The Fire Ant Gazette - A Midland, Texas Blog | "I just post 'em; I don't explain 'em"

I just post 'em; I don't explain 'em
Category: Internet... Just Plain Silly...
Posted Tuesday, December 20, 2005 at 10:23 PM [GMT-6]

OK, settle down. The real reason for this post is that there is actually some interesting logic behind the computation. It's a comparison of the number of hits on a search term in Google with "Safe Search" turned on, vs. the same search with the filter turned off.

There's no practical use for this comparison that I can think of, other than serving as affirmation that an innocent blogger-to-be who's contemplating using "Hot Buns" as a name for her site focused on baking might want to re-think her choice. Or, maybe that's what she's going for to begin with.

In any event, this is the first time I've ever found a need to put a post in the categories of both "Just Plain Silly" and "Internet." Although, now that I think about it, almost everything in the latter probably fits in the former.

Tip o'the hat to Patti over at White Pebble, whose score on this test seems to indicate that the algorithm needs some tweaking.

Um...just curious. Do you have Safe Search on or off in your browser?

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Comments

I am 3.08! I don't know whether I have safe search turned on or off...

Posted by: Rachel at December 20, 2005 11:13 PM

Wow Rach.... Is that a halo I see above your head?

I got between a 7 to 11% depending on the search phrase. Hey, IMO anything below 50% would be darn good.

Posted by: shannon at December 21, 2005 08:13 AM

Rachel, SafeSearch is toggled on and off in the Google Preferences window. There are a couple of levels of filtering available, depending on how much potentially objectionable content you want to screen out.

I leave it on for image searches, as it's shocking what otherwise pops up in for even the most innocent-sounding keywords.

Posted by: Eric at December 21, 2005 08:14 AM

"it's shocking what otherwise pops up in for even the most innocent-sounding keywords."

That is basically how I got the idea for slut-o-meter. I wanted a way to check the "promiscuity" of a person or term without actually having to see images related to the term in question.

Posted by: Joel Franusic at December 21, 2005 11:12 AM

Joel, there's a wealth of potential discussion embedded in this whole area...cultural, technological, statistical. I'm not sure that "promiscuity" is the best term for describing the factor you're attempting to quantify, but it does attract attention. ;-)

BTW, I noticed that you've got quite an eclectic taste in music: the Stones & Jars of Clay; the Beatles and DC Talk. Excellent.

Posted by: Eric at December 21, 2005 11:43 AM

I don't even have a blog and there seems to be some genuinely lurid interest in Freens.

freen: Promiscuity: 60% (258000 / 430000)

"mr. freen": Promiscuity: 49.16% (26200 / 53300)

I didn't even know there were that many searches even being done.

Posted by: Mr. Freen at December 21, 2005 01:37 PM

So the string serotoninrain comes up as 15% or something like that but when I enter serotoninrain.blogspot.com it shoots up to a whopping 62%.

Yikes.

Posted by: Jim at December 21, 2005 07:20 PM

I'm, of course, rather wondering about that algorithm too...

Posted by: Patti at December 21, 2005 07:59 PM

It appears that I'm hanging with a saucier crowd than I ever suspected. ;-)

Posted by: Eric at December 21, 2005 08:02 PM

Well, I'm purer than Gary Ezzo.

Then again, we already knew that. *wink*

Posted by: TulipGirl at December 21, 2005 08:17 PM

Yeah, you didn't need a wonky Google algorithm to figure that out, did you?

But, what about Disco? That may be a whole other ball o'wax... ;-)

Posted by: Eric at December 21, 2005 08:22 PM

Shannon - LOL.

Eric - Been playing with those preferences (which I didn't really think about til now!). Aparently I had it filtering moderately but I've turned it up now so that it won't let me see any!

Posted by: Rachel at December 21, 2005 10:45 PM

http://slut-o-meter.com/rss/slut/Fire%20Ant%20Gazette

Posted by: Adam M. Smith at December 21, 2005 11:11 PM

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Eric, the website was never intended to be something risque, I'm glad that you see beyond that.

I've enjoyed watching this idea grow and evolve. It started as a simple project, cooked up in a few hours at a "code jam". I've hardly done anything on the project since then and the website has really come a long way. (You may be interested in watching the video of Adam presenting this at SHDH5.)

Anyway, it sounds like you have some other perspectives, I'd like to hear what you have to say!

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Posted by: Joel Franusic at December 21, 2005 11:37 PM

HA! ArchaeoTexture rates "Promiscuity: +0.87%"

Posted by: Jeff at December 22, 2005 11:07 AM

Joel, I didn't mean to imply that I'm qualified to bring those discussions to life. I'm just a humble observer watching the parade go by.

Posted by: Eric at December 22, 2005 02:39 PM

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