Google Changes Guidlines for New China Policy

[St0n3y]

I posted this on my e-marketing blog this morning and so far have not seen anybody else discussing it:

Google has removed an interesting line from one of their webmaster info pages.

Specifically, the page on URL removals, used to say:

We’re committed to providing thorough and unbiased search results for our users; therefore, we cannot participate in the practice of censorship.

Today, the sentence ends with “users”, and the line “Therefore, we cannot participate in the practice of censorship” has been removed.

[dannysullivan]

Gary had this on the SEW Blog about another help page having been pulled down, then put back up specifically on the censorship topic. This seems in line with that -- guess bending to China means there are a lot of corrections and and changes they need to put into place. And they probably should have done some of this before, since they've done censorship in other places for longer.

[budgiebird]

I attempted to register with Google multiple times over several days specifically to post a comment on the China censorship issue and have yet to receive a confirmation e-mail. Also the confirmation e-mail for this site just arrived a few minutes ago after several days. I was able to view the Google help page without registration completed and it was full of nasty comments about the China issue with "gmail" predominating (already registered users perhaps?) This thread seems to be the only thing on your site even related to the China issue. I notified my ISP about the e-mail problem yesterday and just received your confirmation now. I have never experienced a known e-mail blocking problem with my ISP berfore. All of this is very weird and disturbing. Has censorship spread to the U. S. or what?

[mcanerin]

Regardless of you rposition on the censorship issue, at least acknowledging that you are doing it is a step in the right direction.

It would be really bad if they pretended they were not doing anything.

Ian

[budgiebird]

[quote=mcanerin]Regardless of you rposition on the censorship issue, at least acknowledging that you are doing it is a step in the right direction.

It would be really bad if they pretended they were not doing anything.



If the quote above is a reply to me (budgiebird) I am confused, being a new member. Who is acknowledging doing what? Does that refer to me? What is the right direction? Who are "they" in the second part? Google? What are "they" supposedly doing? I have no connection with Google, just a user with a registration failure ,thats all.

[mcanerin]

Sorry bluebird - I was replying to the topic of the thread, not your post specifically.

Ian