pantene
From Pantene, in a now [2022-09-12 13:20] deleted tweet:
Introducing SHE: Search. Human. Equalizer., a search tool that shows us what a world with less bias could look like. Head over to our Instagram Stories to see what S.H.E. can do! 🙌 #PowerToTransform #SheTransforms pic.twitter.com/XBy6Z3kecj
— Pantene Pro-V ((???)) April 30, 2019
A thread of my initial reaction—acknowledging the search problem while raising some questions:
Re: the S.H.E. Search Human Equalizer extension from Pantene.
— Daniel Griffin ((???)) May 1, 2019
I'm really interested to know who they are working with.
It looks like currently a crowd-sourced but hand-curated list of search terms they attempt to (somehow unstated?) re-balance (or ‘equalize’ in the results)? pic.twitter.com/Ltkm1Opvon
Others:
I’m sorry to say I was asked conceptually about this project & commented on the idea, but was not allowed see/test it. Some of my hesitation also not captured in this story, and no donation has been made, but I welcome research funding from donations to further study tech harms.
— Safiya Umoja Noble PhD ((???)) May 1, 2019
It would be SUCH A SHAME if (???) wasted all this woke cred by never acknowledging that their “debiased search engine” ad is directly based on the brilliant book Algorithms of Oppression, by (???) https://t.co/GfzfZ2TRkE
— Sasha Costanza-Chock ((???)) May 3, 2019
WTF WTF WTF (???) just took a huge and important social problem (and an area of scholarship) and made it into an ad for their shampoo?! With a fake browser plug-in? Via (???) https://t.co/xOofSnc6lo #algorithms (???) #HCI
— Christian Sandvig🐩 ((???)) May 3, 2019
i mean their ability to so perfectly distill the lesson “diversity/inclusion ≠ justice” into a PR stunt is sort of impressive tho
— Anna Lauren Hoffmann ((???)) May 3, 2019
A too-long thread after more digging into inadvertant(?) deception—here’s 1/40+:
The Pantene S.H.E. plug-in is much more problematic—and far more fake—than initially suspected.
— Daniel Griffin ((???)) May 4, 2019
tl;dr: (???) is elevating itself in search results.
Our sexist and racist society affecting search is real, this isn't the answer.
Credit to a reviewer for highlighting this.[1]
Reactions:
We thought they had maxed out on offenses but Pantene’s anti bias search engine plug in appears to elevate their own products in the search results. https://t.co/mGkYKcV950
— Sarita Schoenebeck ((???)) May 5, 2019
New details emerge: The S.H.E. anti-sexism “debiasing” plug-in is apparently a false flag operation by (???) that injects (???) shampoo ads into your search results. https://t.co/R1kvjoylgd
— Christian Sandvig🐩 ((???)) May 5, 2019
A personal filter to hide bias in search results is at best a band-aid on a structural problem of representational harm. Then they had to throw in a principal-agent problem for good measure! https://t.co/aFf5AcCq83
— Reuben Binns ((???)) May 5, 2019
Thread 🚨
— Blakeley H. Payne @ Future of Everything Festival ((???)) May 5, 2019
Context: Pantene developed a Chrome plugin that is supposed to “equalize” search results between men and women but it turns out that’s not the only thing the plugin does…
Read. This. https://t.co/diTbOU5xjM
Thread on why the answers to our social problems (exacerbated by digital economics) may not be coming from a company providing a technical solution (benefiting itself above others) this time either. ⤵️ https://t.co/rQN1IGXwSK
— Anna Jobin ((???)) May 5, 2019
This is so gross. Also daily reminder to always remember what your at the minimum first two pages of search look like. Probably not a picture to be taken at face value https://t.co/w4lY4zmjUy
— Ada Kępińska ((???)) May 6, 2019
Incredibly gross. https://t.co/aBv7SPNffh
— Danya Glabau ((???)) May 5, 2019
— One Ring (doorbell) to surveil them all… ((???)) May 5, 2019
From a Google Search results page engineer:
I applaud Pantene for challenging search engines to reduce bias. Their Chrome extension is a convincing demo.
— Eamonn O'Brien-Strain 🔎 ((???)) May 6, 2019
However, it is bad as an actual solution. It only works for a few particular searches.
And egregiously it inserts Pantene links as if they were organic search results: pic.twitter.com/AJVLUKJCEt
A follow-up tweet highlighting the activity of Pantene’s parent company, P&G, in digital marketing:
Pantene's S.H.E. tool is a dirty drop of water in a frothy ocean of digital marketing but comes amidst criticism of GOOG from P&G.
— Daniel Griffin ((???)) May 8, 2019
Per (???) & (???), P&G “would move its money to services” that were, inter alia, “more willing to share consumer data with advertisers.”[1] https://t.co/suwE2FdVFM
A follow-up tweet highlighting someone from Good Housekeeping lauding the extension (with some targeted marketing) — and showing how with the S.H.E. extension replaces a Good Housekeeing article from the top result for [great hair] with a page from Pantene.
Inspiration:
— Daniel Griffin ((???)) May 20, 2019
The next step in (???)'s campaign is a mailer to (???)[1]. This is particularly interesting because today if I search [great hair] the top result, after Places and Images, is a classic article in Good Housekeeping from (???).https://t.co/dtOiP0INGo
This page was published on 2019-05-22.