have it taken off the site and marked out of range.
Iâve done my share of rating posts here and I like to think Iâve taken an even-handed, free-speech approach based on decades of experience and life in different countries.
If this is to be an adult siteâand I know the majority of posts lean that wayâthen good luck to it. I will be back as @vergangene-automarken has some excellent stuff, as do the regulars whom I follow, but for now I really want to see what itâs like doing the same thing in my own space. See you there.
I summarized this article to my friends as: âHow can we trust Big Tech? Google didnât like hearing the truth from an intelligent woman, so they forced her out.â And my friend Cathy pointed out itâs a woman of colour.
And if you take the basic position that Google lies, just as I take the basic position that Facebook lies, then youâd rightly take Googleâs Jeff Deanâs explanation with a grain of salt. The MIT Technology Review noted that it doesnât hold water based on practice.
The ousted woman, Dr Timnit Gebru, was the co-lead of Googleâs ethical AI teamâyou can already spot the oxymoron as there is no place at Google, a company exercising monopoly powers and paying little tax, for ethics.
Dean claimed Gebru resigned voluntarily, which is being disputed by both current and former Google employees. The Review notes:
Online, many other leaders in the field of AI ethics are arguing that the company pushed her out because of the inconvenient truths that she was uncovering about a core line of its researchâand perhaps its bottom line. More than 1,400 Google staff and 1,900 other supporters have also signed a letter of protest.
Dr Emily Bender of the University of Washington said in Ars Technica, âFrom the outside, it looks like someone at Google decided this was harmful to their interests.
âAcademic freedom is very importantâthere are risks when [research] is taking place in places that [donât] have that academic freedom.â It wouldnât be the first time Google attempted to silence a critic, then claimed it did nothing of the sort.
And if it doesn’t like being warned about the dangers of AI, then what sort of horror awaits us from Google in that space? It’s not hard to foresee AI bots operating online being harmful or generating misinformation, with nothing to hold them back. Again from the Review:
In 2017, Facebook mistranslated a Palestinian manâs post, which said âgood morningâ in Arabic, as âattack themâ in Hebrew, leading to his arrest.
We are letting these companies get away with being accessories to crimes and, in Facebook’s case, to genocide (over which it withheld evidence).
Still want to use Gmail? How’s this for discouragement?
Google is now rewriting all URLs in gmail/gsuite email messages, *including those downloaded via IMAP*, to go via Google URL redirection, which is a HUGE privacy leak. they're editing the actual message bodies in your inbox.#google#privacy#gmail#security
— Jeffrey Paul (@sneak@sneak.berlin) 🏴 (@sneakdotberlin) October 18, 2020
For those of you who can't reproduce: I'm able to reproduce on two different G Suite accounts/domains, and have heard reports of others experiencing this, but it looks like this happening to *all* URLs, but presently only *some* accounts.
— Jeffrey Paul (@sneak@sneak.berlin) 🏴 (@sneakdotberlin) October 18, 2020
— Jeffrey Paul (@sneak@sneak.berlin) 🏴 (@sneakdotberlin) October 18, 2020
Couple this with my last post on this, I’d now go so far as to warn people to get rid of their Gmail accounts. As a layman, the service just does not seem secure to me.
PS.: This is from another Tweeter more schooled in these matters than me.
Not just these Gmail usersâ privacy is being breached, but also those who send email to the Gmail users, or receive it from them. https://t.co/Nm7PaFvbem
I was absolutely shocked to learn this is how Gmail works.
If I read this correctly, #Google lets more than one person use a single email address (in this case, over 200!)? How daft! Why would they do that? pic.twitter.com/KtTO6PnDEI
As youâll read in the thread, this has been confirmed by other Gmail users.
That should rule out ever using Gmail for secure communications. Not that you should be using a service like that for anything important, but the fact is Gmail has become ubiquitous, and I believe a lot of people donât know any better.
Just imagine being able to receive some emails meant for your rival by signing up to an address that varies from it by a full stop or period.
Secondly, we’ve noticed a large amount of spam where we can trace (via Spamcop) the origins back to Gmail. Oftentimes they have Gmail reply addresses, as in the case of 419 scams (where they may use another ISP or email service with a “sacrificial” address to send them). Why would you risk being among that lot?
Add this to the massive list of shortcomings already detailed here and elsewhere and you have a totally unreliable platform that doesnât really give a toss. They didnât care when they removed my friendâs blog in 2009 and then obstructed any attempt to get it back, until a product manager became involved. They didnât care when their website blacklisting service libelled clean sites in 2013, telling people not to visit them or link to them. And they donât care now.
There really is no reason to use Gmail. Youâll risk your emails going to someone else with a similar address, and youâll be among the company of unethical actors. I can truly say that if Gmail werenât this ubiquitous, and used by so many friends, Iâd just set up a rule on our server and block the lot.
I was chatting to another Tweeter recently about the Ford I-Max, and decided Iâd have a hunt for its brochure online. After all, this car was in production from 2007 to 2009, the World Wide Web was around, so surely it wouldnât be hard to find something on it?
I found one image, at a very low resolution. The webâs not a repository of everything: stuff gets removed, sites go down, search engines are not comprehensiveâin fact, search engines favour the new over the old, so older posts that are still currentâsuch as this post about the late George Kennedyâcanât even be found. This has been happening for over a decade, so it shouldnât surprise usâbut we should be concerned that we cannot get information based on merit or specificity, but on novelty. Not everything new is right, and if weâre only being exposed to whatâs âinâ, then weâre no better at our knowledge than our forebears. The World Wide Web, at least the way itâs indexed, is not a giant encyclopĂŠdia which brings up the best at your fingertips, but often a reflection of our bubble or what the prevailing orthodoxy is. Moreâs the pity.
I canât let this post go without one gripe about Facebook. Good news: as far as I can tell, they fixed the bug about tagging another page on your own page, so you donât have to start a new line in order to tag another party. Bad news, or maybe itâs to do with the way weâve set up our own pages: the minute you do, the nice preview image that Facebook extracted vanishes in favour of something smaller. Iâll check out our code, but back when I was debugging Facebook pages, it was pretty good at finding the dominant image on a web page. Lesson: donât tag anyone. It ruins the ĂŠsthetic on your page, and it increases everyoneâs time on the site, and that can never be healthy. Time to fight the programming of Professor Fogg and his children (with apologies to Roger McNamee).
Top: The post Facebook picks up from an IFTTT script. Above: What happens to a post that once had a proper image preview after editing, and tags added.
After my last post, it seemed fair to give Google a chance to respond. I filed some feedback with them, and, surprisingly, I got a reply. But then I was taken around in circles, again, just like in 2009, though the respondents arenât arseholes like âChuckâ all those years ago.
I clicked to claim this knowledge panel. You send me a verification. In that verification you have âReview infoâ. Itâs just a blue box. I canât click on it or do anything with it. Then when I go to the page to publish on Google Search, you tell me my address doesnât have permission. I canât remember how I got there, but you also show me another window saying someone is already managing my company on Google. That canât be so as Iâm the only person logged in via the Search Console and you verified that I was the right person.
Googleâs first response (links removed):
Hello Jack,
Thank you for contacting us.
You are currently the verified owner of the knowledge panel entity âLucireâ. If you donât see âSuggest an editâ option at the top of your knowledge panel, please confirm that youâre logged in to a Google account that was used for the verification. Also, check that your Web and App activity is turned on. If you are using a G Suite account, turn on the Web & App Activity settings in G Suite Admin.
If this issue still persists, please send us the following so that we can investigate further, examples of these images are attached:
A screenshot of your knowledge panel (please make sure that your verified email/Google account name is visible at the top right-hand corner); and
A screenshot of your âWeb & App Activityâ page.
Also, weâre hoping to bring more features to you in the future. Unfortunately, Posts on Google is not open to every entity at this time.
Regards,
Jay
Google Search support team
It would be rude not to comply.
Hi Jay:
I really appreciate your reply. In the past, whenever I’ve contacted Google, I get radio silence, so I’m really happy you’re there.
I signed in as me but there’s no ‘Suggest an edit’. I fail on the first hurdle, actually, as I believe I had turned my web activity off a while ago. Unfortunately, there’s no way for me to turn it back on or to access the first link you gave me.
I have a Gmail with a school I work with. Even though I’m logged in with [redacted], the verified address, I get prompted to log in with my school address when I hit your first link. I switch accounts, which is the logical thing to do, and log in again. Except the site prompts me to log in with my school address. It’s a never-ending loop.
Hopefully the attached screenshots will help with troubleshooting or to find out what I’m doing wrong.
The browser is Opera, which is Chromium-based, and it has no privacy settings or blocked cookies that might prevent me from accessing Google.
Thank you,
Kind regards,
Jack
Above: This is the knowledge panel screenshot Google keeps asking me for. I’m logged in, with the verified address, and there’s no ‘Suggest an edit’ as they claim. That’s actually why I contacted themâbecause I’m literate and I’ve already read their instructions, which are either wrong, or I’m encountering something unexpected on their systems.
Above: What happens when I click on Google’s web and app activity link that their reps send me. It asks me to verify my email but it’s the wrong address (this is the school one). I click ‘Next’ and get to the second screen, where I can choose the address that Google confirmed was the verified address, and the one used for its own search console. Notice the verified address has a green circle with a J inside it, just like in the top image. I then get taken to the third screen, but note that I have not been logged in. I sign in again. And guess what? We’re back to square one.
This is where it starts to go awry, because despite a really good start from Jay, who confirmed that my regular address was the one that was verified to edit Lucireâs knowledge panel, I next receive this.
Hello Jack,
If you got your Google Account through work or school, you might need to contact your administrator to turn on the Web & App Activity additional service for your organization.
If this issue still persists, please send us the following so that we can investigate further, examples of these images are attached:
A screenshot of your knowledge panel (please make sure that your verified email/Google account name is visible at the top right-hand corner); and
A screenshot of your âWeb & App Activityâ page.
Also, please confirm that youâre logged in to a Google account that was used for the verification and check that your Web and App activity is turned on. If you are using a G Suite account, turn on the Web & App Activity settings in G Suite Admin.
Regards,
Jay
Google Search support team
I fired this off in reply to Jay.
Hi Jay:
Thank you. A couple of things here.
The school account has nothing to do with this. I’m just saying that your server keeps defaulting to the school account and every time I log in with the correct verified account, it logs me straight out again. Every time I switch to the correct account, your system doesn’t like it.
You already have the screenshots. I already sent the screenshot with the knowledge panel. I have re-attached it. This is logged in with the correct, verified account, the one that’s used for the search console, and the one that was used to claim the knowledge panel.
As explained, your server will not let me in to get a screenshot of the web and activity page.
I am logged into the correct account.
As explained, you will not let me get to the web and activity page in order to get a screenshot.
Kind regards,
Jack
Jay wasnât the only one on my case. Tanvi sent me something even more left-field.
Hello Jack,
As informed please, you might need to contact your administrator to turn on the Web & App Activity additional service for your organization.
Also, please confirm that youâre logged in to a Google account that was used for the verification and check that your Web and App activity is turned on. If you are using a G Suite account, turn on the Web & App Activity settings in G Suite Admin.
If this issue still persists, please send us the following so that we can investigate further, as per attached image format:
âą A screenshot of your knowledge panel (please make sure that your verified email/Google account name is visible at the top right-hand corner); and
âą A screenshot of your âWeb & App Activityâ page.
Regards,
Tanvi
Google Search support team
Notice how they keep asking for the knowledge panel screenshot, and I keep sending it, but no one cares.
And they keep wanting this web and app activity page, which they wonât let me access. My response to Tanvi:
Hi Tanvi:
I am the administrator for my organization. There is no one else.
I am logged in to the account used for verification.
As explained, I cannot access the web and app activity page. Every time I do, you log me off.
I do not know what a G Suite is.
I re-attach for the third time the knowledge panel.
I cannot make a screenshot of my web and app activity page because you will not allow me access to it.
Kind regards,
Jack
They just need to check their own records to find I am the only person registered to look after Lucire, and if Iâm not, then their security holes are pretty damned massive. But doing something logical like that might cut to the chase too quickly, and we know from 2009 that Google likes giving you the run-around. I donât know who teaches them customer service but I bet itâs the English.
They keep asking for a web activity page that their own systems won’t let me access.
I think we can realistically chalk this one up to another failed Google service. I hope they can get it cleared up, as the knowledge panel is Wikipedia-based and, therefore, not accurate. While I don’t use Google, I know the majority of people do. Iâll continue being as nice as I can, as I want to see this fixed, but somehow I donât think it will be remedied any time soon. The folks on the frontline wonât understand why their systems cannot accept that one person has two separate email addresses and two separate Google accounts, one linked to each. Youâd think I was the first person ever to have two email addresses, just like Marty McFly telling his uncle that he has two television sets in 1955.
PS.: It just gets nuttier. Just because you keep asking the same things doesn’t mean the answers will change.
Hello Jack,
Thanks for proving screenshot but please provide screenshots as per attachment only.
Please confirm that youâre logged in to a Google account that was used for the verification and check that your Web and App activity is turned on.
To get access to your suggest and edit, please contact your G-Suite Admin. If you are using a G Suite account, turn on the Web & App Activity settings in G Suite Admin. To know more about G Suite please look into G suite Help Center.
Regards,
Tanvi
Google Search support team
Here you go, Tanvi. We can keep going around in circles and your firm will look more and more useless.
Hi Tanvi:
I have provided screenshots as attachments. I don’t know any other way to send you screenshots.
Again: I am logged in to the correct Google account and it was the one used for verification.
Again: I do not know if web and app activity is turned on because you will not let me access it.
There is no G Suite. I am not using a G Suite. I am the only person authorized to deal with this. I am the admin.
Please check your records. You will find that there is no one else authorized to deal with this matter. Mine is the only account that deals with the search console and it is the only account verified to edit the knowledge panel.
Kind regards,
Jack
P.PS.: September 10. Where did we get up to? I forget, because the same thing keeps happening. It’s Groundhog Day at Google.
Right, it’s back to Jay.
Hello Jack,
The screenshot that you have provided is not in the correct format, please resend the following screenshot in correct format so that we can investigate further, example of the image is attached:
A screenshot of your knowledge panel (please make sure that your verified email/Google account name is visible at the top right-hand corner). Please refer to the attached screenshot.
Regards,
Jay
Google Search support team
Fair enough. Jay included a screenshot of exactly what he wanted. I send this to Jay. (It makes no difference. See below.)
Hi Jay:
I wasn’t sure what you meant by correct format but the screenshot helps. Please find that attached.
Kind regards,
Jack
SaiKumar is now on the case. He’s got what I sent to Jay.
Hi Jack,
Thank you for providing the screenshots.
Could you now please try the following and let us know if anything has changed? If not, please send screenshots.
Incognito mode
Mobile device
Different web browser
A screenshot of your âWeb & App Activityâ page (please make sure that your verified email/Google account name is visible at the top right-hand corner).
Regards,
SaiKumar
Google Search support team
This seems pretty reasonable.
Hi SaiKumar:
I’ve attached what I see in incognito mode. I’ve also attached the same screenshots using a fresh copy of Edge instead of Opera.
I can’t help you on a mobile device, sorry. It’s not something I’m prepared to use.
As discussed, Google will not let me access the web and activity page so I cannot supply a screenshot for you. What happens when I click on the link in your email is explained in my email sent on September 7 at 22.51 GMT.
Kind regards,
Jack
How many times to I have to tell them that they won’t let me access the web and app activity page? They keep asking, I keep telling them I can’t access it, and they ask again.
Hello Jack,
Thank you for sharing screenshot.
We need your a screenshot of your âWeb & App Activityâ page for our investigation. You are only providing screenshot of knowledge panel (please make sure that your verified email/Google account name is visible at the top right-hand corner).
Regards,
Tanvi
Google Search support team
At this point, I have my doubts if Google’s staff is even literate.
Hi Tanvi:
I don’t know how many times I have to tell you, Jay and Saikumar this, but I cannot give you a screenshot of the web and app activity page because your system will not let me access it. Please see my email from September 7, 22.51 GMT.
I have already provided you with the correct screenshot from the knowledge panel page but here it is again, from two different browsers.
Regards,
Jack
OK, I shouldn’t have sent Tanvi those SERP screenshots again, but what’s the bet she’ll come back and demand I send her the web and app activity page screen that they won’t let me access?
P.P.PS.: This feels like the final email for now.
Hello,
Thank you for contacting us. We are looking into this. We will get back to you as soon as possible.
Regards,
Tanvi
Google Search support team
I thanked her and I think we can leave it there for the next few years.
P.P.P.PS.: I actually got a reply (September 12, 21.56 GMT). Links removed because I can’t be bothered making them active.
Hi Jack,
Thank you for patiently waiting while we looked into the query for you.
We would request you to try to claim the knowledge panel using a different Google account. If you don’t have one, then create a Google account. Once you create a Google Account, use the email address to add it in the account. Please follow these steps in order to add users to your account:
Under âAdd people to this accountâ, click Start now.
If you need to switch accounts, use the dropdown menu next to your profile image to select the account you want to manage.
Click Add new user.
Enter the Google email address of your new user.
Choose whether the user gets manager permissions. To grant manager permissions, move the toggle to the right.
Click Invite.
You can set different permission levels for users:
Manager: Can suggest changes to the knowledge panel, and add or remove users.
Owner: The primary user on the account, and has the same permissions as managers.
Contributor: Can suggest changes to the knowledge panel.
You can read more about updating users here.
Regards,
Aghrajit
Google Search support team
I followed his instructions as they seemed pretty reasonable but, as it’s Google, they’re not really supposed to work.
Hi Aghrajit:
Thank you for your detailed instructions. I have followed them, added my other Google account [redacted], and invited myself as a manager.
I received the Google confirmation and clicked on ‘Get started’.
However, there is no link to allow me to claim the knowledge panel, just a link to give general feedback, as though I were a regular user. I don’t have any additional privileges.
Please find the resulting screenshots attached.
Kind regards,
Jack
I think they need to face the fact that their knowledge panels don’t work as advertised, a bit like how their blog review process didn’t work as advertised, or how their anti-malware warnings didn’t clear as advertised, or how their Ads Preferences Manager didn’t work as advertised, etc. Remember, this is the company that didn’t even know where the White House was in Google Earthâand it was version five when I discovered this!
P.P.P.P.PS.: September 13, another Googler, who’s trying to be helpful.
Hello Jack,
Thank you for contacting us.
Please confirm if you are using a G-Suite account. If yes you need to follow the correct steps to turn your Web & App Activity on at an administrator level. Please contact your G suite administrator or system administrator and let him know about it. Please follow the below steps so that Web & App Activity is correctly turned on. Try this with the new email you have added and let us know if you are facing the same issue.
Web & App Activity settings in G Suite Admin.
Regards,
Abdul
Google Search support team
At this point, it was getting ridiculous, even though Abdul was being pretty nice about it all. I replied on the 17th:
Hi Abdul:
Thank you. I know my main address [redacted] is not part of any G Suite. I don’t know if [my school email address] is. Is there a way you can tell me if it is?
I doubt that I would be given more privileges than the address currently has because it’s not meant to be used for non-school purposes, and as a board member of that school, it would be inappropriate for me to ask the admin.
I only used this address as it’s the one that Google kept insisting I log in to (see screenshots of September 7), as it refused to let me log in on any other account.
I know your next piece of advice will be to create a new account to see if it could be added to manage my contributions, as Aghrajit suggested, but I’m unwilling to start yet another presence on Google, which has more than enough information on me. Three identities seem like overkill.
Is there no way to simply allow me to log in with the very address [redacted] you verified? I feel we are getting further and further away from the original purpose of this thread, which was to allow me to edit a knowledge panel using an email address that Google confirmed.
Kindest regards,
Jack
Sivaram replied:
Hello,
Thank you for contacting us.
We are looking into this. We will get back to you as soon as possible.
Regards,
Sivaram
Google Search support team
I’m not certain if I’ll update this post. I think I’ve made my point: that things at Google can be half-baked. At least this isn’t deceptive in the way the Ads’ Preferences’ Manager was so many years ago.
At least Twitter works. Google, as usual, doesn’t.
I had a check to see how Lucire was performing in a Google search yesterday and noticed there was a Wikipedia box to the right, and a message saying that if it was about us, I could ‘claim’ the box. I clicked on the link, and as Google knows my email address is associated with Lucire through its search console, it verified me. ‘Congratulations, you’ve been verified’, according to the Google website, and I could ‘Add or change info’, with a ‘Review info’ box that I could click on.
Actually, it’s just a coloured rectangle. Clicking on it does nothing.
Maybe it’s my privacy settings, so I used my fresh, unblocked, Google-can-plant-what-it-likes Chromium browser. I log in as me on Google. And here’s what I get.
Another variant is the below:
âThis account doesn’t have permission to publish on Google Search.’ Um, it does. You just told me I did.
The box remains claimed but there’s not a damned thing I can do.
Long-time readers will remember my pointing out many years ago how the Google Dashboard isn’t accurate, especially when it comes to arithmetic. Nothing has changed.
Google says I have one task. Well, I can’t, since I’ve never used it. Click through: I have none, and Google returns a ‘Get started’ page. Google says I have two albums. Again, impossible. Click through: I have none. It says I belong to one group. Click through: zero. I’m honestly astonished at how bad they are. If you can’t do maths, you probably shouldn’t be working with computers.
Finally, I see Facebook has forced a lot of people to change to its new template. I actually don’t care what the UI looks like, as I’m not there sufficiently to care. And I bet that if you were Māori, you’d want to have the old template back, since you can’t type macronized vowels. The macron just winds up on the baseline on any Chromium browser.
One friend tried to replicate this on Windows and couldn’t, so this might not be a universal issue.
The font being called by the stylesheet is Segoe UI Historic. I have it installed, and it’s not something I’ve ever edited. I will point that that, according to Character Map, no macronized vowels are visible in the relevant Unicode range, though I haven’t opened it in Fontlab to confirm. If the browser has to substitute, that’s fine. But what font (indeed, which of the Segoe fonts) has macrons on the baseline? It appears to be Microsoft’s Segoe, so if it’s not a Facebook linked font (the code inspector suggests it isn’t), then we can point the finger at Microsoft for a buggy font on a standard Windows 10 computer. Either way, someone in a Big Tech outfit goofed.
I had bookmarked this on my cellphone but because it’s my cellphone, it takes a long time to get it on this blog. I have to remember to grab the phone, then look up the post. But it’s your regular reminder that Facebook usually does nothing, despite saying it actively takes down hateful content. As I noted on The Panel in late August, eight copies (I believe in part) of the Christchurch massacre still exited on the platform as of March 15, 2020. The lies are laid bare once more.
Two people murdered by a white supremacist called to arms by a Facebook post Facebook refused to take down is an âoperational mistakeâ.
Genocide. Subverted elections. Holocaust denial. A live-streamed massacre. What evidence do we need? https://t.co/qRaPgV1OeX
As a company, they also take their sweet time in removing bots. Here’s Instagram in a message to me on August 27 (it’s not the only 2018 report they responded to that week):
