Fake views – Googling the news
Are Google searches biased in favor of left-leaning news outlets?
Economist Print edition | United States | Aug 30th 2018
… Our analysis finds that, even after accounting for how popular their websites are, fewer articles from right-leaning outlets show up on Google. … built a model which incorporates data from the Knight Foundation on how trustworthy Americans think each publication is. After controlling for trustworthiness and volume of Trump articles published, we found there was no evidence that ideology influences Google News results. Google’s search algorithm takes account of the popularity of articles and how user-friendly websites are, among many other variables. It may be that conservative publications write fewer eye-catching articles about the president. As the chart shows, the results are skewed by the popularity of three outlets that have done some of the best reporting on this presidency. A final possibility is that liberals, despite their horror, are simply more compelled to read about Mr. Trump than conservatives are.