Google sued by KinderStart for penalizing site

[JohnW]

Website owner sues Google based on 1st amendment rights, using a twist of the arguement Google successfully used to defend themselves in the SearchKing suit.
www.breitbart.com/news/2006/03/17/D8GDKG900.html

[BradBristol]

Anyone wanna bet (i am giving odds) that they are going to be no more successful than search slut was...

One of these days, there will be a main stream reporter that understands the terms used in SEO.... Being banned is now being in the sandbox, according to this ignorant reporter.

I guess some reporters just love catchy names... even if they are wrong!

[investing101]

Actually Google might find themselves in a contradictory position in this case.

When they are accused of copyright and trademark infringement they argue that they are a just a "non-biased compiler" of information and their use of copyright and trademarks is protected under "fair use" law -- they try to present themselves as if they are some sort of "library." But then if someone complains that they have been "black-listed" by Google and their site is not being displayed in the search results "properly," Google defends themselves arguing that their search represents "opinion" and is protected against any claims that it is "unfair" under First Amendment law.

I think Google is going to have to figure out exactly what position they want to take in handling information.

--Joe

[unreviewed]

I checked out the web site (the one suing Google) and it somehow got a popup past my blocker and offered to install a spy ware program. This is a site aimed at children for goodness sake ...

[gehrlekrona]

but what I am hoping from this is that Google has to warn web sites before they drop them from their index.
I thought that in this country you were innocent until proven otherwise and that you had a chance to defend yourself but when it comes to Google then they are the Almighty and can't do anything wrong, and if they do... OH well, sucks to be you, right??? We know what we are doing and you did something wrong but we won't tell you about it before we kill your site and we won't tell you afterwards either, no matter how many time you do a so called re-inclusion request.
I guess when you walk hand-in-hand with the Chinese government then you can do like the chinese does, put people in jail for years with no trial and not telling them what they did wrong, not even that they violated the Chinese Guidelines so all you have is to read the Guidelines over and over again to see what you might have done wrong and to annoy BigBrother.....

[cline]

Originally Posted by investing101

When they are accused of copyright and trademark infringement they argue that they are a just a "non-biased compiler" of information and their use of copyright and trademarks is protected under "fair use" law -- they try to present themselves as if they are some sort of "library." But then if someone complains that they have been "black-listed" by Google and their site is not being displayed in the search results "properly," Google defends themselves arguing that their search represents "opinion" and is protected against any claims that it is "unfair" under First Amendment law.

No contradiction. Libraries have always excercised opinion in choosing what items to put in their collections.

[JohnW]

>I am hoping from this is that Google has to warn web sites before they drop them from their index.

This site is not dropped from the index.

The article reports on an interesting legal theory, however many of the facts in the article must surely have been reported incorrectly by the writer. The site is not banned.

I'm not really sure what keywords, if any, it would deserve to rank for if it were not penalized, if it is actually penalized.

[gehrlekrona]

I also checked and found their web site but I also did some cache checking on different Google data centers and most of them had an old cache from June last year. The ones that were new was about a week old.
If I were Google I would let the site show up in the index too

[JohnW]

Check this out:

http://www.google.com/search?hs=OBz&...om&btnG=Search

If I had a site with problems like this I would be looking at my webmaster, not at Google. I still have not seen where Google has done anything unusual to them, what am I missing?

[BradBristol]

I don't think your missing anything John.

These guys have a sub par website that uses some 'shady' methods and they are blaming google for not listing it at the #1 spots they want.... Like I never heard that story before working as an SEO.

Those kinder folks are gonna get their butts kicked in court.

But they are gonna get millions and millions in free advertising...

Maybe they will fair better in the long run than search slut did, but I doubt it.

[Old Welsh Guy]

As I have posted elsewhere, this is more about getting their name in the media than winning in court. No-one can tell you what books to stock in your FREE library. Same applies to a search engine. If they want to appear at the top, then welcome to adwords.

[inlogicalbearer]

They should clean up their comments in their directory before to do anything. A site for childs should be monitored when you got open comments in their directories !!!

I've found in less than 5 minutes; Casino links, diet pills links, drug pills link and even piercing links.
Probably the crawlers have saw thoses and put it in sandbox. Links on my blog.

[vayapues]

ugg, here we go again. I hope Google counter sues for legal expenses. Not to mention liable, defamation, etc.

As people realize how a lawsuit gets their name in the media for free, they will cause a lot of heart ache for Google, and a lot of wasted time and energy for everyone else.

Kinderstart is shameless, not to mention that their site is um, well, really bad, to say the least.

But look how many of us have visited their site just in this discussion. They are getting a lot of mileage out of it, which is exactly why Google needs to go after them. Not for revenge, but simply to stop the problem before 10,000 other site owners sue them.

[vayapues]

They should clean up their comments in their directory before to do anything. A site for child's should be monitored when you got open comments in their directories !!!

They are not a child's website. They are a scrapper wearing sheep's clothing, out to make a quick buck.

I can understand being out to make a quick buck, don't get me wrong, but at the least, have some ethics. There site is loaded with garbage that is not appropriate for children.

[ewc21]

Right, OWG.

They even put Adsense code in their site. They never paid a penny for any sales generated by organic search, and Google did not ask for any percentage of their earnings just because Google was the referer that helped people find their site.

As with my other posts elsewhere, this is more of gaining popularity by being talked about than the suit. Just imagine how much traffic Kinderstart generates from the 160 plus news links you'll find in Google News about this story.

[JohnW]

>this is more about getting their name in the media than winning in court

If that’s true, I can’t imagine that they expected the type of commentary they are getting here and elsewhere. If the national press picks up the fact the professional search engine marketing community is slamming them, this may not turn out they way they planned. Do you think they know that they did this to themselves with sloppy coding?

[Marcia]

but what I am hoping from this is that Google has to warn web sites before they drop them from their index.

The logistics of that would be overwhelming. There's no reason innocent parties should be burdened because of the actions of a few - and it is just a few, compared with how many sites & pages are indexed.

I thought that in this country you were innocent until proven otherwise and that you had a chance to defend yourself

Immaterial and irrelevant to the matter at hand.

This isn't a legal or criminal issue, this is an issue of adhering to publicly published guidelines. Failing to do so is either deliberate (in which case the party already knows what they've done) or lack of knowledge - which is nobody's responsibility but the person running the site.

If the person running the site doesn't have the knowledge to know why a site is in trouble, they're free to hire an SEO consultant to examine the situation and tell them why. The lack of knowledge of a few is no reason for Google to pay employees to assume the role of SEO consultant and provide free SEO services to webmasters at their own expense. That's not their responsibility, it's the responsibility of the people running sites.

[Old Welsh Guy]

Ignorance is no defence.

But the matter here is that there is nothing to defend against. We have to be careful here and look at what is being said. If this company win this case, then ANYONE with a directory who removes a site from it is also open to being sued.

People have to get it in their heads that getting traffic (organic) from Google is a free bonus, not a right. The only rights you aquire are those when you take up a paid agreement with them via adsense/sdwords etc.

[vayapues]

The lack of knowledge of a few is no reason for Google to pay employees to assume the role of SEO consultant and provide free SEO services to webmasters at their own expense. That's not their responsibility, it's the responsibility of the people running sites.

Amen Marcia, Well Put.

If this company win this case, then ANYONE with a directory who removes a site from it is also open to being sued.

People have to get it in their heads that getting traffic (organic) from Google is a free bonus, not a right.

Also well put.

[dannysullivan]

The First Amendment provides protection against the US government from hindering free speech. It does nothing to prevent private parties from doing so. Google isn't part of the US government. It has no First Amendment obligations to fulfill, any more than a newspaper can be forced to print something it doesn't want to. I'm amazed the suit tries to argue this point. It doesn't speak well for the lawyer or lawyers behind it, much less the chances of success.