Google uniquely recognized and exploited search data exhaust that rivals ignored
Evidence
Other search engines in the 1990s had the chance to do the same, but did not pursue it. Around 2000 Yahoo! saw the potential, but nothing came of the idea. It was Google that recognized the gold dust in the detritus of its interactions with its users and took the trouble to collect it up.… Google exploits information that is a by-product of user interactions, or data exhaust, which is automatically recycled to improve the service or create an entirely new product. — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 211
Categorization
- DEFINE: Formally introduces the term ‘data exhaust’ with a concrete definition.
- SHARE: Would interest anyone in tech history or early Google lore — Yahoo’s having seen and passed on the same opportunity is a sharp counterfactual.
- SEED: Counterfactual essay angle: what would the web look like if Yahoo!‘s 2000 insight had been pursued, and would data-exhaust capitalism have arrived anyway from elsewhere?
- XREF: connects to: Google’s 2008 DoubleClick alliance fused search and profile tracking — Nick Couldry & Ulises A. Mejias, The Costs of Connection: How Data Is…, 114; Google justifies total knowledge collection as a requirement for useful search — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1275; Google institutionalized secrecy to sustain behavioral surplus extraction — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 279 (+3 more)
Broader Connections
- Google institutionalized secrecy to sustain behavioral surplus extraction
#expands(0.72) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 279 - Google’s patented user-profiling schema already enumerated behavioral surplus attributes by the early 2000s
#expands(0.72) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1854