Comments on: Google – censorship as trade barrier http://www.lawfont.com/2007/06/26/google-censorship-as-trade-barrier/ an analysis of law, technology, economics, and policy Wed, 11 Aug 2010 08:06:54 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 hourly 1 By: Craig http://www.lawfont.com/2007/06/26/google-censorship-as-trade-barrier/comment-page-1/#comment-55706 Craig Thu, 28 Jun 2007 00:52:01 +0000 http://www.lawfont.com/2007/06/26/google-censorship-as-trade-barrier/#comment-55706 Google invites those criticisms by adopting and promoting its feel-good slogan of "Don't be evil". Censorship is seen in some quarters as being evil, so when Google agrees to censor its search results to comply with local laws, then it is perceived as making a mockery of its own slogan. Of course, given the size of Google's market capitalisation, it's not discussing censorship primarily out of the goodness of its founders' hearts. Rather, they see this as a means of extracting further income from advertisers by widening the scope of search results. Google invites those criticisms by adopting and promoting its feel-good slogan of “Don’t be evil”. Censorship is seen in some quarters as being evil, so when Google agrees to censor its search results to comply with local laws, then it is perceived as making a mockery of its own slogan.

Of course, given the size of Google’s market capitalisation, it’s not discussing censorship primarily out of the goodness of its founders’ hearts. Rather, they see this as a means of extracting further income from advertisers by widening the scope of search results.

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