Acid complicates search after deadly Brazil bridge collapse


By AFP
December 23, 2024

The bridge, connecting Brazil's northeast states of Maranhao and Tocantins, collapsed on Sunday - Copyright TOCANTINS FIRE DEPARTMENT/AFP HANDOUT

A search operation for a dozen people missing after a deadly bridge collapse in Brazil was being complicated by the possible presence of acid in the water, authorities said Monday.

At least two people are confirmed dead from the collapse, which occurred late Sunday on the Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira bridge linking the states of Maranhao and Tocantins.

When a section of the bridge went down, it took with it two cars, two motorbikes, and four trucks — two of which were carrying sulphuric acid, a police spokesman told AFP.

Their dangerous cargo prompted officials to pause the search operation early Monday.

Water supplies to communities in the region were also suspended because of the possible “toxic” acid pollution, the spokesman said.

The bridge, more than half a kilometer (1,600 feet) long, spans the Tocantins River between the towns of Estreito and Aguiarnopolis and serves as the main route linking the two Brazilian states.

Brazil’s infrastructure and transport department said the causes of the collapse of the bridge, which was built in the 1970s, were being investigated. It said the central beam of the structure gave way.

The collapse came on top of two other deadly transport accidents in Brazil over the weekend.

The country’s worst highway accident in 17 years happened on Saturday when a bus crashed and caught on fire, killing 41 people in the southeast state of Minas Gerais.

Police said a large block of granite apparently fell from a truck coming the opposite way, striking the bus. The truck driver — whose license was suspended two years ago — fled the scene.

On Sunday, a private plane crashed into the city of Gramado in south Brazil, killing a family of 10 on board.

The Piper Cheyenne 400 turboprop was being piloted by a businessman named Luiz Claudio Salgueiro Galeazzi.

At least 17 people on the ground were injured, as the plane hit a building’s chimney, a house and a furniture store as it crashed shortly after

Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano erupts, spewing columns of lava

HARNESS IT FOR POWER

By AFP
December 23, 2024

Kilauea, on Hawaii's Big Island, is one of the world's most active volcanoes - Copyright US Geological Survey/AFP HANDOUT

One of the world’s most active volcanoes sprang into life again Monday, spewing columns of lava 80 meters (260 feet) above Hawaii, US vulcanologists said.

Images showed enormous fissures in the caldera of Kilauea, on Hawaii’s Big Island, spraying jets of molten rock into the air.

The USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory said the eruption began just after 2:00 am local time (1200 GMT) in the southwestern section of the caldera.

“At 4:30 am, lava fountains were observed with heights up to 80 meters (262 feet),” the agency said.

“Molten material, including lava bombs, is being ejected from the vents on the caldera floor up onto the west caldera rim.”

The eruption was also sending matter much higher into the atmosphere.

“The plume of volcanic gas and fine volcanic particles is reaching elevations of 6,000-8,000 feet above sea level… and winds are transporting it to the southwest.”

“The eruption is occurring within a closed area” of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, the observatory said, adding that lava flows “are currently confined to Halema’uma’u and the eastern part of Kilauea caldera.”

However, it warned that sulphur dioxide emanating from the fissure would react with other gases in the atmosphere.

So-called vog — volcanic smog — can affect people and animals, as well as crops.

Kilauea has been very active since 1983 and erupts relatively regularly, including most recently in September.

It is one of six active volcanoes located in the Hawaiian Islands, which also include Mauna Loa, the largest volcano in the world.

Kilauea is much smaller than neighboring Mauna Loa, but is far more active and regularly wows helicopter-riding tourists who come to see its red-hot shows.

Op-Ed: Dark energy doesn’t exist? The universe just isn’t playing ball with the theory


By  Paul Wallis
December 23, 2024
DIGITAL JOURNAL

Stars are still forming in the blue centre of the Messier 78 stellar nursery, emerging from the orange clouds at the bottom. — © AFP

Some of us have never been impressed with a dark matter/energy/whatever theory of physics that can’t even define itself. Quite a lot of people, including me, smelled a very large rat with the lack of physical properties definitions.

“We don’t know what it is, we can’t describe it, but it’s the answer to everything and we need billions to research it.”

This is why people in authority need to do STEM sciences.

The bottom line here is that “dark” is clearly on the way out in practical physics.

According to Phys.org, the whole idea simply isn’t surviving modern scrutiny. There are much better ways of explaining an expanding universe than with something inexplicable that just doesn’t work.

The Phys.org link is well worth reading. The University of Canterbury in New Zealand has provided an exhaustive study supporting a coherent timescape as an analysis devoid of dark energies, etc.

The University of Canterbury also deserves due credit for having the guts to slaughter this particularly insufferable smug sacred chicken of scientific PR in so many words.

The universe can get on fine without dark energy. Real functional physics isn’t dependent on “dark” anything. That was also pointed out decades ago, but of course, ignored.

This is after decades of smug blather and billions of dollars that could have been better spent elsewhere on real science, mind you.

The inexplicable turns out not to be inexplicable.

It’s hard to believe that a generational herd of ingenues in white coats have been hunting the physics equivalent of the Jabberwocky, but there it is.

I’ve never been impressed with the sheer sloppiness of “dark everything”. How is this useful? Why was there no insistence on defining the nature of “dark” anything? In corporate business, this would be considered nepotism, funding one’s dear little friends and their useless associates in their trivial pursuits.

You can’t get much more trivial than “non-existent”.

“Fraud” is such a pejorative word. That’s why I’m not using it. Others might, particularly the ones paying for it.

In cosmological terms, it’s far less excusable. The expansion of the universe and related phenomena are important. Cosmology has been tripping over a few things lately, like missing a huge chunk of the universe.

Measuring things and getting the measurements wrong. That was one of the more innocent causes of the stampede to dark matter. Someone measured the mass of the Andromeda galaxy, got it wrong, and assumed that the “missing” matter must have been dark matter.

It wasn’t. The measurements were simply wrong.

Then there’s using the Cosmic Microwave Background as a sort of universal wall hanging rather than “then what happened?” as science or a cross-check of all these supposed phenomena.

How can the CMB, of all things, be static? Did anyone look after the updated image? Would the CMB support any theories of missing mass and mysterious energies, perhaps?

Instead of which cosmology has been literally chasing shadows based on theories based on bad measurements.

If you search Google News for “baffled universe”, dark matter inevitably comes up in the search results. Over the last few years, and especially since the JWST, the results have been consistently against the “dark” theories for a couple of years now.

Nothing the JWST is seeing is fitting those theories. Ironically, good old gravity and time distortion seem to be doing the job.

God only knows why any real scientist would expect the universe to just obligingly fit any theory. It never has.

Good work University of Canterbury, and can we now get on with the real cosmology?

__________________________________________________

Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.

SEE

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for AETHYR

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for ETHER

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for DARK ENERGY

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for DARK MATTER

Investors swoop in to save German flying taxi startup


By AFP
December 24, 2024


The Lilium Jet has yet to make a manned test flight - Copyright AFP ARNULFO FRANCO

A German flying taxi startup was Tuesday saved from collapse after a consortium of investors swooped in at the 11th hour to take over the ailing firm.

Lilium had already filed for bankruptcy in October, and was expected to fold entirely this week unless it could secure new sources of funding.

But the startup, which has been developing small electric-powered jets that can take off and land vertically, announced a “major breakthrough”.

Mobile Uplift Corporation, a company set up by a consortium of European and North American investors, had signed a deal to buy the assets of the crisis-hit German company, Lilium said.

Lilium, which is based in the southern state of Bavaria, did not disclose the price of the deal.

The agreement is expected to be finalised at the start of January, which will “allow us to restart our business”, Lilium CEO Klaus Roewe said.

Lilium had attracted substantial interest, with Saudi Arabia’s flag carrier Saudia earlier this year signing a deal to buy 50 of the firm’s jets with options to purchase 50 more.

But it has yet to conduct a manned test flight, with the first such trial not expected until next year, and burnt through huge sums in development costs.

It was forced to turn to the state for emergency funding but the German parliament’s budget committee refused in October to approve a loan guarantee to the tune of 50 million euros ($52 million).

Lilium was founded in 2015 and employed more than 1,000 people, although most were made redundant ahead of this week’s deadline to get new investors on board.

The company is facing tough competition, including from aviation giants Airbus and Boeing, to develop flying taxi technology.

First demonstration of quantum teleportation over busy Internet cables


By Dr. Tim Sandle
December 24, 2024


A programmable photonic circuit has been developed that can execute various quantum algorithms and is potentially highly scalable. This device could pave the way for large-scale quantum computers based on photonic hardware. Image by 彭家杰. CC BY 2.5

Northwestern University engineers are the first to successfully demonstrate quantum teleportation over a fibreoptic cable already carrying Internet traffic.

The new research advance opens door for fast, secure quantum applications without specialized infrastructure. This is based on activity inside Internet cables. Internal to the cable, photons needed for teleportation are lost within the millions of light particles required for classical communications.

Now scientists have quantified light scattering to find exact areas to place photons to keep them safe from other particles. This approach has successfully worked in experiments carrying regular Internet traffic. The discovery introduces the new possibility of combining quantum communication with existing Internet cables — greatly simplifying the infrastructure required for distributed quantum sensing or computing applications.

Commenting on the research, Northwestern’s Prem Kumar, outlines why the research is important: “This is incredibly exciting because nobody thought it was possible…Our work shows a path towards next-generation quantum and classical networks sharing a unified fibreoptic infrastructure. Basically, it opens the door to pushing quantum communications to the next level.”

Only limited by the speed of light, quantum teleportation enables a new, ultra-fast, secure way to share information between distant network users, wherein direct transmission is not necessary. The process works by harnessing quantum entanglement, a technique in which two particles are linked, regardless of the distance between them. Instead of particles physically traveling to deliver information, entangled particles exchange information over great distances — without physically carrying it.

“In optical communications, all signals are converted to light,” Kumar explains. “While conventional signals for classical communications typically comprise millions of particles of light, quantum information uses single photons.”

By performing a destructive measurement on two photons — one carrying a quantum state and one entangled with another photon — the quantum state is transferred onto the remaining photon, which can be very far away. The photon itself does not have to be sent over long distances, but its state still ends up encoded onto the distant photon.

In other words, teleportation allows the exchange of information over great distances without requiring the information itself to travel that distance.

By examining how light scatters within fibreoptic cables, the researchers found a less crowded wavelength of light to place their photons. Then, they added special filters to reduce noise from regular Internet traffic.

To test the new method, the researchers set up a 30 kilometre-long fibreoptic cable with a photon at either end. Then, they simultaneously sent quantum information and high-speed Internet traffic through it. Finally, they measured the quality of the quantum information at the receiving end while executing the teleportation protocol by making quantum measurements at the mid-point. The researchers found the quantum information was successfully transmitted — even with busy Internet traffic whizzing by.

The study, “Quantum teleportation coexisting with classical communications in optical fiber,” appears in the journal Optica.

On Christmas Eve, Pope Francis launches holy Jubilee year

FORGIVING THE DEVELOPING WORLDS DEBT

By AFP
December 24, 2024

Pope Francis opens the Holy Door of St Peter's Basilica during a ceremony to mark the launch of Jubilee 2025 - Copyright POOL/AFP Remo Casilli
Clément MELKI

Pope Francis opened the “Holy Door” of St Peter’s Basilica on Christmas Eve on Tuesday, launching the Jubilee year of Catholic celebrations set to draw more than 30 million pilgrims to Rome.

The 88-year-old pontiff, who has recently been suffering from a cold, was pushed in a wheelchair up to the huge, ornate bronze door and knocked on it, before the doors opened.

In a ceremony watched on screens by thousands of faithful outside in St Peter’s Square, the Argentine pontiff went through the door followed by a procession, as the bells of the Vatican basilica rang out.

Over the next 12 months, Catholic pilgrims will pass through the door — which is normally bricked up — by tradition benefiting from a “plenary indulgence”, a type of forgiveness for their sins.

Pope Francis then presided over the Christmas Eve mass in St Peter’s, where he turned once again to the victims of war.

“We think of wars, of machine-gunned children, of bombs on schools and hospitals,” he said in his homily.

The pope had drawn an angry response from Israel at the weekend for condemning the “cruelty” of Israel’s strikes in Gaza that killed children.

He was due to deliver his traditional Christmas Day blessing, Urbi et Orbi (to the city and the world), at midday on Wednesday.



– Rome facelift –



Some 700 security officers are being deployed around the Vatican and Rome for the Jubilee celebrations, with measures further tightened following Friday’s car-ramming attack on a Christmas market in Germany.

Much of Rome has also been given a facelift in preparation, with monuments such as the Trevi Fountain and the Ponte Sant’Angelo cleaned up and roads redesigned to improve the flow of traffic.

Many residents have questioned how the Eternal City — where key sites are already overcrowded and public transport is unreliable — will cope with millions more visitors next year.

Key Jubilee projects were only finished in the last few days after months of work that turned much of the city into a building site.

Inaugurating a new road tunnel at Piazza Pia next to the Vatican on Monday, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said it had taken a “little civil miracle” to get the project finished in time.

Over the course of the next few days, Holy Doors will be opened in Rome’s three major basilicas and in Catholic churches around the world.

On Thursday, Pope Francis will open a Holy Door at Rebibbia prison in Rome and preside over a mass in a show of support for the inmates.



– ‘Profiteering, unfair debts’ –  VULTURE CAPITALI$M BY ANY OTHER NAME



Organised by the Church every 25 years, the Jubilee is intended as a period of reflection and penance, and is marked by a long list of cultural and religious events, from masses to exhibitions, conferences and concerts.

“It’s my first time in Rome and for me, to be here at the Vatican, I feel already blessed,” said Lisbeth Dembele, a 52-year-old French tourist visiting St Peter’s Square earlier.

The Jubilee, whose motto this year is “Pilgrims of Hope”, is primarily aimed at the world’s almost 1.4 billion Catholics, but also aims to also reach a wider audience.

Traditions have evolved since the first such event back in 1300, launched by Pope Boniface VIII.

This year, the Vatican has provided pilgrims with online registration and multilingual phone apps to navigate events.

Jubilee 2025 also has a mascot named Luce (meaning Light in Latin) inspired by Japanese anime cartoons.

The event will see groups from around the world come to Rome throughout 2025, from sports and business figures to migrants, artists and young people.

Among the groups registered on the official site is Italian LGBTQ group La Tenda di Gionata, reflecting the pope’s call for the Church to be open to all.

In his homily, the pope said the Jubilee was a time for “spiritual renewal” and hope, including for “our mother Earth, disfigured by profiteering” and “for the poorer countries burdened beneath unfair debts”.

As well as the regular Jubilees every 25 years, the Church has organised extraordinary Jubilees, the most recent in 2016. The next is in 2033 to commemorate the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

Libcom.orglibcom.org/article/debt-first-5000-years-david-graeber

Debt: the first 5000 years - David Graeber - Libcom.org

Nov 21, 2012 ... Attachments. Debt:The First 5000 Years.pdf (5.3 MB). finance · debt · anthropology · David Graeber · PDF. Comments. Spikymike. 11 years...

EVs top the safest cars list for 2025

SHARE WITH AN EV SKEPTIC

By Dr. Tim Sandle
December 24, 2024

DIGITAL JOURNAL


Volvo plans to go all-electric by 2030 - Copyright AFP/File NICOLAS ASFOURI, Nicholas Kamm

Safety and reliability are two important Internet search criteria, and ”car safety” averages 794,000 searches on Google worldwide.

According to Confused.com, a UK car insurance comparison company, the safest car manufacturers for 2025 have been identified, based on past data. This analysis is based on vehicle safety ratings and consumer complaints to identify the safest and least complained-about car brands.

The data set examined related to vehicle safety ratings and consumer complaints data sourced from the UK National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) for 2,317 vehicles released since 2014.

The top 5 safest car manufacturers are:

• Volvo
• Subaru
• Tesla
• Genesis
• Polestar

Each brand in the top 5 achieved a 100 percent safety score, meaning all of their cars received only 5-star ratings for overall vehicle safety. This rating is based on a comprehensive analysis of crash tests, including frontal impact, side impact, and rollover resistance, as well as advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS). These brands excel in a wide range of safety features; and from collision prevention systems to driver distraction detection.

When it comes to overall safety, electric vehicle (EV) brands are leading, with Polestar and Tesla both offering electric vehicles and releasing only 5-star safety-rated cars in the last decade.

EVs tend to be safer than most combustion engine cars. They perform well in crash tests—lacking a heavy front engine allows for more spacious crumple zones and better weight distribution, which can help prevent flipping.

Both brands offer a wide range of safety features, including radars and sensors for detecting external risks and onboard technology to protect the driver if there is a crash.

Volvo and Genesis are the least complained-about car brands, study shows.

Customer complaints are a helpful way to gauge how well-liked and how safe a car is. The analysis revealed that Volvo and Genesis tie for first place as the least complained-about car brands, based on the average number of total complaints per car for each brand. The analysis highlighted common consumer concerns, including car faults and technology issues [1].

Polestar took second place, with Lexus following closely behind in third. Audi, Mitsubishi, and Smart also ranked among the top 10 brands with the fewest complaints. Each of the brands in the top 10 had fewer than 100 complaints per car tested.

2024 car models have had the highest percentage of 5* ratings to date

Apart from a couple of blips, the number of cars with a 5-star rating has been increasing over the last 10 years. Therefore, in general, cars from 2024 are have more 5-star safety ratings than previous years. This is due to the return of quality materials and an advancement in technology. 2024 has seen a rise in all sorts of technological advancements, from the shift to more

EVs received 44 percent fewer complaints than ICE vehicles

When comparing electric cars (EV) to internal combustion engine cars (ICE), EVs had a much higher percentage of 5-star rated models. EVs score over 91 percent in safety, with ICE cars falling behind by 69 percent. While more ICE vehicles are analysed due to EVs being relatively new, this highlights that EVs are entering the automotive space with safety as a top priority.

Additionally, internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles received the highest number of complaints from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, averaging 161 per car tested year-to-date. However, electric vehicles (EVs) fare much better with an average of just 91 complaints per car—a 44 percent reduction compared to ICE vehicles. Hybrid vehicles take the lead as the least complained-about fuel type, averaging just 62 complaints per car, a 62 percent reduction compared to ICE vehicles and 32% fewer complaints than EVs.

Taiwan blocks Uber-Foodpanda merger over monopoly concerns


By AFP
December 25, 2024


Uber — © AFP LIU JIN

Taiwan has rejected ride-hailing giant Uber’s plan to buy Delivery Hero’s Foodpanda on the island, stating on Wednesday that the deal would significantly harm market competition.

The US ride-hailing giant was aiming to acquire Foodpanda Taiwan by the first half of 2025 for US$950 million, merging the top two players in Taiwan’s food delivery market.

“If Uber acquires Foodpanda, it will be completely unrestrained by competition,” Taiwan’s Fair Trade Commission (FTC) vice chairman Chen Chi-ming told a press conference.

“The disadvantages to market competition from this merger far outweigh its economic benefits,” Chen said, adding that the merged companies’ market share would exceed 90 percent.

“No corrective measures could sufficiently ensure competition would be maintained,” he said.

Uber had described the deal, announced in May, as one of Taiwan’s largest international deals outside the semiconductor industry.

Chen said the FTC conducted an economic analysis to assess the merger’s impact on competition, and received over 600 responses from food delivery platforms and relevant agencies.

Taiwan’s delivery trade union welcomed the FTC’s decision, with spokesperson Su Po-hao saying it secures “greater benefits for the future of the food delivery industry”.

The union had argued that the merger would have created a monopoly and led to widespread losses for delivery riders, vendors and consumers.

The companies have also reached a separate agreement for Uber to buy US$300 million in newly issued ordinary shares of Delivery Hero, according to May’s statement.

Op-Ed: Naivete, greed, unpreparedness + stupidity = 30% job losses? THAT dumb.


By Paul Wallis
DIGITAL JOURNAL
December 25, 2024

OpenAI said its new platform Sora can generate videos up to a minute long - Copyright AFP/File Kirill KUDRYAVTSEV

A brief slightly nauseated look at anything including the words “artificial intelligence job losses” will do. All of this is expected to happen within the next five years so put a down payment on your next can of baked beans now.

Given the current state of what is rather unwisely called the world, you’d think that 30% job losses would mean something to someone. That’s the most common number being bandied about regarding probable job losses due to artificial intelligence.

Even less impressively many of these losses are expected to happen in the finance sector. You know that place that’s the home of rustic morality and good old downhome values.

For some reason, somebody thinks that the extremely clunky chatbot version of artificial intelligence can handle high finance. The current attempts at AGI are nowhere near that level, let alone this primitive rubbish. They also seem to think that it can handle futures contracts, derivatives commodities, and rampant market fraud.

It’s not often that the word “dumb” can be used as a form of flattery but this is one of those cases.

Somebody also apparently thinks that you don’t need to look at your own accounts. If nothing else, it is as good an example of the sheer technological illiteracy of the business world as you could ever wish to see.

In the next five years, you can assume that the sheer unaffordability of everything will be well entrenched. This means that the Jobs Mass Extinction Event will probably synchronize nicely with the next economic meltdown, war, or whatever other entertainment happens to be available.

The probability is an economic meltdown in the market, a crash, or something else we haven’t had for a while. The same geniuses that gave you the 2008 disaster are still waddling about. The good news is that you won’t have anything like enough money to be involved in any of it.

The almost-new American national sport of bankruptcy has tragically sidelined tens of millions of people. The rest of the world isn’t really doing much better but is making less of a fuss about it.

The astonishingly naïve belief that this technology is in any way Safe For Baby Or anyone else Is truly fascinating.

Consider this:

A technology that is already famous for lying and deceptive behavior is about to be entrusted with the business of the world.

Hooked up to things like blockchain or other accounting systems AI could commit fraud on a scale to bankrupt whole countries or perhaps the world.

Add to this the fact that you would be able to do absolutely nothing about it. You are in roughly the same position as a person buying a non-existent second-hand car.

Now – Who’s a clever little collection of brainless pond scum? Guess.

Better still, AI is usually attached to unaccountable third parties. Try managing a contract dispute on the basis of AI fraud.

AI can be hacked. AI will be hacked. So far there hasn’t been a word on this subject.

Yes, if you have been somehow completely unable to ignore the 30 years of cyber fraud and cybercrime, AI is exactly what you want.

That was the fun bit. Socially it will be even more of a disaster. Somebody has apparently been doing some thinking and has managed to come up with the idea that even Universal Basic Income will not be able to manage AI job losses.

It’s academic anyway because at the moment nobody has UBI due to the total refusal of society to allow anyone the ability to afford anything. It is nice to know that somebody took the time to think of something else that wouldn’t work, though.

Now the really good news

You’re living in a world run by the sanest smartest most intelligent most forward-looking and least neurotic people in history. Intellect simply oozes out of every available crevice.

Now you’ll be able to finally make use of all those survival skills you learned from that nice hermit crab back when you could afford to pretend to be alive.

Simply use your bodily secretions to fuse all those bills into a nice shelter for yourself and your loved ones.

I suggest you start taking all these hints while you still have something to take them with.


Disclaimer
The opinions expressed in this Op-Ed are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of the Digital Journal or its members.

Is Google deliberately degrading quality?

Poor quality is good for business

By Dr. Tim Sandle

DIGITAL JOURNAL
December 25, 2024

Google's advertising practices are also subject to investigations or proceedings in Britain, the EU and the United States - Copyright AFP/File Josh Edelson

In light of Google facing the possibility of a court-mandated breakup after being found to be a monopoly, WalletHub’s CEO Odysseas Papadimitriou has told Digital Journal that, based on a recent analysis of search results and court documents, the deteriorating quality of Google search results over the last couple of years is most likely an intentional strategy designed to boost advertising revenue rather than poor execution.

To support his position, Papadimitriou cites:

Going Downhill: 63 percent of people think that Google search results were better last year, according to a nationally representative survey conducted by WalletHub.


Cost of Trusting Google’s Top 5 Results on Credit Cards & Banking Terms: $202 on average, according to a WalletHub study.


Industry insiders have been warning about this: The SEO industry has been up in arms about the declining quality of Google search.


Monopolies do not have to worry about quality: According to court documents (page 48 – section 134), Google’s internal testing showed that significantly worse search results would not hurt the business.

Why would Google act like this?

Poor quality is good for business

Deteriorating quality started after Google’s CEO put the head of Ads to lead both Search and Ads: Google always had a Church/State separation between their ad business and their organic search. In June 2020, Sundar Pichai decided to change that and align the two initiatives for maximum profit. Internal arguments prove that the separation was bad for consumers but good for advertising revenue.

For example, the former head of search wrote: “The nature of how you would easily increase queries is a key reason I don’t like queries as an end metric. The easy ways are almost all bad. Having queries as a metric will, in my opinion, have a subtly bad effect as a launch metric even if we ‘ decide not to do the bad things’.”

Papadimitriou continues to follow the matter closely and remains concerned about the impact on publishers as well as consumers.