[_Nat_]

I'm having trouble getting a clear perspective on what's going on. So many of the descriptions are vague and based on apparently informal descriptions, leaving much to the reader's imagination.

> It's not theoretical, researchers are quoted in the article and papers have been altered.

In grad school, PhD students' advisors typically insist on various revisions before publishing a paper, as publications reflect on the advisor and their institution. So there's nothing even slightly weird about Google having the same interest in revising the papers pushed by its researchers.

Unless there IS something weird about what Google's doing? But if so, what is it?

[cmiles74]

When an graduate school advisor provides feedback on a paper, the goal is to improve the quality of the paper. The peer review process also has the same goal in mind: produce a better paper.

According to this Reuters article, Google's new process happens after peer review and Google's other processes have completed.

"The “sensitive topics” process adds a round of scrutiny to Google’s standard review of papers for pitfalls such as disclosing of trade secrets, eight current and former employees said."

Instead of publishing the paper, Google will now review the paper with an eye to negative impact the paper may have on existing Google product (or lobbying efforts, etc.) Google isn't doing this to improve the quality of the paper, they are doing it to protect their business interests.

"For some projects, Google officials have intervened in later stages. A senior Google manager reviewing a study on content recommendation technology shortly before publication this summer told authors to “take great care to strike a positive tone,” according to internal correspondence read to Reuters."

I think this is very different from the advising process in graduate school.

Preventing people from disclosing trade secrets seem fair to me. Preventing valid research simply because it may negatively impact business strikes me as less reasonable.

"Four staff researchers, including senior scientist Margaret Mitchell, said they believe Google is starting to interfere with crucial studies of potential technology harms."

[_Nat_]

> I think this is very different from the advising process in graduate school.

All of that sounds normal to me. Including filtering out trade-secrets, which is completely normal when working with trade-secrets in grad school too. Additionally, it's completely normal to filter out intellectual property you might plan to patent; confidential information; proprietary industrial information; information protected by law; dangerous findings (e.g., hackers often omit details of an exploit until the relevant vendor has had time to fix); and a few other categories.

Maintaining a positive, constructive tone is also completely normal. For example, failed experiments are typically described as progressive steps toward an ultimate success; unforeseen problems are discoveries; and major issues are seen as research challenges to be overcome. Or, ya know, stuff like that.

I mean, is that all this story's about? Because if that's it, then it seems like nothing substantial. But if that's the case, why is this in the news?