Google Trends says Elmhurst, Ill., Loves Gay Porn
I'm sure I've mentioned how much I love Mark Morford. For your reading pleasure:
Then give Google Trends a play and let me know if you come up with any interesting stats. Turkey is really big on satan.
Wouldn't it be fascinating if you could do this, not just for what terms people throw at google, but for what people actually do? When you look at the stats for marijuana you can see related news stories on the timeline, mostly related to medical marijuana. There's spikes around all the medical marijuana initiative stuff, and I was imajining that it was people actually smoking pot rather than just typing "marijuana" into a google search box.
Wouldn't that be interesting though. Actual truth, what are people actually "doing" as opposed to what they're saying. Not any one specific person, just trends and demographics. It reminds me of Jamais Cascio's Participatory Panopticon. He says in the future it will not be one Big Brother watching, but lots of little brothers. You can't get mugged in a world where you have a wirelessly connected video recording device that records everything you see and hear. If you see the guy mugging you, he's caught.