9 October 2024

Understanding Google Perspective and Its Role in Combating Trolls

By Ronald Smith

Authored by HigherVisibility, the Publisher Channel Content

Understanding Google Perspective and Its Role in Combating Trolls

Let’s chat about the internet and all the interesting stuff that happens there. You see, the internet is this amazing place where people come together to inspire, motivate, organize, inform, and of course, have lively debates. It’s like a big ol’ playground for ideas!

But, like any place with minimal regulations, the internet has its fair share of not-so-great moments. See, because we don’t have that face-to-face contact, some folks feel more courageous hiding behind their screens and keyboards. That’s when things can get tricky…

Now, if you’re not familiar with the term trolling, let me break it down for you:

Ever since social media platforms skyrocketed in popularity and we started acknowledging serious problems like cyberbullying, trolling has become a major part of online culture. It seems like some platforms, like Yik Yak, exist solely for the purpose of trolling. Nowadays, whenever you come across a shared post or news article, you can bet that the comments section will be filled with intentionally offensive, provocative, and unhelpful remarks.

The Negative Impact of Trolling on the User Experience

Even though the problem of trolling has been around for a long time, it has become much worse in recent years. A lot of controversial things have happened, like a presidential election that caused a lot of debate, concerns about what’s happening in other countries, and an increase in fear of terrorist activity. All of this has had a negative impact on online communities. And to make things even worse, people are sharing actual fake news, and there have been attempts to discredit trusted news sources.

That’s why Google came up with a new tool called Perspective. Perspective is an API, which is basically a set of instructions that helps developers add something new to a software they already have.

So, I’ve got something pretty cool to tell you about. It’s called Perspective, and it’s an API that publishers can use on their websites. What’s an API, you ask? Well, it’s like a special tool that helps websites do cool things.

Now, here’s what Perspective does. When you leave a comment on a website, Perspective checks it to see if it’s offensive or mean. It does this by comparing your comment to a bunch of other comments that people have said were offensive. And get this, there are hundreds of thousands of those comments in its database!

After comparing your comment, Perspective gives it something called a toxicity score. This score tells you how likely your comment is to offend someone or make them want to stop talking. It’s like a scale from 0 to 100, with 0 being not offensive at all and 100 being super duper offensive.

So, why is this important? Well, the idea is to make conversations on websites more friendly and respectful. Perspective helps keep the internet a nice place for everyone!

Understanding Google Perspective and Its Role in Combating Trolls

Let me explain how Perspective works. It’s a tool that helps identify toxic comments by using a database of examples. It gives feedback to people who make comments and website moderators. This feedback happens in real time, so it’s very fast. For example:

If a comment reaches a certain level of toxicity, publishers will be notified. Then they can decide what to do with that comment.

Is Perspective like Censorship from Google?

This is an interesting question, but it’s hard to answer right away. Perspective is a new tool that was just launched at the end of February. It lets publishers decide what level of toxicity they are comfortable with. They can choose a threshold of 59 or 99 for comments, and they have the freedom to decide how to respond to those comments.

I wanted to create an application that doesn’t limit conversations by censoring certain topics. Instead, I aimed to enhance conversations and make them more fruitful. A crucial part of improving conversations is ensuring that people aren’t discouraged from joining in the first place. And so, the idea for Perspective was born.

Who is using Perspective?

Since Perspective is still new, it has only been introduced in partnership with a few highly respected publishers, such as the New York Times. The New York Times is renowned for its exceptional journalism, having won more Pulitzer prizes (119, to be exact) than any other news organization. Their extensive coverage across various cultural spheres like politics, art, opinion, and international affairs makes them the perfect candidate to test out Perspective.