Probably not. Anyone sceptical enough to use a "non-biased" search engine would be just as sceptical of the biases of any supposed "non-biased" competitor. Personally I'd argue there's not really such a thing as non-biased content. Everything produced by humans, either directly or indirectly is going to have some amount of bias.
It's also a balancing act to some extent. Is a search engine biased towards a certain political perspective but which reduces the amount of fake news better or worse than an unbiased search engine which weights fake news and accurate reporting equally? I think all you can really do is be aware of possible biases and question everything you're consuming.
My main concern with what Google and other tech platforms are doing is the subtleness which I suspect could be a deliberate move. Sites like Fox News still appear in Google results, but they just seem to be put significantly lower than other sources. Google knows 99% of people will look at the top 4-5 links, so as long as Fox News or other right-wing sources don't appear near the top you've effectively censored their content to 99% of Google's users without ever having to admit to doing anything nefarious because it's still technically there and maybe if you were explicit enough with your search it might even rank in the top results.
I don't really know what the answer is. I'd personally just urge people not to consume news, and if they're curious about anything just download official statistics. For example go ask people how many people they think will die this decade of smoking related diseases, or how many people are killed in terrorist incidents. Generally people don't know these numbers, despite the fact one kills millions and is rarely spoken about and the other is basically an irrelevant problem despite being discussed endlessly. Google is just a small part of what was already well established problem imo.
kypro|4 years ago
It's also a balancing act to some extent. Is a search engine biased towards a certain political perspective but which reduces the amount of fake news better or worse than an unbiased search engine which weights fake news and accurate reporting equally? I think all you can really do is be aware of possible biases and question everything you're consuming.
My main concern with what Google and other tech platforms are doing is the subtleness which I suspect could be a deliberate move. Sites like Fox News still appear in Google results, but they just seem to be put significantly lower than other sources. Google knows 99% of people will look at the top 4-5 links, so as long as Fox News or other right-wing sources don't appear near the top you've effectively censored their content to 99% of Google's users without ever having to admit to doing anything nefarious because it's still technically there and maybe if you were explicit enough with your search it might even rank in the top results.
I don't really know what the answer is. I'd personally just urge people not to consume news, and if they're curious about anything just download official statistics. For example go ask people how many people they think will die this decade of smoking related diseases, or how many people are killed in terrorist incidents. Generally people don't know these numbers, despite the fact one kills millions and is rarely spoken about and the other is basically an irrelevant problem despite being discussed endlessly. Google is just a small part of what was already well established problem imo.