# The power of platforms is the control of discovery

- Link: https://www.andreidraganescu.info/2016/04/19/the-power-of-platforms-is-the-control-of-discovery/
- Published: 2016-04-19T11:33:19+03:00
- Author: Andrei Draganescu

Look at this [elizabeth tobey](https://medium.com/u/e25c8fde5cbc), have the patience
please, it’s worth it:

_What kind of relevance algorithm requires adding the username of the author, if
one searches for the exact title words?_

### Discovery is the weapon platforms have against independent publishers.

And that is why all platforms, [Medium](https://medium.com/u/504c7870fdb6), @Facebook,
@Twitter, @instagram etc., all migrate towards non organic results, filtered lists
that help

>  _platforms show what they want to show_.

It is important to note, _want to show, _not “have to”, “need to” or “is best for
the user”, not even what a “machine” decides to show. Machines cannot _decide _otherwise
than what they are programmed to “decide”. There is a lot of manual tweaking to 
seemingly automated decisions, and I believe a lot of consumers do not know this
fact. It is a danger that a lot of small publishers will have their voices unheard
simply because some “important” factor disqualifies them from being found.

What if I was searching for some “obscure” specific fact checking say, “level of
emissions on Volkswagen”, would it be normal to find think pieces about “global 
warming” instead of an article titled “Level of emissions on XYZ Volkswagen models”?
I hardly think so.

What if Google decides to switch to the ways of Facebook, medium or twitter and 
instead of **enabling access** to information, start to suddenly **broker **it? 
What will the Internet be used for then?

This is not good.