"left leaning Google"

Yeah, they are so left the let China censor their site.

Kim, I thought you were stepping down, ala Rather?

Hmm, jp2, I fail to understand your logic.

Sounds like the Google Death Ray continues to function.

http://www.unitedmedia.com/comics/dilbert/archive/dilbert-20060516.html

Hmm, should we begin filing hate speech complaints against news sites that we find offensive and see if the treatment is identical?
-=Mike

"Yeah, they are so left the let China censor their site. "

Posted by: jp2 at May 22, 2006 03:06 PM

Could anything be MORE left than catering to an oppressive communist govenment?

just curious

MikeSC,

The problem with your suggestion is that "hate speech" is the invention of the left, and as such, the left decides what is and what is not hate speech. Likely anyting someone on the right finds offensive won't be labeled "hate speach" by the left.

I seem to remember that Sergey Brin and Larry Page donated money to the Democratic party for the 2004 election, so I think the term "left-leaning" is probably accurate here.

Could anything be MORE left than catering to an oppressive communist govenment?

When they're doing it to get into as many markets as possible, as other companies (Yahoo, MSN) have done, it seems pretty capitalistic to me.

By the way, Google is not a public utility. If you don't like their policies, don't use their products and services.

Why not give us links to the three op-ed pieces cited by Google as examples of "hate speech" and we can see for ourselves?

It isn't because that whole "reality has definite left-leaning bias" now, is it?

Never mind, here are the links.

1. www.newmediajournal.us/staff/peck/05102006.htm

2. www.newmediajournal.us/staff/stock/05082006.htm

3. www.newmediajournal.us/guest/imani/04222006.htm

OK Lee, after laboriously cutting and pasting the links and reading the 2/3 I could get to work, show me the "Hate Speech." I see some vitriolic verbiage, but not hyperbole or hate. The pieces are clearly opinions, not news articles. I've seen similar opinion pieces at the Daily News and NYT, and even the Daily Astorian.

I think the motto "Don't Be Evil" may be false advertising unless one expects the information presented by Google News to be filtered politically based on editorial content:
http://news.google.com/intl/en_us/about_google_news.html
http://www.google.com/intl/en/corporate/index.html
http://www.google.com/terms_of_service.html

Of course you can always tell them what you think at their address for news suggestions:

http://www.google.com/support/news?hl=en

Mantis, the contention is that Google has become an essential resource for business, thus it DOES have a responsibility to be objective and unbiased.

Lee, maybe it's because we're concerned about censorship, even if we don't agree with the things being said?

Opening your mouth and making yourself seem a fool is a basic human right, that commenters on this blog avail themselves of frequently. Why should it be any different for these newsmediajournal people?

Nicholas:

Indeed.

epador,

What does Google do that is any different than what Yahoo! or MSN does? How are they "an essential resource for business"?

Mantis, the contention is that Google has become an essential resource for business, thus it DOES have a responsibility to be objective and unbiased.

So, let me get this straight. When something is deemed "an essential resource for business", the rules of the free market no longer apply? By what criteria does something attain such status? As far as objective and unbiased, forget it. Businesses are biased towards their own profit. Google has decided also to be biased against what it considers hate speech, at least on their news page. If you, or "business", don't like those policies then don't use Google. There are other resources to choose from. That's how the free market works. Are you getting it yet?

Hmmm.

1. I frankly don't use Google all that much, and never for news.

2.

When something is deemed "an essential resource for business", the rules of the free market no longer apply?

Pretty much yes. Which is why I can't pay your Cable/DSL provider to drop you and to never sign you up again.

Whether or not a Google ranking is an essential service is frankly something I wouldn't want to try and push. It seems a bit odd.

Is there a "recommended" search engine, one that isn't known for censorship? I'm guessing there's hundreds but where to start. I just tried altavista and it found the newsbusters story no problem. So did google so I'm wondering about the validity of this quote

"As a sidebar, the NewsBusters article that first broke this story on May 19 cannot be found by doing a Google News search even though other recent articles by NewsBusters can."

Pretty much yes. Which is why I can't pay your Cable/DSL provider to drop you and to never sign you up again.

No, but the cable company can go ahead and decide to drop me if I violate their policies by, say, not paying my bill, or using a descrambler. Same thing. No one paid Google to pull sites off of Google News. Go ahead and call the cable company and tell them I'm stealing cable. If I am, do you think I'll be their customer anymore? Plus, the "never sign you up again" part is silly. "Hate speech" sites can get back on Google News if they put forth the effort.

And as for the inane "American Thinker" article, why exactly, if Google's purpose is to remove conservative content under the guise of "hate speech", does it do the same damn thing to Indymedia?

And let's not forget this little tidbit from the Thinker piece:

a recent study by Hitwise ranked Google News as the fifth most visited news website behind Yahoo, the Weather Channel, MSNBC, and CNN

Mmm, fifth. Sounds essential to me. Send the feds to Mountain View to stop this censorship! How come conservatives only believe in free markets when it suits them?

By the way, Google is not a public utility. If you don't like their policies, don't use their products and services.

Mantis is absolutely correct. Try all you want to prove otherwise, but he's right.

I guess Google will soon be forced to remove the Washington Post as a source:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/19/AR2006051901769_pf.html

My reference to the essential business service comes directly from the linked articles, which I suppose those who question it did not bother to read. You might also want to read all the Google disclaimers, statements etc on their site, and see what you can find as a reference to their filtering criteria. It is illuminating. I tried leaving the links yesterday but it exceed the # allowed per post.