Nov

ALIGNMENT CHART! Search Engines

Posted by MGK Published in D&D Explains Everything, The Internets

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As requested.

Really, I just did this in the hopes of igniting nerd holy war.

ALIGNMENT CHART! Archer (April 16th, 2014)
ALIGNMENT CHART! That 70s Show (July 10th, 2013)
ALIGNMENT CHART! NBA Players (July 2nd, 2013)
ALIGNMENT CHART! Game of Thrones, Season Three (June 12th, 2013)
ALIGNMENT CHART! Downton Abbey (October 30th, 2012)

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bryan rasmussen said on November 8th, 2011 at 9:06 am

google is chaotic evil. You can tell because they keep saying don’t be evil which is something a chaotic evil person would totally be saying to fool you.

Also a good person would say it, but who thinks google is good anymore?

At any rate it is definitely something that a neutral person would never say.

Rbx5 said on November 8th, 2011 at 9:26 am

Considering I only know about 4 of these, I cannot suss out the logic behind this :T

Will "scifantasy" Frank said on November 8th, 2011 at 9:33 am

Honestly, I almost _want_ Google to be True Neutral. Neutral, in this case, means not taking sides–“You ask me for a query, I return it. I ask no questions, I don’t monitor, I don’t filter. I return the unedited web.”

I think the problem is that Google isn’t Neutral _enough_. (Or perhaps, is too Lawful. Depends how you look at things.) Things like saving queries, and giving data to law enforcement without a warrant fall under…well, that’s the question, isn’t it? Is that Good, or Lawful (because it can be used to catch criminals and the like), or is that Evil, or Chaotic (because it undermines privacy)?

MirrorMan said on November 8th, 2011 at 9:35 am

“Really, I just did this in the hopes of igniting nerd holy war.”

Yeah, that’ll probably do it. Just curious, but are you crazy by any chance?

Remus Shepherd said on November 8th, 2011 at 10:02 am

Is it bad that I’ve never heard of any of the good or lawful ones?

gehaz said on November 8th, 2011 at 10:39 am

Another vote for not having heard of most of these outside the Google->Ask quadrant. Which means this doubles as Nerd Holy War trigger and PSA!

On the subject of Google and “don’t be evil,” I’ll note that while a CE person might say it (although my bets would be on something more subversive), it fits neutrality to a T. A good person would say “Be good!” not “Don’t be evil.”

I don’t think anyone’s going to argue for Google being Good (but this chart illustrates why they might out of ignorance), but I think “Don’t be evil” is exactly what a True Neutral person would say. Now, they might follow it up with “Don’t be good, either,” and the absence of this from Google’s slogan is an indication that when they started they were more Good than they are now.

Still, I’m not ready to consign them to the same category as the Baidu/Bing/Asks of the world.

zurn said on November 8th, 2011 at 10:40 am

Amusing *and* informative…

Will "scifantasy" Frank said on November 8th, 2011 at 10:44 am

Gehaz: Well said!

CB said on November 8th, 2011 at 11:14 am

Nerd holy war indeed. “I fight for the glory of Google! Prepare yourself heathens!”

Will "scifantasy" Frank said on November 8th, 2011 at 11:14 am

True Neutral has paladins?

Beacon said on November 8th, 2011 at 11:29 am

Wow, I haven’t even heard of the five good and/or lawful ones.

Google throws in so many weird Easter Eggs that its hard to think of it as anything but Chaotic.

I’m not sure why you think Ask is Chaotic Evil but you’re spot-on with Bing being Evil (and useless). I have never found what I was looking for with Bing.

Granted I don’t have a lot of luck with Yahoo either but my computer doesn’t automatically use Yahoo so its out of sight, out of mind.

ThatNickGuy said on November 8th, 2011 at 11:50 am

You could probably do one for all the various social networks, too. Facebook, Twitter, LiveJournal, MySpace, etc.

Facebook, of course, would be Chaotic Evil.

acabaca said on November 8th, 2011 at 12:33 pm

Google is definitely some brand of evil.

Steve said on November 8th, 2011 at 1:32 pm

Never heard of five of those and don’t use the other four. Dogpile is what works for me…

Timothy said on November 8th, 2011 at 1:40 pm

I think Google is not the mean but the mode. It’s true neutral only because of it’s omnipresence. Though I don not know what it would be if it were not on an altogether different level to the other search engines.

-evan. said on November 8th, 2011 at 3:07 pm

Where is Altavista? And/or Dogpile?

Sean D. Martin said on November 8th, 2011 at 3:09 pm

I have never found what I was looking for with Bing.

Even when Bing was passing any queries you gave it thru Google?

Reply

Zifnab said on November 8th, 2011 at 3:41 pm

Will:

True Neutral has paladins?

No, but I think they have a lot of lawyers. And lawyers can get very self-righteous sometimes.

Will "scifantasy" Frank said on November 8th, 2011 at 4:54 pm

…he said to a lawyer, on the blog run by another lawyer.

01d55 said on November 8th, 2011 at 5:00 pm

I can tell your heart wasn’t in this, because there’s no quotes. Well-selected quotes make a good alignment chart shine.

Ed (Jack Norris) said on November 8th, 2011 at 5:38 pm

I’ll defend the choice of Ask as chaotic evil.
I can’t count the number of times I’ve had to clean up after it (uninstalling its damn toolbar, switching back to the proper home/start page, and various malware-y bits of detritus strewn about the hard drive) on my parent’s computer after my nephew has had a couple of hours of blithely ignorant web searching for free games and sundry kid shit.

Ted said on November 8th, 2011 at 5:43 pm

As a Parks & Rec fan, I’m a little shocked that Altavista gets no love.

Joe Helfrich said on November 8th, 2011 at 7:38 pm

“Really, I just did this in the hopes of igniting nerd holy war.”

Oh, it’s going to be worse than that. I’m going to send the link to a friend of mine who does SEO for a living.

Mitchell Hundred said on November 8th, 2011 at 10:35 pm

If you’re taking alignment chart requests, I have a couple of suggestions which I have neither the knowledge nor the motivation to follow through on: Webcomics and the News Media. Just a thought (and another thought).

supergp said on November 8th, 2011 at 10:44 pm

Of COURSE True Neutral has paladins. MGK has already covered this: http://mightygodking.com/index.php/2010/10/13/4065/

highlyverbal said on November 8th, 2011 at 11:48 pm

@ Ed (Jack Norris): Hey, I feel for your nephew in that situation. Ask is so damn evil that they openly lie about what clicking their links means. Your poor nephew probably very seriously investigated what the links promise not to do, and naively thought he was safe. Absolute malware.

highlyverbal said on November 8th, 2011 at 11:53 pm

Alignment chart request: an alignment chart of previous alignment chart requests.

So far, candidates from this thread:
Social Networks – lawful evil
Webcomics – chaotic good
News Media – chaotic(?) evil
Alignment chart requests – true neutral

supergp said on November 9th, 2011 at 1:09 am

Also, what the fuck? I don’t even know these other search engines. There’s anything worth using but Google, these days? I’d use Baidu if I were, you know, in CHINA, but…Google won, move on, anywhere else.

Strawhair said on November 9th, 2011 at 1:11 am

Duckduckgo seems to be in the right place. It’s got that inviting color scheme, and it doesn’t try to push your searches the way some sites I could name do.

hilzoy fangirl said on November 9th, 2011 at 4:28 am

If you really want a nerd holy war, how about one for social news websites?

I think I’m on a roll.

MirrorMan said on November 9th, 2011 at 11:15 am

“Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya. You used Baidu. Prepare to die.”

cole1114 said on November 10th, 2011 at 10:57 pm

You should do one for wrestling, that’d be mildly entertaining.

Packerchu said on November 14th, 2011 at 12:01 pm

Would Ask still be chaotic evil if it had kept Jeeves?

Graehaus said on November 20th, 2011 at 5:55 am

About paladins, I figure since there are the 9 alignments, and gods that represent them. Why not?