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Google vs. DMCA and Scientology
Uebergeek writes "This article at the NYTimes (free registration, blah blah) details how google is dealing with the many complaints it gets from organizations when one of its links potentially violates a copyright (or just irritates the copyright's owner).
Specifically, it talks about how Google is dealing with the Scientologist's complaints about the list of the Operation Clambake site... now Google features a prominent link to another site that shows the complaint that the Scientologists filed, along with the delisted links."
How long will the DMCA be used to trample freedom of speech, expression, and fair use, until Congress gets it into their thick skulls that this is BAD LEGISLATION, and repeals it?
Maybe the overwhelmingly negative response to CBPTBA (or whatever) will act as a wakeup call.
--
Repeal me, NOW!!!
Thank you.
Are you going to financially back a lawsuit if one is filed?
THIS is what Google is attempting to avoid.
They may be the best search engine around, but like everyone (sans Microsoft) they have very limited "off-topic" funds to fight "pointless" lawsuits.
Karma? Karma? I don't need no stinkin' karma.
If they believe it should be listed, they should have the courage to list it themselves.
I disagree. Google has the correct proceedure. I don't want individual companies taken down simply because they can't afford the legal fight...
If it was just google doing this, I would have a problem. However I think google has shown other companies how to handle these type of issues....
"Only one thing, is impossible for god: to find any sense in any copyright law on the planet." Mark Twain
It's rather Ironic that the NYT article discussing the right to link in such a balanced and enlightened manner, itself contains no hyperlinks to any of the sites that it is discussing.
Seeing as Scientology fits all the classic signs of a cult, why has it not been properly labled and dealt with? Simply reclassifying it properly would give law enforcement agencies much greater access to investigate and prosecute abuses within the "church" of Scientology and would serve to protect the members from themselves.
The only people who lose when you call Scientology what it is - a cult - are the profiteering people who run it.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
Agreed, but this one isn't pointless to them. Nothing to do with pro or anti-scientology, any attempt to force controls on content threatens the essence of a pure-bred search engine.
Cheers,
Ian
This has been nicknamed by the Churches critics as Operation Footbullet for obvious reasons.
One point the article made is that the original controversy caused lots more people to link to xenu.net, pushing it up from 4th in the Google results for "Scientology" to 2nd. I'd like to encourage everyone who hasn't already done so to also do this - maybe it can be pushed up to 1st :-)
These days, having moral courage usually means having the cash to back it up. Granted, Google has more cash than most high-tech companies these days, but not enough to shrug off Scientology. Also, Google could face a second, potentially more expensive investor lawsuit, should the Church of Scientology sue. Not taking proper steps to protect your investors' dollars is grounds for legal action; and the ultimate result, if and when you lose both lawsuits, could be the end of your company, with all those jobs lost and all your intellectual property on fire sale. This is the same reason why Slashdot resorted to similar indirect means a year ago.
The simple fact is that corporations exist to increase shareholder value -- not to make moral stands, employ people, heal people, or do all those other fuzzy things that they sometimes do in the process of making money. I don't like it either, but that's the state of the world.
Finding God in a Dog
Cryptonomicon notwithstanding, does anyone have some links to these myriad of investor lawsuits that everyone in Silicon Valley is so terrified of? Because in 15 years of reading the WSJ daily I have read of one or two, all of which were thrown out by the court. US corporate law seems to be pretty much "pay your money and take your chance" when it comes to investors and their ability to actually affect the direction of a firm that they have invested in.
sPh
Are you going to financially back a lawsuit if one is filed?
... a tool to find stuff. Nobody should be help liable if the search engine turns up stuff that someone doesn't agree with.
Someone ought to. Seriously. We need court precedents to say that search engines are not liable for linking to sites...a search tool is just that
Hello? EFF? CDT? CPSR? Are you guys listening???
My journal has hot
They're the premiere web search engine right now, with multiple companies (like Yahoo) using them as their own search engine.
What kind of power does Google have? It can make a web presence disappear.
Think of it like this: how do most people find sites on the internet these days? Search engines, right? Sometimes they'll find them indirectly but that's only by chance. When they're actually looking for something, they'll use a search engine. Which usually means they'll use Google.
So by removing all references to a particular site, Google can essentially make that site disappear.
And so Google should do exactly that to any web site that belongs to any entity that threatens Google with a lawsuit.
It should prove especially effective against companies, which rely more and more on their web presence.
Use 'slashdot stuff' in the subject line in any email you send me if you want to get past the spam filter.
Let's revoke the church of scientology's tax exemption.
Silly? I don't think so; consider:
Churches in America don't pay taxes. They're recognised as non-profit, socially befeficial institutions and as such, it's historically been seen as worthwhile to afford them tax free status (given that they meet certian requirements).
The Church of Scientology is tax exempt. This despite the fact that they charge for their teachings and venomously attack those that provide these teachings for free (unlike other religions). This makes them more like corporation than a religious organization. Thus, they should be treated as one. Require them to file tax documents like any corporation and be subject to audit by the IRS.
The CoS is a cult; and there's nothing wrong with that. Cults have existed for years throughout the world, and the distinction between "legitimate" and "cult" beliefs is at best a tenuous one. But the behaviour of the church of scientology is that of a corporation (evil and vindictive, but a corporation). Let's let them have their trade secret teachings and go after people with lawsuits for publishing secret teachings and critical views of their religion; but let us also not passively fund this corporation by making it tax exempt.
In Russia, and in much of Europe, where controls on government intervention in the religious/ideological sector of the economy are not so stringent, the government is free to oppress scientologists, and does so. Read about it at the OCRT website. [freefind.com] Other governments use these same powers to quell political dissent, which is why in our society we have had the good sense to deny the government these powers.
I find it funny to read Americans spout this kind of stuff. From the outside, American society and law seems much less forgiving about people who have different viewpoints that many other countries, such as Russia and European countries. A good example is that girl who was recently thrown out of school for opposing what the US has been doing in Afghanistan. How intolerant does a society have to be to throw a young girl out of school for being anti-war?
It's funny. I live in Spain. Yesterday I was in a bar with some friends and a couple of American tourists. One of the tourists pointed a finger at my friend and in a suprised voice asked "are you legal?" After a bit of confusion we realised that he was asking my friend if she was old enough to drink in a bar. The girl was twenty. You cannot imagine how ridiculous it sounds to us here that in America an adult of twenty years of age cannot drink a beer in a bar. And you think it's the land of Freedom! Ha!
What if you could convince your Senator or Congress-person to mirror the material? Do they have immunity for this sort of thing? Even if not, I'm sure there's more than one Senator out there who would enjoy ticking of the Scientologists.
I seem to remember that Canadian MP's have immunity for anything that they say in the House of Commons. While this probably doesn't extend to their official websites, it probably hasn't been tested. They could also table the offending material as part of a debate on the subject which would give them a reason to post it. Again, I don't know if any of this would be legal, but it would certainly be interesting to find out. (And I believe that both the US and Canadian governments have more money and more responsibility to do this that google does).
. --- If you're looking for free e-mail you won't find it here! http://www.noemailhere.com
"I find it funny to read Americans spout this kind of stuff. From the outside, American society and law seems much less forgiving about people who have different viewpoints that many other countries, such as Russia and European countries. A good example is that girl who was recently thrown out of school for opposing what the US has been doing in Afghanistan. How intolerant does a society have to be to throw a young girl out of school for being anti-war?"
Well we didn't hear about that, nobody talked about it in the US but it wouldn't surprise me. Censorship is alive and well around here.
I can think of lots of ways in which so-called "mainstream" religons endorse or cause what could be considered "harm" to their members, depending entirely on your personal point of view.
For instance (and please, these are not attacks, simply topics for thought) - the Catholic ban on contraception leads to how many unwanted pregnancies/back street abortions, maybe even deaths? What about religions which promote surgery on infants (e.g. circumcision)? I may be showing my ignorance, but isn't the Indian caste system based on religious belief? The list goes on...
Not to mention the countless wars waged in the name of one god or another, that looks to me like "endorsing or causing harm to critics".
I'm not defending the COS, really I'm not, but you have to treat all religions equally. Personally, I'd go for no special treatment for any religions, but that's cos I'm a non-beliver, and frankly the power wielded by the unelected heads of the major religions scares me
---- Den ene knappen er powerknapp, den andre er Bender voice knapp "Bite My Shiny Metal Ass"
Bru-hahahaha!
If we keep going we can push the critic's sites to #1-#10 and land the official scientology site on page 2 of the listings. :-)
--
Free software isn't free, but expensive software is expensive.
Have you looked up the USA on the Amnesty site?:
Pardon me, but if you want to run up and hug someone who's firing a gun at you, feel free, but I've no problem with shooting them in the head. Humanitarian crisis in afghanistan? Are you people serious? Men, women, and children were tortured and mudered every single day by the Taliban. Women were regarded as less than a farm animal. Now there are women in school, and the children are taught mathematics instead of "death to America, kill yourself for Islam." The US dropped food to the afghan people, and some people bitched. The US freed the afghan people from a totalitarian regime, and still some people bitched. We took prisoners to an American base, fed them, clothed them, gave them a place to sleep, all at cost and risk to us, and still people bitched. Amnesty Int would bitch if we put Al Qaida prisoners up at the Waldorf Estoria with room service and a view. If you want to hug the guy with a bomb strapped to his chest, feel free. I find this to be a good thing, as when he detonates himself, it'll quiet the bitching and moaning about our treatment of these murders, and you'll likely shield me from the blast. Thank you, I appreciate that.
As for capital punishment, it's hotly contested even here in the US. Why don't we end it? Because we have a process. If it's decided that capital punishment doesn't fit our justice system, it will be eliminated. People whining at us will not eliminate it. Personally, I'm all for it. It reduces the cost of housing/feeding this person for the rest of their life; it ensure they will never walk the street again (no chance for escaping from prison 10 years down the road); and it most certainly fits the crimes to which it's applied. In most cases, the family of the victim (assuming it's homocide) has enormous pull to ensure the death penalty is not used if they don't believe in it. (Matthew Shepard case)
Now, I'm looking at this and I can't believe it:
Central Asia on the brink of a human rights crisis
Philippines: Human rights must be respected to secure peace and stability in southern Philippines
We're supposed to force everyone in the world to play nice with one another? Whenever we try to ensure that people are treated justly, (Saudi Arabia/Kuwait/Afghanistan/Bosnia/etc) all we get is flak for our "occupation". Everyone wanted the US to come and save Saudi Arabia from Iraq, and now they're bitching because we were/are on Saudi soil? I sincerely hope that we pull out of the middle east altogether, so that when Saddam starts firing off the chemical weapons and people start dieing, we can sit back and laugh at the ignorant folks who kept complaining about us being there.
We're always the first ones everyone calls when something bad happens, and we're the one everyone complains to when anything happens that they don't like. "Please come save me, but get the hell out when I say so." The people who decry our way of life are the same people who gain a large benefit from it. Those in the Middle East who complain about our way of life don't seem to have any problem accepting the money they get from selling us oil. Were it not for the US, the kurds in northern Iraq would still be dieing of the chemical weapons used on them, kuwait would be an Iraqi province, afghan women would still be being beaten and murdered while denied the most basic rights, most of Japan's income wouldn't be there, and WWII would have ended a bit differently (lest you forget the American supplies we sent, the Sherman tanks, the troops, the weapons, food, engineers, etc). Hell, the French still hate the Americans for some odd reason, even though we helped liberate France.
Speaking for the USA, we'd like a friggin 'thank you' some time soon.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
M. Scott Peck, MD in his book, Further Along the Road Less Traveled came up with these 10 criteria for a cult:
1. Idolatry of a single charismatic leader
2. A revered inner circle
3. Secrecy of management
4. Financial evasiveness
5. Dependancy (followers become dependant)
6. Conformity
7. Special language
8. Dogmatic doctrine
9. Heresy (Peck's definition of this is a little vague; something about the relationship between God and man not being proper)
10 God in captivity (Peck defines this as claiming to know everything about God)
I would add an 11th criterion: You have to give an excessive ammount (perhaps all) of your personal wealth to the organization. Maybe Peck would fit that under conformity or dependance.
Peck notes that prior to Vatican II, the Catholic Church met most of these criteria, and still meets many of them. I suppose that one of the dangers of trying to find an objective measure of something is that you risk placing things you hold to be of value in a less positive light. Exercise for Slashdot readers: Apply these criteria to the Free Software Foundation, and/or the Free Software movement in general.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?