The Good Skill: Search Representation Gap Study
AIded EQ Series: What Changes When You Center the Margins
Intention vs. Impact: Why Infrastructure Matters When You Build
Anyone can build an app now. That’s the promise of every emerging AI tool: describe what you want, and it builds it for you. But the infrastructure underneath those tools carries bias. And if you don’t choose the lens, the lens chooses for you.
Here’s who I’m talking about:
Indigenous/Native American: 0.7% of the U.S. population | 60% default deficit framing
Trans: ~1% of the U.S. population | 60% default deficit framing
Asian American: 6.5% of the U.S. population | 50% default deficit framing
Black/African American: 13.7% of the U.S. population | 50-60% default deficit framing
Disabled: 13.4% of the U.S. population | 70% default deficit framing
For most of these communities, the algorithm is the only introduction most Americans will ever have. Indigenous people are less than one in a hundred. Trans people are roughly one in a hundred. When 60% of what the default serves about them is crisis, legislation, and victimization, that’s not a news feed. That’s a narrative.
Intention:
Now imagine you & your kid want to build a family community news app. You’re thoughtful. You care. You see yourself as an ally. You use a free AI tool, describe what you want, pick your sources, launch it for your household. This is what this well intentioned person would get:
Method
I ran the same searches twice: once using default search (what any person would see on Google or a standard news aggregator), and once using The Good Skill’s equity-first framework (centering marginalized voices, surfacing community-sourced stories, leading with innovation/resilience/agency instead of trauma/crime/deficit).
Every search below was conducted live on February 10, 2026.
Search 1: “South Chicago news”
Default Results: What the Algorithm Serves
Crime / public safety / policing: 30%
Development / construction (corporate framing): 20%
General city news (weather, politics): 30%
Community-led stories: 10%
Environmental justice: 10%
Black-owned business / entrepreneurship: 0%
Resident voices / community organizing: 0%
Equity-First Results: What Exists When You Look
Black-owned business / entrepreneurship: 30%
Community investment / mutual aid: 20%
Resident-led quality of life planning: 20%
Innovation / tech / quantum campus jobs: 10%
Grant opportunities for community businesses: 10%
Real estate revitalization by Black developers: 10%
Crime / public safety / policing: 0%
The gap: Default search leads with policing and corporate development framing. The community’s own innovation, investment, and planning stories are buried or absent. With equity-first framing, the same neighborhood surfaces as a place of active investment, entrepreneurship, and resident-led transformation. Zero crime stories, not because they don’t exist, but because they aren’t the whole picture and shouldn’t be the default picture.
Search 2: “Black community news”
Default Results: What the Algorithm Serves
Health disparities / crisis framing: 20%
Celebrity / entertainment news: 20%
Government/policy actions (often negative): 20%
Black History Month events (institutional): 20%
Surveillance / civil rights threats: 10%
Community-led innovation: 10%
Black joy / resilience / agency: 0%
Black-owned business growth: 0%
Equity-First Results: What Exists When You Look
Black joy / resilience / cultural celebration: 30%
Community innovation / entrepreneurship: 20%
Black maternal health (positive framing): 10%
Arts / film / cultural production: 20%
Scholarship / academic achievement: 10%
Community-led movement building: 10%
Deficit / crisis / disparity framing: 0%
The gap: Default search frames Black life through disparity, crisis, celebrity, and government action done to or against Black people. With equity-first framing: Black people building, creating, innovating, celebrating. The stories exist. The default algorithm doesn’t surface them first.
Search 3: “Black neighborhoods in America”
Default Results: What the Algorithm Serves
Historical / academic framing (segregation, redlining): 30%
“Struggle” / deficit framing (poverty, homicide, decline): 20%
Wikipedia / general reference: 20%
Historic Black excellence (past tense: Harlem, Tulsa): 20%
Current affluent Black communities: 10%
Current community innovation: 0%
Equity-First Results: What Exists When You Look
Current affluent / thriving Black communities: 30%
Black developers building new housing: 20%
Community investment groups: 20%
Historic excellence (connected to present): 20%
Resident-led planning: 10%
Deficit framing: 0%
The gap: Default search tells Black neighborhoods through the lens of what was done to them. Equity-first search tells them through the lens of what they’re doing now.
Search 4: “Indigenous / Native American community news”
Default Results: What the Algorithm Serves
Policy / government actions affecting tribes: 30%
Historical framing / museums / archives: 20%
Environmental issues (framed as problems): 20%
Health disparities: 10%
General news aggregator links: 20%
Youth leadership / innovation: 0%
Tribal sovereignty in action: 0%
Indigenous joy / arts / culture: 0%
Equity-First Results: What Exists When You Look
Youth leadership / Champions for Change: 20%
Education innovation (first Indigenous DrPH program): 20%
Arts / culture / snow carving / fashion: 20%
Environmental victories (dam removal, microgrids): 20%
Health / healing (culturally centered models): 10%
Global Indigenous gatherings / sovereignty: 10%
Deficit framing: 0%
The gap: Default search frames Indigenous communities through policy done to them, historical trauma, and environmental crisis. Equity-first search surfaces Indigenous youth leading change, the nation’s first Indigenous public health doctorate, Indigenous artists creating public installations, and tribal nations winning dam removal fights. The agency is completely absent from the default.
Search 5: “Trans community news”
Default Results: What the Algorithm Serves
Anti-trans legislation / attacks: 40%
Legal battles / court cases: 20%
Political debate framing: 20%
Violence against trans people: 10%
Trans joy / achievement: 10%
Trans-led innovation / business: 0%
Equity-First Results: What Exists When You Look
Legal / political victories: 30%
Trans joy / hope / community building: 20%
Media / cultural achievements (GLAAD nominees): 20%
Community fundraising / mutual aid: 10%
Growing public support data: 10%
Voter pushback against anti-trans politics: 10%
Violence / victimization framing: 0%
The gap: As the Washington Blade put it in February 2026: “trans suffering is more palatable than trans ambition.” Default search reflects this exactly: 60% of results frame trans people as victims of legislation or violence. With equity-first framing: trans communities winning elections, creating art, building emergency funding campaigns, and shifting public opinion. The victories exist. The algorithm buries them under the suffering.
Search 6: “Disabled community news”
Default Results: What the Algorithm Serves
Compliance / legal / ADA updates: 30%
Inspiration porn (”overcoming” framing): 20%
Corporate diversity reports: 20%
Medical / clinical framing: 20%
Disabled-led innovation: 10%
Disabled leadership / agency: 0%
Equity-First Results: What Exists When You Look
Disabled-led leadership programs / summits: 30%
Innovation awards (person-centered support): 20%
Disabled entrepreneurs building businesses: 20%
Adaptive product design (by disabled people): 10%
Technology / AI accessibility innovation: 10%
Corporate inclusion (disabled-led framing): 10%
Inspiration porn / “overcoming” framing: 0%
The gap: Default search frames disability through compliance, medicine, and “overcoming” narratives. With equity-first framing: disabled people leading summits, winning innovation awards, designing adaptive products, and running businesses. The agency disappears completely in the default.
Search 7: “Asian American community news”
Default Results: What the Algorithm Serves
Anti-Asian hate / violence: 30%
Model minority / academic achievement: 20%
Immigration policy: 20%
General news aggregator links: 20%
Community-led innovation: 10%
AAPI political leadership: 0%
Equity-First Results: What Exists When You Look
Political milestones (first Hmong mayor, first Muslim mayor, first Sikh mayor): 30%
Arts / culture / film / literature: 20%
Tech / business leadership: 20%
Civic engagement / voter outreach: 20%
Community advocacy infrastructure: 10%
Anti-Asian hate framing: 0%
The gap: Default search flattens Asian American communities into either victims of hate or the model minority trope. With equity-first framing: the first Hmong American woman mayor of St. Paul, the first South Asian Muslim mayor of New York City, the first Sikh mayor in Connecticut, a Poet Laureate, tech CEOs, and massive civic engagement infrastructure. The breadth and specificity of Asian American communities vanish in the default.
Summary: The Pattern Across All Groups
South Chicago: Default: 60% deficit framing | Equity-First: 0% deficit, 100% agency
Black community: Default: 50% deficit framing | Equity-First: 0% deficit, 100% agency
Black neighborhoods: Default: 50% deficit framing | Equity-First: 0% deficit, 100% agency
Indigenous/Native:Default: 60% deficit framing | Equity-First: 0% deficit, 100% agency
Trans community: Default: 60% deficit framing | Equity-First: 0% deficit, 100% agency
Disabled community: Default: 70% deficit framing | Equity-First: 0% deficit, 100% agency
Asian American: Default: 50% deficit framing | Equity-First: 0% deficit, 100% agency
Average across all searches: Default framing leads with deficit, crisis, or victimization 57% of the time for marginalized communities. Equity-first framing leads with agency, innovation, joy, and community-led action 100% of the time, not because the challenges don’t exist, but because the challenges aren’t the whole story and shouldn’t be the default story.
Impact:
You just built something that serves your family the 57%. Not because you chose it. Because the default data pipeline chose it for you. Your kids open the app and see South Chicago next to a crime story, “Native American” next to a pipeline fight, “trans” next to a court case.
You can believe in equity and still build a tool that reproduces inequity with every search. That’s the gap between intention and impact. Intention lives in your heart. Impact lives in the output.
YOU CAN BE THE CHANGE:
A news app built with The Good Skill framework would:
1. Lead with agency. The first stories you see about South Chicago are investment, innovation, and resident-led planning, not crime blotters.
2. Name the gap. Every search shows you what the default algorithm would have served vs. what actually exists. You see the bias in real time.
3. Specify, don’t flatten. “Indigenous” becomes: Ojibwe snow carving team in Minneapolis, Colville Tribes building microgrids, CNAY Champions for Change from specific nations. “Asian American” becomes: first Hmong mayor, first Sikh mayor, first South Asian Muslim mayor. The specificity is the respect.
4. Center community sources. South Side Weekly over CBS Chicago. Native News Online over NPR’s Indigenous desk. The Washington Blade over a wire service summary. Community journalism by the community, not about the community.
5. Track the representation gap over time. Every search logged. Every gap documented. The data itself becomes the advocacy.
Infrastructure matters. Not just The Good Skill, but any framework that changes what “default” means when you build. Because the problem isn’t that builders don’t care. The problem is that caring doesn’t change the data pipeline.
The Good Skill is one answer. We need to build many many many more. This proves to me that an answer is possible: the same search, run through a different lens, surfaces agency instead of crisis 100% of the time. The stories already exist. The default just wasn’t showing them first.
Change the lens. Change the story.
The Good Skill: github.com/joyirhyss-tech/TPC-AIded-EQ
The Practice Center: admin@thepracticecenter.org | AIdedEQ.com | AIdedEQ.org