Search is also more than the specific mathematical algorithms and deep-machine learning developed by computer scientists and software engineers to index upward of a trillion pages of information and move some from the universal data pile to the first page of results on a computer screen. The interface on the screen presents an information reality, while the operations are rendered increasingly invisible. 36 The media and communications scholar Alex Galloway destabilizes the idea that digital technologies are transparent, benign windows or doors providing a view or path to somewhere and in themselves insignificant-the digital interface is a material reality structuring a discourse, embedded with historical relations, working often under the auspices of ludic capitalism, where a kind of playful engagement of labor is masked in vital digital media platforms such as Google.
(Noble, p.147)
Search does not merely present pages but structures knowledge, and the results retrieved in a commercial search engine create their own particular material reality.
Commercial search, in the case
(Noble, p.148)
of Google, is not simply a harmless portal or gateway; it is in fact a cre- ation or expression of commercial processes that are deeply rooted in social and historical production and organization processes.
The present focus on the types of information presented in identity-based searches shows that they are removed from the social context of the historical representations and struggles over
(Noble, p.150)
disempowering forms of representation. These critiques have been lev- ied toward other media practices such as television and print culture.
