Google Removes Kazaa Links, Keeps Sponsored Links

SanityInAnarchy writes "Everyone should remember when Google removed several links that Sharman (owner of Kazaa) claimed were infringing their copyrights. At first, only real results were touched and sponsored links left alone. Well, that sponsored link was removed, but there are quite a few left on a search for 'Kazaa Lite' that, if they aren't infringing Kazaa copyrights, openly advocate piracy. Well, maybe not quite, but I still can't believe they expect that phrases like 'complete albums,' 'full-length movies,' and 'Napster lives' are to be interpreted as '100% legal.'"

Comments

Sic Transit Gloria Kazaa

[Empiric]

When Napster did it, it was cool and unique.
When Kazaa did it, is was merely cool.
When Kazaa Lite did it, it was down to just another corporation, profiting from piracy.

Besides, last I heard, the Kazaa network is rapidly becoming useless, probably due to most everyone going "read-only". And probably everyone on Slashdot knows what the obvious, technically-properly-done successor is, so I won't even mention it.

Re:Sic Transit Gloria Kazaa

[Sevn]

And probably everyone on Slashdot knows what the obvious, technically-properly-done successor is, so I won't even mention it.

Nope, no idea. Kazaa has been working great. That and I've been using Irate a lot lately and freaking loving it. Just today I got ten COMPLETELY LEGAL songs and I liked all of them but 2. What technically properly done successor are you talking about?

Re:Sic Transit Gloria Kazaa

[Zocalo]

the Kazaa network is rapidly becoming useless

You must have some hefty expectations then, because KLite is telling me right now that there are "3,914,228 users online | 788,202,332 files (5,910,272 GB)" being shared. That hardly seems anywhere near "useless" to me, and I doubt it's going to get that way for a while either.

Remember, many of the people on there are not "technically" inclined; they are just average Janes and Joes who found out about Kazaa by word of mouth/email from friends when Napster went under. Until Kazaa's successor is known to the average man in the street Kazaa is probably going to remain king.

Two different issues!

[writermike]

Sharman never complained that Google infringed on the rights of downloaders to pirate from Kazaa versus Kazaa Lite. Sharman complained that Google infringed on Kazaa's copyrights.

Whether or not Google has links to other sites that openly advocate piracy doesn't really have much to do with the Kazaa/Kazaa-Lite debate, methinks.

i noticed this too

[fuckfuck101]

and it's still not hard to find links with kazaa lite, or anything to do with illegal nature.

a far more pressing issue for me is why doesn't google remove links for "kiddie porn" or "illegal porn" or "rape pics" or something?

or is it a case of one rule for one, another for everybody else?

Re:i noticed this too

[Jonathan C. Patschke]

and it's still not hard to find links with kazaa lite, or anything to do with illegal nature.
< snip >
or is it a case of one rule for one, another for everybody else?

This is precisely why they shouldn't filter out any search results. If they filter only some some "illegal" (keep in mind that legality is a function of locality) links, they are, in effect, endorsing the others. Your sacred cow may not be mine, and everyone's kink is someone else's horror.

Search engines merely provide a searchable index to content. I don't see how they can be seen as guilty of copyright infringement, so long as the page descriptions are kept short enough to qualify under "fair use". An impartial tool like a search engine is not a place to enforce morality, since morality is subjective by its very nature.

I should close by saying that I don't personally condone the examples you've given, but the people involved in the creating of that content are the wrongdoers, not Google.

guess what's the funniest part...

[Dreadlord]

in other news, KaZaA users are searching for KaZaA Lite using KaZaA itself, installing it, and getting rid of KaZaA for good!

At the risk of repeating myself...

[Pig Hogger]

... click on my signature to get the cen$ored google links...

Of course they are

[evilroot]

Of course such phrases can be considered %100 legal. Suppose you sell complete, legal albums from your band on your website. Being excluded from Google results would be quite damaging.

Also, belive it or not pr0n is perfectly legal and one of the single most profitable businesses on the Internet. "Full length movies" etc are buzz phrases from porn sites, and if Google starts filtering that too how much further is it to content censorship? For a Slashdot story I really don't like the pro-copyright law spin on this article. Terminating links for whatever reason is a bad thing. Go after the sites themselves for infringement, not search engines.

Legal trends against google?

[zapp]

It seems that there's been a trend lately for blaming a search engine for what can be found using its services. It is not google's responsibility to maintain the content of the Internet.

If i search google for "Child pornography" ... it is not their fault if some comes up.

If I search for mp3s or full movie rips, its not their fault. They are an indexing service, not a filtering service, nor a content provider.

blah people are stupid.

I can't believe people haven't attacked this guy.

[I'm a racist.]

The submitter of this article seems to be a bit of an asshole.

I still can't believe they expect that phrases like 'complete albums,' 'full-length movies,' and 'Napster lives' are to be interpreted as '100% legal.

Might I refer you to the first ammendment?

Google: "Don't be evil"

[cubal]

Remembering that google's motto is "don't be evil", we again see some of their rather odd decisions. First it was "pornography is alright, but hate isn't", now it's "copyright infringement is wrong, but open advertising of piracy is ok"...

hmm, could it be that "stuff that could get us sued is evil", and "stuff that we get paid for is fine by us"?

Just a thought.

Re:Google: "Don't be evil"

[Snowspinner]

They didn't remove hate across the board. They removed it in Germany, which has extremely strict hate speech laws, which Google was probably running afoul of.

Nor did they say anything about copyright infringement being wrong. They complied with a DMCA request. The DMCA being the evil thing that it is, they were, quite likely, in violation of it.

In other words, both cases were not Google being evil, they were the law being evil. Google is not the legislative body in either the US or Germany, so that's not really their fault.

DMCA Notice

[CausticWindow]

Why are Google always linking to the Chilling Effects website? Why aren't they hosting the DMCA Notices themselves?

Would they still be in DMCA violation if the DMCA notice with the removed links were hosted by them?

What about Chilling Effects? Are they in DMCA violation by hosting those notices?

Google pulled a fast on on the RIAA

[m.dillon]

You guys are idiots. Google pulled the links, but they also put a link up to the original DMCA notice that was sent to them which... guess what? LISTS THE BANNED SITES!

So now instead of these sites being deep in the list of results, they are now front and center, and probably getting far more hits then they were before the notice was sent.

Successor

[Overly Critical Guy]

And probably everyone on Slashdot knows what the obvious, technically-properly-done successor is, so I won't even mention it.

Actually paying for stuff?

What if I post the DMCA'd links here?

[Anonymous Coward]

If I post the links for Kazaa Lite downloads that Google had to remove here on Slashdot, will Slashdot get a takedown notice? If so, will Slashdot comply? Moderators, please mod this up so that it will show up in the Google/Google News search index!

a. http://www.kazaagold.com
b. http://mp3download.com
c. http://www.kazaalite.tk
d. http://www.kaaza.com
e. http://doa2.host.sk
f. http://www.k-lite.tk
g. http://www.kazaa-file-sharing-downloads.com
h. http://www.kazaalite.nl
i. http://home.hccnet.nl/h.edskes/mirror.htm
j. http://www.kazaa-download.de
k. http://www.zeropaid.com
l. http://www.kazaalite.nl/downloads.htm
m. http://kazaa.infos-du-net.com
n. http://www.kazaa-lite.tk
o. http://www.kazaa-lite.info

Usenet archive is real problem

[Jacek Poplawski]

Please read this .
I mean following fragment:

FOR GOOGLE GROUPS, YOU MUST IDENTIFY EACH MESSAGE THAT ALLEGEDLY CONTAINS INFRINGING MATERIAL BY ITS MESSAGE-ID.

So, they bought DejaNews, they own probably only existing complete (?) Usenet archive, and NOW they want to censure it!

I don't care about links, if you want link you can find it in many places. Problem is Usenet archive. There is no other place where you can find posts from 1995 or even 1992.

Dear google, I fsck your link database, but leave Usenet archive unchanged, you are not creators of that content!

Ironic

[mantera]

I just find it pretty ironic that kazaa are complaining about copyright infringement.

Google is active in censorship, commercial esp

[supaflah]

I have a nonprofit site dedicated to japanese design.
It was number one on google. it is now blocked out, and commercial links to amazon and other booksellers come first.
Apparently there is an agreement between Google and their advertisers to give priority to their pages.
Also, don't forget that google has a well known disrespect for searchers privacy, by placing permanent cookies, and has a long lasting relationship with the Feds, providing profiling information on suspicious searches.
Proof? Well, don't google for it. Googlewatch.org is a good place to start.

Leave search engines out of this

[gad_zuki!]

This is like demanding Enron being removed from the yellowpages. Control search engines and you control the net I guess, this is one of the bigger problems of the DMCA. Linking should not be illegal regardless of the site.

Let them fight their battles, but leave unaffiliated third-parties out of it. Google has nothing to do with kazaalite, google has nothing to do with scientology, etc. You would think a GOP administration would defend business like google and free speech, but the DMCA has yet to be challenged and Ashcroft has no problem using it for his own end.

I don't want a goverment sanitized search engine, I want the rawest information I can get.