Is Google hiding content critical of itself—while losing the spam battle?

For a while I enjoyed getting some of the hits from the unwary searching for my name in association with the misinformation that Semrush allegedly generated. After all, it’s my name, and I should enjoy the hits for Google SEO jackyan in order to set the record straight, rather than have the unscrupulous among SEO […]

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Semrush, LLMs (or “AIs”), and Google: a three-headed misinformation hydra?

It turns out that Semrush is likely responsible for the misinformation regarding my name. When Shahid Jafar first encountered the fake topic of a new Google algorithm named for me—and apparently created by me—he mentioned he had seen 8,000 references to it. I couldn’t, but it turns out—thanks to another blog post that has incorporated […]

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A history of dealing with ad networks

Written in the feedback form to one ad network as we attempt to find someone to complement our work with H12 Media. Sums up a lot about the murky world of online advertising. It’s to a ‘Google Publishing Partner’, and we know Big Tech lies, but I’m keeping an open mind with this provider. Italics […]

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It would be nice to get my Amazon Associates money

This has been going on for between 10 and 20 years, and I think closer to the latter. Didn’t know Jeff was this hard up for cash. I didn’t record the dialogue last time, giving them the benefit of the doubt, but since I can’t trust the buggers, I will this time. Fed in to […]

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Putting Autocade’s Mediawiki behind Cloudflare

This is not a bad problem to have, but it could get expensive:     Therefore, today I made the decision to switch Autocade to Cloudflare. I had been warned by people who know far more about this than me that it will affect the statistics, so I’ll have to get over not being able […]

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Is Google stealing your voice for its virtual assistant? Meanwhile, Mktg Stinx

Here’s Google’s latest privacy gaffe, the latest in a long, long line where they pretend to not know it’s happening till they’re embarrassed into admitting that it is happening—and then the authorities will fine Google millions of dollars which they will make back in a few hours. Ibly writes in a post on the fediverse […]

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Tech musings from a non-tech: search engines and the nightmare of AWS

A great quote from Penn Jillette in Cracked: Einstein comes up with this idea E = mc² — a profound, powerful, mind-blowing idea — and he has to work forever to make people understand that and to share that reality. Woodward and Bernstein are pretty sure the president of the United States committed crimes, and […]

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We need to serve the technology with the new pay-by-plate meters

We need to change our habits slightly with the new pay-by-plate meters in Wellington City, as I discovered. If I arrive in town for, say, two 90-minute meetings with, say, 15 minutes between them, what I might do after the first is to move my car. I might also put a bit of extra money […]

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Having less and less faith in websites

It’s a pity Zapier’s email systems don’t work because the people seem very nice. I signed up to the service in December, but eventually unsubscribed from all their emails by going to the email preferences’ page and selecting the appropriate option. It didn’t stop the emails from coming, so I wrote to them to advise […]

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Hellos and goodbyes

Twenty twenty-three, what a year. I’ve met some amazing people this year, a lot of whom are in the public service. You know who you are. I am happy to know you. Those who champion the good in our society. Those who offer alternatives to things that harm society. Those who create good in this […]

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