There’s something about this topic that is unsettling – the deal seems nearly devilish, beneficial and somewhat horrifying at the same time. Google’s latest plea to the US and EU governments to help fight censorship centers on the economics, not the political morality, of censorship.
Google, U.S. Government Could Take On Censorship
As businesses go, establishments don’t get much bigger than Google. But even the Mountain View-based corporation needs a little help now and then, and in its war on censorship, Google is seeking assistance from the United States government.
Amnesty Int’l Warns Of Web Censorship “Virus”
It may not be fatal, but it’s a pretty bad disease nonetheless; according to Amnesty International, “The virus of Internet repression is spreading.”
Turkey Takes Censorship Several Steps Further
Over two months ago, authorities in Turkey found a video on YouTube that implied Ataturk, the country’s founder, was gay. Turkey banned YouTube, YouTube removed the clip, and the Turkish government got way too cocky – it’s now reserved the legal right to block any website with content it finds offensive to Ataturk’s memory.
Geotargeting for Censorship?
Segregating your traffic by geographical location is a useful thing and is known in the search engine marketing circles as “geotracking”, but you could go one step further and target specific traffic based on geographical location using the cryptic practise known as “geotargeting”. But what happens when it’s used to block access to users based on their geography?
MoveOn Blasts MySpace Over Censorship
MoveOn’s executive director Eli Pariser called MySpace a "serial censorer of user-generated content" and presented a litany of complaints about the social networking site’s practices.
Yahoo/Flickr Censorship Accusations Answered
A talented photographer posted her photos on Flickr, and when another company stole and sold the pictures, she wrote a post about it. After almost 450 people had voiced their support, Flickr deleted the artist’s post, and cries of “Censorship!” ensued. But now Flickr’s co-founder, Stewart Butterfield, has stepped up and apologized.
Google Shareholders Support Censorship?
During the Vietnam War, an American major said, “It became necessary to destroy the village in order to save it.” Well, in a slight twist on that, Google’s shareholders have decided that they must continue censoring Google China in order to keep it alive.
Google’s Press Meeting (censorship)
There’s a lot of great reports coming from Google’s annual press and shareholder meeting, held yesterday at the Googleplex. To make it a little easier to digest, we’re going to break it down into three parts for you. Here’s part four, you can also read part one, part two and part three.
Google Board Votes Down Proposal Against Censorship
Recently, a number of groups that own shares in Google put forth a shareholder proposal that would require Google to resist government censorship efforts, and to notify users when consorship had occured despite Google’s best efforts. Wenesday, Google’s board of directors issued a recommendation that the proposal be voted down, ensuring the proposal will never have a chance, since the big three of Page, Brin and Schmidt hold 66.2% of all voting power.