Mike Ananny, a postdoctoral scholar at Microsoft Research and fellow at Harvard’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society, writes in the Atlantic about a strange Android app discovery:
As I was installing Grindr on my Android phone yesterday, I scrolled down to take a look at the list of “related” and “relevant” applications. My jaw dropped. There, first on the list, was “Sex Offender Search,” a free application created by Life360 that lets you “find sex offenders near you and protect your child … so you can keep your family safe.”
I was flabbergasted. How and why was this association being made? What could one application have to do with other? How many potential Grindr users were dissuaded from downloading the application because they saw this listed as a related application? In essence: Who did this linking, how does it work, and what harm is it doing?
(via danah boyd)