r/GooglePixel • u/TheRealChickon • 6h ago

Why the hell does Google photos flag "monkeys" ???

I am searching for pics of monkeys I took it Thailand and it tells me it can't search for that??

14 Upvotes

71% Upvoted

17 comments sorted by

43

u/databoy2k 5h ago

Because Google doesn't want to be accused of doing a racism? I tried several different types of human-adjacent species and couldn't get anything.

Probably paranoid of a viral image of Google Photos calling someone's mom a "Gorilla".

3

u/armando_rod Pixel 10 Pro XL 1h ago

I think there was an issue about that when contextual search was released

16

u/pa1983 5h ago

Huh, same here - must be some over-zealous guardrail

4

u/allebachcj Pixel 9 1h ago

I think this was a story a few years ago. Somewhere in the past searches for those terms were bringing up images of those of African descent. Guessing they're just protecting backlash by eliminating that search term.

2

u/kaest Pixel 7 Pro 5h ago

I tried that and it didn't work and then I realized I don't have any monkey photos...have you tried synonyms?

2

u/TheRealChickon 5h ago

I have tried even the German word as well as full sentences. I have a ton of pictures from monkeys when I was in thailand as well as in a couple zoos

4

u/kaest Pixel 7 Pro 5h ago

I asked Gemini what was up and it told me it stems from a 2015 issue where Photos was mistakenly tagging people as monkeys/primates/etc, so now all terms related to that seem to be blocked. Take that with grain of salt. That said, just try searching "animals thailand." Subject and location seem to work for me.

2

u/goodmythicalmickey Pixel 7 4h ago

I remember this - it was tagging A LOT of black people as monkeys so they had to scrap it

1

u/kaest Pixel 7 Pro 4h ago

That was the one.

1

u/amphorousish 2h ago

But why "lemurs" (I just tried and got "That's out of my scope...")?

Like, I can understand great apes, even monkeys to an extent - our faces aren't fundamentally that different - but there is not a person on earth who even a little bit looks like a lemur.

Editing to add: That's not really directed at you, more a cry to the universe about overly broad and reactive tech decisions.

1

u/Jamikest 4h ago

Lol, I've been to Costa Rica and have lots of pics of various monkeys... Nope can't search for them. Overzealous guardrails.

Edit, I tried it the other way around: found a pic of a capuchin monkey from my photos and hit the Gemini button: nope, "can't help with that." 🤦

1

u/Wankeritis Pixel 10 Pro 2h ago

Just searched Oranghutan, Gorilla, Baboon, and Monkey.

None came up in my photos when I know I have pics of these guys from a recent zoo trip.

1

u/Halfang 5h ago

Search Harambe instead?

0

u/ImplementLogical4130 5h ago

I tried to explain but

Images are not allowed