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thedrifter
07-18-03, 09:44 AM
July 17, 2003

Google can’t find weapons of mass destruction either

By Matthew Fordahl
Associated Press


The hunt for weapons of mass destruction isn’t going so well in Iraq. In fact, it’s not going so well on the Internet search engine Google, either.
Type “weapons of mass destruction” in Google’s search box and hit the “I’m feeling lucky” button. What you’ll get is an authentic-looking error message created as a lark by a British pharmacist now enjoying his 15 minutes of Internet fame.

“These Weapons of Mass Destruction cannot be displayed,” it reads. “The country might be experiencing technical difficulties, or you may need to adjust your weapons inspectors mandate.”

Anthony Cox, 34, of Birmingham, England, created the site back in February to get a few chuckles from friends. As is often the case on the Internet, those friends — and friends of their friends — started linking to his page from their sites and Web diaries.

The number of links to a particular site happens to be a big factor Google considers when indexing pages to be returned via its popular search engine. The “lucky” button takes users to the top-ranked page for a particular search.

No hacking was involved — or necessary.

Cox, who previously was best known on the Web for his day job of studying drug safety, said he had no idea the page would move to the top of the list for the WMD search.

“It was really just a private joke among a few individuals,and then I sent it off to a newsgroup,” he said. “It just spread like wildfire throughout February. ... And then it started to die down during the war. During that time it had accumulated links from other Web sites, which pushed it up the Google page ranking system.

“Then it just went through the stratosphere in terms of hits,” he said. “It became even more funny that Google couldn’t find any WMD.”

Cox’s site isn’t the only popular page to take a tongue-in-cheek approach to serious queries. Type in “French military victories” and hit the “lucky” button. A page designed to look like it’s from Google asks, “Did you mean: French military defeats.”

Mountain View, Calif.-based Google declined to comment on specifics, but a spokesman confirmed that those sites are at the top of the list because they scored the highest under the company’s automated system.

For users who hit the regular search button, Google returns 1.4 million pages on the search “weapons of mass destruction.” Though Cox’s joke is on top, the remaining sites are mostly serious.

Cox says the number of hits reached a crescendo during the week of July 4 and has not showed any sign of slowing down. He’s received hundreds of e-mail messages, including a few from aircraft carriers in the gulf and even weapons inspectors who said it was amusing.

A number of e-mails criticized Cox, who said he was not against the war.

“It’s been widely seen as anti-war, but that’s not what my intention was,” he said.

One link takes readers to a book listing on Amazon.com for “Pieces of Intelligence: The Existential Poetry of Donald H. Rumsfeld.” The U.S. secretary of defense has his own link on Cox’s page — next to a bomb and a link to the 1963 classic film “Doctor Strangelove.”

Cox also manages to criticize the “Old Europe.”

“If you are an Old European Country trying to protect your interests, make sure your options are left wide open as long as possible,” it reads. “Click the Tools menu, and then click on League of Nations. On the Advanced tab, scroll to the Head in the Sand section and check settings for your exports to Iraq.”

Cox says he hasn’t experienced any major repercussions from the joke.

“I don’t have the White House or Donald Rumsfeld breathing down my neck yet,” he said. “There hasn’t been a SEAL extraction team to get me yet.”




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Copyright 2003 The Associated Press.

http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/content/editorial/editart/071703google.jpg

British pharmacist Anthony Cox poses next to his laptop computer that displays the “Weapons of Mass Destruction” web page he created. — Max Nash / AP photo

http://www.google.com/


Sempers,

Roger
:marine:

Sgt Sostand
07-18-03, 10:59 AM
weapons of mass destruction is not joke just what if he had them but just put them some place where the US cant find them .........ill give them time if he had them it will come out