Re:Google Maps updates 'dangerous' Ben Nevis route
by reaperducer on Saturday July 17, 2021 @03:47PM
(#27868269)
I’m assuming it was recent teenagers who got confused by Google Maps
I don't entirely blame the GPS generation for this. As a society, we've been telling ourselves "Computers are never wrong" for almost a hundred years. Yet every day on HN, we see stories where the computers, or at least the systems they run, are wrong.
It's only gotten worse since people started believing that Google is the arbiter of truth. My wife told me that she's had people banging on the doors after hours where she works because Google told them they were open. Where she works doesn't have public hours at all, so there's no reason any should be listed in Google.
Still, it reminds me of my days working in television when people would call up the TV station in a fit if what was on TV wasn't what was listed in the TV Guide. I don't know how many times I've told people, "We decide what to put on the air, not the TV Guide."
Perhaps it's all just a general abdication of the responsibility to think.
I don't entirely blame the GPS generation for this. As a society, we've been telling ourselves "Computers are never wrong" for almost a hundred years. Yet every day on HN, we see stories where the computers, or at least the systems they run, are wrong.
It's only gotten worse since people started believing that Google is the arbiter of truth. My wife told me that she's had people banging on the doors after hours where she works because Google told them they were open. Where she works doesn't have public hours at all, so there's no reason any should be listed in Google.
Still, it reminds me of my days working in television when people would call up the TV station in a fit if what was on TV wasn't what was listed in the TV Guide. I don't know how many times I've told people, "We decide what to put on the air, not the TV Guide."
Perhaps it's all just a general abdication of the responsibility to think.