The following is a UPI report:
To its credit, Internet giant Google Inc. said this week it had tweaked an algorithm to dissuade companies from purposefully mistreating their customers.
Curiouser and curiouser, it turns out the owner of an online eyeglasses company, DecorMyEyes.com, had said for publication in a New York Times article that he abused his customers from time to time because it would provoke negative reviews, which in turn would increase his revenue.
This worked because Google treated negative reviews as equals with positive reviews when it ranked companies for searches. That is to say a mention is a mention and there was, in fact, no such thing as bad publicity in this case.
DecorMyEyes.com's profitable unpleasantness turned out to be near-sighted. Google caught wind of the Times article and changed the formula for ranking companies in the same week the Federal Trade Commission issued a 79-page report on guidelines for companies and regulators dealing with Internet privacy.
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