| In January 2006 Google's launch of a censored search engine in China was considered a black day for freedom of expression. Google believed the benefits of increased access to the Chinese people outweighed their discomfort in censoring some results. |  |
It must have been difficult for Google executives to consider walking away from the potential AdWords and AdSense revenue. So they didn't.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), an international non-profit digital rights advocacy and legal organization, criticized Google's capitulation with the Chinese government.
In A New Approach to China, a frustrated Google throws down the gauntlet to the Chinese government
no more censorship on google.cn
Co-founder Sergey Brin, the son of persecuted Russian Jews, is likely Google's conscience in this scuttlebutt with China according to the musings of Ken Auletta (journalist and author of Googled - The End of the World As We Know It).
Danny O'Brien of the EFF recently said of Google's turn-about
we'd now like to be one of the first to commend Google for its brave and forthright declaration to provide only an uncensored Chinese language version of its search engine.I recalled Newman's most sage-like warning from an episode of Seinfeld - the American television sitcom from the 1990s
alright, alright, alright you go ahead, you go ahead you keep it secret, but you remember this...when you control the mail, you control information!
The first distinguishing characteristic of the new World Order that global conflicts are not always government to government. Conflicts are now corporation to government as well.
More
- Google and China: What's the real story, and where does it go from here? by Mac Slocum O'Reilly's Online Managing Editor.
- Google China Censorship: Opinion Roundup from Richi Jennings' IT Blogwatch
- For historical context, see the BBC post Google move 'black day' for China.
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