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Subpoena Resistance Hurts Google Stock
imrec writes "Google stock sees a record 8% decline shortly after news concerning the government's request for Google's search logs broke earlier this week." From the article: "'There are potentially concerns that Google could be in the cross-hairs of the Justice Department,' Kessler said. 'Investors are worried about interest rates and inflation and they felt technology stocks like Google, Apple, Yahoo and others were able to withstand these kinds of pressure. But now that ability is in doubt,'"
Buy Now!
My Doctor prescribed daily nasal saline irrigation, hehe
Ahhh, now we'll really see whether they can really live up their "Don't be evil" policy! Does Google prefer stock price over ethics? While my instinct tells me the answer is firmly "no" I think we are all interested in the result.
I think Google did the right thing. In the western democracies we all have strict rules governing the powers of the various investigative authorities. There are very good reasons for this. The Police and Justice Department have incredible powers granted to them by the state. However, the same power that allows them to catch criminals can also be used for less noble purposes.
In any organisation of considerable size there is always a rogue element. An element that is deceitful, unethical and motivated by influences orthogonal to the goals of the institution. Sometimes these are fairly benign: David Blunket trying to get a quick visa so he and his bit on the side have a nanny to look after their child. Sometimes these can be very malicious: Robbers breaking in to the Democrat headquarters and planting bugs so Nixon could spy on their election campaign. (I'm British so they may be inaccuracies in this account)
The law is there not only to protect us from criminals but to protect us from the people who catch them too. In many ways, the protection from the people who catch criminals is vastly more important than protection from criminals. What criminal can get state sanctioned approval to search your home? Impound your possessions? Wrongfully impression you?
All over the western world, governments are granting their Police more and more powers in the name of combating terrorism. The chance of being killed by a terrorist is approximately zero. For comparison, in Britain 0.03% of us will die[1] in ALL possible mishaps this year. That takes account of murder, car crashes, being eaten by ferocious llamas and so on and so forth.
I would therefore venture that the threat posed by increasing Police power is vastly greater than the threat of terrorism. In Britain, we saw this illustrated for us nicely when an octogenarian, life-time member of the Labour party was escorted from the annual conference and arrested under anti-terrorism legislation. Here was a man saying that war in Iraq was unjust and he gets arrested under anti-terrorism legislation. This war on terror is becoming a war, conducted by ourselves, against ourselves to remove the democratic values we cherish so dearly. Shakespeare himself could not write such a dark tragedy.
Getting back to point. Just because the Justice Department says Google should jump it does not mean Google should meekly reply: "How High, Officer?". Just because the government asks you to do something does not mean that they have the proper authority to ask for it. Let them prove in a court of law that they have the proper authority to make such a claim. If they're right, they'll win and Google will have to capitulate. If they're wrong, then a precedent is set and the complicated system of checks and balances has once again protected liberty.
Simon
[1] - The Independent, Yesterday, in the Editorial section. Feel free to correct this figure if it is incorrect.All Google needs to do is rename itself to Freedom Search, and all will be well...
Fox can take the sky from you.
The whole market's taking a hit from the Nikkei scare, and the oil prices. I doubt that most of GOOG's investors even know that there's any issue with the DoJ's unreasonable demands on Google.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
...or forever hold your peace!
(pun not intended...)
The entire market was down. Granted, not 8%, but to attribute
the decline in the Google shareprice because of the DOJ action
is silly.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Going public was a double-edged sword for Google. While Google performs and the stock performs, the shareholders aren't an issue (pretty much up until now). Google's "Do No Evil" is really out of their control now. A bunch of short-sighted bottom-line investors are in control of it now. Google can manage to take a hit here and there, but if this thing of the DoJ gets out of hand, Google's whole culture may take a change for the worse when the shareholders want their pound of flesh.
This is just flat wrong! Google's stock got clipped because the whole market went down. Investors are worried because the price of a barrel of oil went above $68 a barrel, the Nikei exchange tanked, and several Big Names reported shortfalls. Target buy prices from wall street analysts rangfe fromn $480 to $560. I wish I had a couple of million to put into this "flawed" stock! I expect to see Google at $500 before the end of 2006.
Google does something that is bound to endear them to their audience, and thus bound to increase their "ratings" (page views), and thus bound to increase click numbers for their customers, and so bound to increase their income - and their stock goes DOWN? Once they get a court order, they'll give up the data, sure, but the cost of fighting the supoena is nothing compared to the good will their resistance to releasing user data will garner. I don't think these investors really understand what Google is selling.
The whole market got slammed yesterday. Google is way out there in terms of valuation and 8% isn't that much considering.
The "Justice" Dept. didn't just go after Google records, they asked all the major search engines. Google just had the nads to stand up and say no.
That's not going to cause their stock to go down, being over-bought causes a sell off, especially when the rest of the market is taking a header. Google could be selling toxic waste and as long as their earnings stayed up the market would still buy their stock. This is nothing more than another example of an over-reaching administration trying to gather statistics to support the conclusion they started with.
I can't wait 'till November.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
You mention shareholders, but as far as I know, the majority of Google stock is in the hands of the founders and the employees.
Anyone got data on this in support/against?
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
What kind of insanity is this, that the government goes out of control, spending billions on a pointless war, spends billions more spying on its own citizens - and Google has its stock price downgraded because it stands up to a basic infringement on the rights of American citizens? Even though this would have no effect on profitability or income? Jesus Christ on a stick.
... and then they built the supercollider.
This is mostly rationalization. The stock was obviously over-inflated and something was bound to come along and burst the bubble. The significance of the actual subpoena controversy is overstated.
Gov tries to punish users, Google protects users.
Wall St. fears Gov may punish Google, Wall St. punishes Google.
The ball is in users' court...
Users punish Gov, punish Wall St., and/or protects Google.
Suggestions?
Thank you, Edward Snowden.
"Arguments from authority are worthless." —Carl Sagan
Why do they need to really log what you are doing? Surely they could create a profile about you by using an initial 3 months of search data, delete all of the search records and periodically tweak it. They don't need to record all of your searches for the rest of your life, all they need is to build and tweak your advertising profile.
.05% of the market. It's looking more and more like the Internet will not be a stronghold of liberty in general, but rather just freedom of speech.
Of course this does expose a fundamental flaw of modern capitalism that I as a libertarian will admit is real: there is no alternative here. Everyone is doing it, probably even the wannabe Googles that have
... the stock was simply highly overpriced and the markets made a first adjustment!!!
If you feel that using Google is henceforth treason to your government then use Patriot Search!
Thanks, your search has been recorded and will be shared with the governments of the world!
I think Google did the right thing.
Google is a marketing and advertising company. First, foremost, and mostly only. The don't be evil thing is superb marketing that gained them a groundswell of grassroots support, good for them. But their stock in trade, the tins of beans on their shelves, is consumer data. This information is their livelihood. the only reason they are resisted government requests for this information is because they don't want to give up their hard won and very valuable data. Plain and simple. Once it gets into govt hands, who knows where else it will go?
This is not ethics or morals, its like asking walmart to give up their entire inventory of shop-brand cola forever, while still buying it in. That's google's position, so spare us the hero stuff. (Shakespeare?!?) I fully expect this to be modded into the topsoil by the cleansed of brain, but honestly, this is slashdot. Three strangers disagree with you and you're meant to feel bad?
What he can't kill, he has sex on. Trent.
I think it's hard to say Google's decline was due solely to the DoJ inquiry and their refusal to cooperate. The market dropped 213 points yesterday on other fears.
The link between the subpena[sp?] and the drop in Google's price is pretty weak. A better answer might be the decline in LiveDoor over in Japan because of securities fraud. Major financial organizations don't buy just a few stocks. They tend to buy quite a few and some do so with heavy leveraging. The collapse of LiveDoor probably jeapardize the liquidity of some of those organizations. To stay afloat they sold off a bunch of other stocks, including Google with its previous $400 valuation. If anyone's interested, read "When Genius Failed" to see a similar scenario like this that happened when Russia defaulted.
Combine that with the Nikkei's drop and higher oil prices, you can see why. Let's not forget people's knee jerk reaction. Also, some people got it on Google not because they believe in its financials or ideas but because they see the price go up and think that more people will pile on -- other people like themselves. They planned on selling as soon as the price start on a major move down. So perhaps the LiveDoor collapse triggered the move. Seeing this, they all tried to sell and thus magnified the change. This kind of thing is very common. Read "The Devil Takes the Hindmost" for some good examples. The phrase means that stock speculators all know that an overpriced stock will come down eventually but they all plan on selling out and handing it off to the next idiot and hopefully the last idiot is the devil. I'm not saying Google is pure speculation but I'm sure some of its buyers were speculators who only looked at the price and nothing else.
In any case, there are much better explanations or theories for the drop than just a little subpena. Anaylsts are not all geniuses, especially the ones that speak to the news media. I mean, if I was a genius and knew what's going on, why would I let other people know? You make money trading because you know or think you know more than the other party.
EvilCON - Made Famous by
As a connoisseur of finer soapy busty asian schoolgirls I would hope that they'd be tracking my selections to help improve their algorithms for everyone else. It's something I can give back to the world without any additional effort on my part. And oh by the way, YOU'RE WELCOME!
Definately no evidence the DOJ thing has anything to do with this. I wonder at this point if the Bush admin and it's friends are planting this story to punish Google for resisting their hard line views.
The whole market is down, and given how high prices Google's stock is, the drop looks all the more extreme.
Now I'm not a financial guy nor do I know a whole lot about investing and the like, but I am wondering why Google has not split this stock long ago? Their current price is doing a lot to keep small investors out of owning anything but a pittance of Google stock. Does anyone with market knowhow have an explanation for why a company would let it's stock go so high when it will suffer such extremes in value during currnent market fluctiations like right now? I know most companies split their stock when it gets expensive enough. Why not Google?
--Won't that be grand? Computers and the programs will start thinking and the people will stop. - Dr. Walter Gibbs
Let's keep swamping Google with sex searches!!! (see .sig)
So anything could prick a bubble.
Last I checked it was around 400 a share: http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=goog
And its market capitalization was around 118 billion dollars. That gives them a P/E ratio of around 88 or 89.
To put this in perspective, their market capitalization, which should be around how much money their business is worth, is about 40% of Microsoft's market cap. And Microsoft is a monopoly sitting on $40 billion of cash. Their P/E is in the low 20's.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
One of the Mozilla related blogs I read suggested filling search logs with useless data if everyone does this in the same query then both the search engines and the government will know we don't find this acceptable.
I can understand issues being brought up if requested data included the ip's or other forms of user identification, but the request made to Google was for one million pages within their index ( an incredibly small percentage of their complete index, and data that could be easily and freely compiled by conducting automated searches on google itself ) and one week's worth of searches. At no point has the DOJ requested that search terms be accompanied by ip's or userid's of individuals conducting those searches ( which are almost deffinitely stored by google anyway ). How is the request of data unassociated with individual users a breach of privacy?
Statistics are compiled on a number of products/services/figures and released daily. These statistics are generated by analysing individuals personal data, be it related to shopping, travelling, viewing, eating, etc. However when these statistics are compiled, they are done so without any complication or outry, due to the fact that the data analysed is not linked to an individuals identity.
The only problem here is Google's unwillingness to comply with a perfectly reasonable request, in the process defending its actions with its 'Do No Evil' moto to gain further public support and free publicity.
No personal data has been requested, nor would it be neccesary for the case in question.
What kind of insanity is this, that the government goes out of control, spending billions on a pointless war, spends billions more spying on its own citizens - and Google has its stock price downgraded because it stands up to a basic infringement on the rights of American citizens? Even though this would have no effect on profitability or income? Jesus Christ on a stick.
Whoever modded these words troll deserves to be locked up for no reason, never see a trial, and be tortured at Guatanomo bay. And then be "disappeared".
didn't RTFA btw
" 'Investors are worried about interest rates and inflation and they felt technology stocks like Google, Apple, Yahoo and others were able to withstand these kinds of pressure. But now that ability is in doubt, "
How does the subpoena resistance have anything to do with interest rates and inflation? Sounds like the article is a coincidence.
If I was Microsoft, I would try to lobby at the government exactly for this: getting them subpoena google every month.
And I bet, the US government is using Google pretty much exclusively if it comes to Internet search.
The boorishness and panache of the Bush administration knows no boundaries. This is one more straw on the camel's back of liberty. How far this administration will go is still unknown.
As others have said: buy Google Stock. They need no "Google Defense Fund"....
What madness. What All Star Weenies: MSN, Yahoo, and AOL-- who cave and cower and quiver in fealty to this adminstration. How mindlessly droll and insensitive....
If Google caves to the subpoena, then the last shred of dignity and privacy from the Internet is gone.
If Patrick Henry were alive, there'd be a regime change in Washington.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Now is my chance to pick up some stock at a bargain. Bless you Oh Fickle Market.
Also, there's no way knowing which queries were by children (this is about COPA, right?). If they're looking for search queries that were by children, assuming there aren't huge numbers of Square Pant's Sponge Bob fetishs out there, they can just try out the queries directly and see what the search engines return.
I suspect this is just a fishing expedition by the goverment and that they will pick and choose the data to fit whatever conclusion they see as most convenient. Kind of like SCO's strategy against IBM. "We will keep asking for discovery until we find something incriminating."
% Held by Insiders4: 35.11% % Held by Institutions4: 37.90% So... you're wrong. 295.55M shares out, aprox 80M floating... Also I remember a lot of insider selling when GOOG hit the 430 mark, you might have been right then, but now, with a free float of about 27%, you aren't.
Three tings I hate about stars: -Wars -Treks -Gates
Teach the government what its people want. Inform the lawmakers. One way to do this could be to start hitting sites that teach YOUR point of view on the search engines that you think the government will see. Punishment is very bad teaching method, as any parent may know. Retaliation is very bad tool. Shed the light instead. Be the beacon of real hope, real justice, and real change for the better. Thanks, Tuomas
I can't wait 'til you're no more successful November 2006 than you were in November 2004.
"I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anym... is today pizza day?"
Thank god you morons have the attention span of the average fruit fly.
Atheists for Bush 2006
of normal market behaviour is one way to get attention... I find it difficult to believe that a DOJ request for proprietary data would have such an impact on Google's stock price. Google is a great resource and this episode ( I'm sure it won't be the last, either) highlights a need for an encrypted, anonymous alternative to search engine access (a'la overnet?) and perhaps another searching/indexing model. As long as access records to index data are stored centrally, people will want to get at what other people are looking for and that alone is reason enough to deny them the data, especially to corporate and government entities. For legal and security purposes it might be practical to aggregate queries and filter redundant ones at semi-randomly picked proxy sites located outside the area of jurisdiction, then pass the resulting queries on to a distributed engine. This might also serve to reduce network load to the core service.
I agree 100 % with your observations. I would also add that Google relies heavily on software patents (eg the patent for the PageRank algorithm, as well as the Overture patents), and that software patents are evil, in part because they restrict the creation of free and open software.
Google made a big splash about the "Summer of Code", which IMO, is simply an attempt to buy the silence of the open source crowd by funding other open source projects that do not infringe on Google's patents. The tactic seems to have work, given the frequent positive coverage of Google on Slashdot, which is part of the Open Source Technology Group.
Investors are worried about interest rates and inflation and they felt technology stocks like Google, Apple, Yahoo and others were able to withstand these kinds of pressure.
This will determine whether or not Google is Evil in a rainbow guise or not, if they can withstand pressure from the shareholders to uphold greater virtues "WE SHALL SACRIFICE A LAMB and FEAST".
GOOG is just following the market down. Every time the market moves, the analysts have to come up with an explanation, which is almost always bogus.
It seems extraordinarily clumsy of the Justice Department to subpoena this information from the search engines. First and foremost, by what right can the US government require confidential information from a company or person when there is no criminal action contemplated? The fourth amendment protects against unreasonable search and seizure, and this seems to be just such a case.
Fourth Amendment
Second, the traditional way for the US government to get this kind of information is to fund a 'study' and pay the web search companies for a series of analyses on a given topic of interest. The companies get to keep their methods confidential, get some return for their trouble, and the government has the benefit of expert analysis. Is this ethical? I'm sure Google and the government could agree on a degree of data anonymity that would satisfy both parties.
In this specific case, it appears that the government is trying to access data that isn't going to satisfy their objective. By being confrontational, they aren't going to get the benefit of Google's guidance.
Finally, it's pretty cynical to try to extract this information under the guise of combating child pornography. They are trying to get their nose in the tent using an issue that no one dares to counter.
Why do they need to really log what you are doing?
/., everyone just said "google is good! they loves teh me!" and thought they were just defending the user...
Because Google is a company. Companies like to make money. Search results are gold to Google. I agree if Google were the perfect virgin company we all would believe they are, they shouldn't keep records - adsense should work on the fly, no profiling. Fact is profiling works, and they make a killing off of it. I believe they aren't bowing to the DOJ to hide the extent of their profiling and because they are afraid of revealing (somehow) trade secrets - which they partially saidin their subpoena reply. Of course, being
Google hands over the search records to the government and loses user credit forever.
- Chirac had to go mainstream or resign and end his mandate as a looser.
And what happens when the government finds a query for "How to rape a child". Will the government feel it has the need, for public safety of course, to request the ip of that request? How will google respond? What would it look like to the public if google refuses to give for THAT request? What happens if google gives in and then the government asks for more IPs based on other queries, "How to make Meth at home", "How to murder and get away with it", "bush pork barrel spending", "Bush funny pictures". If you give in on one your going to be presured to give in for others. Look at bush and the current abuse of the what used to be our rights and tell me theat they wouldnt also abuse this.
Listening to talk radio yesterday, I was surprised to hear Xmission received and complied with a similar request to hand over all their web traffic logs to DOJ. I believe every major ISP has been issued with a similar request.
The patriot act has been used to force compliance with a wide sweeping DOJ porn sweep.
The request is not perfectly reasonable. The government is asking for lots and lots of data from Google to support their argument for a bill.
I don't know about you, but there is absolutely no possible justification for this. A subpoena is meant to compel testimony in a court proceeding, not to steal data on your citizens for the soul purpose of possibly justifyiny a conclusion you made based off of hyperbole.
The Yasashii Syndicate ||
Basically, Google said no basically because disclosing information on search to the govt puts them at risk for all kinds of outside data mining. Also, if Google disclosed information and I knew about it I'd use another search engine.
Specifically, the founders hold all the voting stock of the Company. Everyone else has non-voting stock. Even if other investors hold a large number of shares of non-voting stock, which outnumber the voting shares, they can't do squat. This was a brilliant move on Google's part. Fund the Company like a public one, but run it like a private one (ie with long-term goals and responsibility).
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
GE missed their earnings mark for 4Q- I watched as the Dow and to a lesser extent, NASDAQ, went into a short freefall at the time of the financials statement from GE. Nearly everything got pasted in the market yesterday.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
I think the bush administration has already lost.
The kind of McCarthyesque trend that the bush administration has been promoting tends to fall apart when the people get tired of it and someone very publicly stands up against it.
Gonzales might have gotten away with this in the post 9/11 hysteria.
Now, years and broken promises later people are tired of it all.
Gonzales already lost it for the bush administration by having Google tell him "No".
If he pursues them in court he will just draw more public attention and outrage to the situation, worsening the bush administration image with every public word that is spoken about it.
At some point the government will just reqire them to hand over the data, under threat of jail time for contempt. So this is all just for show. " see we fought for your privacy".
What they are not thinking about is the ramifications later of pissing off the man. The government has a long memory. ( espcially since once you elect someone they tend to stay for life..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Actually, 'Don't Be Evil' is firmly ingrained in as part of Google's business model. It's explicitly stated in their SEC Filing (top of page vi). Of course, this leaves open wide interpretation of how to qualify 'evil', but I'm pretty sure the shareholders can't simply bypass it entirely. That is, it's very slightly more than just an informal motto.
Doesn't this starkly expose the futility and dysfunctionality of the stock market system, and discredit the idea that "the free market" has some sort of guiding hand that will give the best results?
What kind of insanity is this, that the government goes out of control, spending billions on a pointless war, spends billions more spying on its own citizens - and Google has its stock price downgraded because it stands up to a basic infringement on the rights of American citizens? Even though this would have no effect on profitability or income? Jesus Christ on a stick.
First, I must comment on "the free market". With all the regulations and such, it's not free. Maybe compared to Soviet Russia, but still very restrictive compared to a libertarian version. Second, in what way is the market dysfunctional when a stock drops? Isn't it actually working exactly as it should, with the stock going to the price level the market forces believe it to belong in? Third, it isn't dropping because of this subpoena. It's dropping because the market forces are starting to realize how overpriced Google is. I don't care how much someone thinks Google will grow, with a P/E ratio of ~80 it would have to quadruple it's earnings to even be in the ballpark of reasonable (personally I do not think a P/E of 20 is reasonable, but if Google would continue with strong growth it might be acceptable).
"Subpoena Resistance Hurts Google Stock"
should be:
"Subpoena Hurts Google Stock"
The Resistance is the only reason the stock didn't drop by 20%. Our federal PR machine would like you to believe that the resistance is the problem.
The government which is strong enough to protect you from everything is strong enough to take everything from you.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Finally someone has got to the essence of the request for information. It's summary data merely intended to support the case that child porn continues unencumbered and that children have unfettered access to porn.
Instead of "Do no evil" Google has gone to the extreme of "Report no evil." Like an ostrich with its head in the sand Google wants to pretend that there is no evil in the world when in fact their tool can be used as an instrument of evil.
Here's my new slogan, "Combat evil." Alas, that takes moral clarity and moral courage so I doubt a for profit company will have the integrity to do it.
Give it up. People who can't see what is happening by now are never going to see.
We need to just accept that in the future there will be two prison systems. One for the guilty, and one for the presumed guilty. Oh nevermind. I forgot we already have that in place.
--TheShow
Google is at fault here. How would someone find porn on the internet - ask friends, look up in the newspaper..No! When people want to search for porn, they go to google. Google is the front door to the porn world. It would be a fair assumption to make that folks looking for child porn are primarily using search engines such as Google to find it.
Secondly, Google collects massive amount of data on users searches', and is always looking for ways to utilize that data. That data is only a legal paper away. If Google hadn't collected so much data about users, it won't be in this trouble now.
Google has had a nightmarish privacy record, and this thing could bring the company down. The govt. wants to strengthen its case before the courts so that it can have an effective law which curbs child porn. It does not want your or mine search results, it simply wants some aggregate data which is not person specific but is indicative of the child porn activity on the web. Google is opposing this ! Shame on you Google.
Google - Privacy; Microsoft - Security.
% Held by Insiders4: 35.11% % Held by Institutions4: 37.90% So... you're wrong.
Not really. Because the insiders hold class B shares, while outsiders have class A shares. Each class B share has 10 votes, each class A share has only one. So the insiders own ~30% of the company, but control ~80% of the votes. It looks to me like Larry Page and Sergey Brin can outvote all the rest of the stockholders combined.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
The NASDAQ got hit for 2.35%, S&P 500 for 1.8%. Big losses across the board, and I'd expect a young tech company with a high PE like Google to get slammed worse than the averages. So I doubt this has anything to do with the DoJ. Typical stock rag reporting. A happened. B happened later. Therefore, B was caused by A.
See this is why shares are so unpredicatable right now.
The fact that an irrelavant mass-media news report which has absolutly nothing to do with profitability / performance can have a greater impact on a companies share price than a highly relevant future profitability / performance report shows something is not right.
This is not the way business should be done. Regardless of the possilibities for corruption by media executives (who by the way are getting quite involved in tech companies) share prices (and the livelihoods tided up in them) should not be dominated by the publics voyeuristic news appetite of the day.
When business finance and investment starts becoming so petty, crashes start taking place.
From the NY Times:
http://www.uazuay.edu.ec/bibliotecas/conectividad
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
I think Google's good conduct is an essential component of their role within their industry. I think there was actually a surprisingly large untapped market for a "reputable" search service - one that wouldn't do payola results, sell your "video rental history" to the highest bidder, and be frightened into censoring you at the drop of a legal hat.
I think providing good results in a clean interface was absolutely key to Google's success, but I also think their technique is not earth-shattering and has already been copied by Microsoft and Amazon and others. One of the key things that will keep people with Google from here on out is their distinctive corporate ethics, which will make people feel safe and secure sticking with them, and distrustful of their competitors. You can make as mundane a comparison as the lucrative organic food market, where the internet is disproportionately full of picky eaters. But I think it's more basic than that, I think that reputation propagates down from trend setters and opinion makers, and many many people "get it." I think this is vital to Google's survival, and I think they know it.
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It doesn't matter whether they have voting stock. Even though they can't vote on the direction of the company, they are investors and Google is still accountable to them. In other words, they could sue the management for damages if this goes too far and they lose money.
Google was affected by the whole market going down yesterday as investors dumped yesterday due to earnings reports from the big boys in the market. Don't you guys read Yahoo?
They should deliver it in written form. Bound journals filled with binary.
Not mutally exclusive with that idea would be an attempt to use the story to build a link for future supoenas. This time the dip was probably part of the general market dip as the result of the probelms in Japan (which everyone has been waiting years for it to implode still) Maybe enough sheeple will swallow the story this time so that next time, they do react when Bush's handles want customer data. Since stock price is not linked to reality but instead only to perception, creating an association may be the real goal.
People are skitish after the Inet bubble "popped" and Googles stock is quite high (perhaps unrealistically high)people will bail because they think the stock is ready to drop, not because Google said no to the Feds.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Any AI/expert system engine that tries to 'learn' from user interactivity would keep track of this. It would be a useful thing to know the mapping between any user's query versus which of the results that user clicks, giving them more weight.
Why not look at this part of the article:
"The most obvious reason were the mixed earnings results from Yahoo," Standard & Poor's analyst Scott Kessler said of Tuesday's disappointing quarterly earnings report from Yahoo Inc
It's not like Google was the only stock to take a dive, the market was hurting yesterday. The Tokyo stocks have been hurting for the past few days (or at least hurting badly). Sure, there could be fear about the Justice department scrutiny. It could also just be that everythings hurting right now. Correlation does not necessarily mean causation (to butcher a phrase).
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
A perfect example of the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy. Zonk, you're an idiot - or an unscrupulous intellectual arsonist. But then, thinking about it, that's true for every Slashdot editor, and it's not even news...
quidquid latine dictum sit altum videtur.
Google is just influential enough to make some changes in the way "shareholders" influence a company. The value of a company is not based solely on the value of its shares. The value of its product has no bearing on that of its shares (except where it's a popularity contest such as in the world of fashion and pop). If Google's disapproving shareholders sell their shares causing the price to fall, I say SO BE IT! Other people who do approve will come alone and buy them.
I think that once the "boogey man" of the shareholders is exposed, perhaps other corporations will be steered more by moral and quality compases rather than those of the booget-man-shareholders.
Google and Yahoo are viewed as doing similar things. Yahoo had a bad quarter, so Google was traded down.
Alternately it could be because their P/E was over 100 and people started to wonder if they really were worth that much.
Additionally, I also heard that people are concerned about click fraud. Something like 30% of ad click-throughs are fradulent (I hear), and I guess there is concern that this will reduce the value of ad placements on the internet and thus impact Google's income.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
There are already far too many forums on the web that discuss stocks.
Federal subpoena over Google: a new marketing oportunity
http://google-blog.dirson.com/post.new/0345/
Well it goes beyong user privacy. The government is requesting this information to help revive COPA (the Child Online Protection Act), which google may not want or agree with. Many net users disagreed with the bill when it first passed, so this wouldn't be all that surprising.
.xxx domain, in fear that it would give porn some kind of legitimacy. Of course if the goal is to protect children, .xxx sure would make filtering a lot easier. Even requiring sites to flag content not suitable for minors would help filtering, but they want COPA style censorship. Their argument will be that filters are inneffective, either because they can be bypassed by a saavy teenager or because they simply don't catch everything.
Also, if there are no ip addresses revealed I don't see the utility of the data. Even if ip addresses were released, wouldn't the government have to also subopena ISPs for the associated personal data - at least if they wanted to find out if there was lots of browsing from houses where minors live? So what exactly are they trying to conclude? Any statisticians willing to speculate?
If they are looking for queries for child porn how will they differentiate just what queries were for child porn? Many porn titles use the word young and teen, would they exclude those or use them to build up their numbers? Also since child porn is already illegal, how would a wider reaching COPA style law changing anything?
This administration has also said that it is gearing up to go after parts the porn industry directly, as they feel certain companies have pushed the boundaries too far on indecency. I thought these things were state/community matters, but I guess not. From the sound of things, I believe they will be announcing indictments against deviant pornagraphy involving consenting adults, so I can't say I trust their intentions.
This administration has also opposed the creation of the
So... Why not require websites to self-flag, combined with passworded filtering options that operate at the ISP end?
COPA style censorship requires age verification by the site, which usually involves identification via credit card. It also lets some federal office pick where to draw the line (power + low accountability is no good) and would chill many adults from viewing material they want. This is because credit card records aren't always that private, and viewing porn requires incredible discretion because of social mores. The new registered airline traveler program requires disclosure of credit card records, and the Total Information Awarness program that this administration supported called for indexing everyones'. Spouses may also see credit card records, along with bank employees. COPA would certainly make adults think twice before viewing porn online, and I think this is part of a hidden agenda.
The court ruled when striking down COPA that protecting minors can be done w/o such overreaching. I don't see the effort to revive COPA as anything more than these these puritan officials trying to nanny us. There are ways for parental control to be achieved w/o sacrificing the freedom of adults.
I applaud google for refusing the subopena, and think this will pan out well for the shareholders, as maintaining user trust will only help in the long term.
If you want to spin things, you might say that MSN, AOL and Yahoo all lost value because they lost customer trust by selling them out. Well, look at this, I'm not the only person who thinks that way. If Google fails to keep their customer data confidential, all tech firms will suffer.
As for the crosshairs of the DOJ, has the reporter forgoten about the big M$ anti-trust case and continued monitoring? Microsoft is not in the crosshairs, they are in the jaws of the DOJ vice and can be squeezed at will. Any change in Washington's mood can have M$ paying fines or split into companies the size of a fruit stand.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Strange, because this MSNBC article says Google[s] stand could be good for business. I guess you can spin this story any way you want.
You guys never see the light at the end of any tunnel. You only see more tunnel, which makes you think that a silent train running without a headlight is going to hit you at any moment. For the most part, you guys are right to be cautious, but something tells me that even in what appears to be a time for righteous and just pessimism, there is no consensus of faith among you, in common human decency, even when people have bought and earned your trust with free services and products so many of you guys use. I guess the point is that if it's not under the GPL, you can't trust it. That's a bad attitude, but falls in line with what I expect from the Slashdot horde.
.com bust, has scrambled to dig the change out of the couch, and they haven't really even looked to see if it's even their couch, or if they are pissing off the owners of said couch.
I don't work for Google, but I do see a chance for these two guys who do want to leave a positive impact, and unlike Microsoft, without evil dirty business ethics. You can say they refused any request for search data because of financial reasons related to giving up hard earned consumer data, but I think Google has managed to make money in a way that actually positions us to dole out more favor for them, over any other company of it's size. Think about the fact that while they are an ad distribution channel, their ads are subdued and don't play any part in perpetuating the annoying variety of web ads. I've yet to see a Google based popup or annoying flash ad in the middle of the screen. What I've seen are quiet text based ads that are in line with the context to the site they are on.
Because "don't be evil" is more or less telling you guys what you want to hear, you reject it on principle that Google is paying you lip service, so you quietly scoff at their financial success, all the while using GMail accounts, Google's web presence for video, image searching, or really, any other kind of searching. Oh yeah, and I _love_ Picasa. I'll sing its praises on another day.
Google has shaped the face of the internet company to be more substantial than flashy. Also, unlike Yahoo, you don't find out every week that you've been opted into some sneaky spying software like web beacons. Yahoo, since the days of the
Until Google installs a rootkit, an expose is written defining how they use GMail to leverage their business in a sneaky way, or if somehow, like Yahoo, they are attempting to keep track of every website you visit, even the ones at 3AM with a disproportionate number of JPEGs, with twice as many boobies. (Unless you are into cyclops boobs, which I wouldn't put past some the guys who beat off to the female elves in MMOs.)
... there is no cause for concern. (Got so wrapped up into not being a total pill, that I forgot to end the sentence.) :)
"Stop Searching"
Forget the stock price, do you approve of the government looking into your searching habits? I dont.
Remember when it was said ' they would never do that' just a couple of years ago when echelon was all the talk? Welp, welcome to 'never'.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
All -
This article really overstates things. Google - at over $400 a share - was significantly overvalued on a Discounted Cash Flow(1) basis. At just(!) $300 a share, Google would have to grow at its current rates for 5+ years to be fairly valued.
Let's be clear here, I believe that Google is a great company (and living in Mountain View, am looking forward to their free WiFi for our community) and will continue to influence the business world, our society, and culture for a long time to come. But I also can see when a company is overvalued. At between $100-$200 a share, Google would be fairly valued.
Google has been - and still is - in a bubble. As we say in 2000/2001, a small event can puncture a bubble and cause a stock to drop in value. The DOJs subpoenas may just be the event that puncture's Google's bubble.
Yours,
Jordan
1. Discounted Cash Flow or DCF is the sum of all future cash flows discounted back to the present. It is the best way to get an intrinsic value for a stock.
Ideally, you wish to purchase stocks of companies trading below their intrinsic value. Of course, buying below intrinsic value is as much art as science, but it is possible.
The question based on google's policy should they not provide information to the DoJ, since it is a "enforceable governmental request" or are they questing that?
i nformation/
Google only shares personal information with other companies or individuals outside of Google in the following limited circumstances:
* We have your consent. We require opt-in consent for the sharing of any sensitive personal information.
* We provide such information to our subsidiaries, affiliated companies or other trusted businesses or persons for the purpose of processing personal information on our behalf. We require that these parties agree to process such information based on our instructions and in compliance with this Policy and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures.
* We have a good faith belief that access, use, preservation or disclosure of such information is reasonably necessary to (a) satisfy any applicable law, regulation, legal process or enforceable governmental request, (b) enforce applicable Terms of Service, including investigation of potential violations thereof, (c) detect, prevent, or otherwise address fraud, security or technical issues, or (d) protect against imminent harm to the rights, property or safety of Google, its users or the public as required or permitted by law.
http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacypolicy.html#
How do they really know it was because of the supoena that Google stock dropped. Did they take a poll of investors? The NYSE dropped 213 points yesterday. A lot of stocks went down in value.
I never have understood how the media can always declare with certainty that a particular event caused a stock or stock market to react a certain way.
But what defines "Evil?" Is porn evil? Is kiddie porn evil? Is information on how to cut heroin evil?
This battle has nothing to do with evil. It has everything to do with the control of information.
My Sysadmin Blog
I hope Google keeps denying access to Bush's henchmen. In fact, we should all stop cooperating with Bush's farce and PR/FUD campaign known as the "War on Terra"--it's all about a Presidential power grab and this patriot knows who the real threat to this country is, and that's George W. Bush.
Steve Magruder, Metro Foodist
I find it interesting how you managed to mis-spell subpoena with it sitting on the title bar of your browser.
This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
Slashdot should not report on things the do not understand (the stock market). Yahoo reported earnings that was lower than expected (they missed earnings estimates). The interpretation here is that the market for online advertising (although Yahoo doesn't rely on advertising as much as Google) has slowed. Google was affected as investors believe that rather than Google (who has not released earnings yet) will also be affected by this and also miss their estimates.
All of the news coverage of Google's "slide" is designed to punish Google for their refusal to comply with the wishes of the Republicans... "Release your search data to us or else bad things will happen to you[r stock]." Hopefully Google will hold on for the ride.
The Death Penalty: Killing people to show others that killing people is wrong.
Like you can't pay your taxes in all pennies. Even though it is legal tender.
Blar.
It is a zero sum game! Thousands of traders made big $$$'s going short on GOOG in the days before the crash. THEY knew nothing about the DOJ. IT had to do 99% with cashing out. Trading the markets now for almost 40 years __ And I still don't no which way google will go at the bell on Monday __ but I do know that YHOO call options are a deal! :-) Happy trading!
Google has dual class stock. Class A gets 1 vote per share, Class B gets 10. Google execs held on to all of the Class B shares, so they retain voting control of the company. http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1288776/000 119312504142742/ds1a.htm
He would have never subpoena google to this orweillian action. Why can't we get back to the good old days..
True enough. I'm wasn't so much replying to him as I was adding my comment so that readers on the fence could see that this is a serious issue and that google did the right thing. If he hadn't been modded 'insightful' by some fool, I wouldn't have thought it necessary.
Patriot Search sounds like it's a search for missiles.
What did Google do when told by the record companies to take certain sites off of their search. If I remember correctly they did just that... and then linked the written-request also, which named all of the sites they wanted removed from their search engine. It'll be amusing to watch how this all plays out.
I have mod points, but I can't find "-1 Ignorant".
This is by far the most clear & concise explanation to the whole mess.
Thanks!
Mod points are a dangerous tool. Abuse them wisely.
Or it could just be that Wall Street suffered a record lose since March 24, 2003.
:P.
The BBC story dated Friday, 20 January 2006, 22:44 GMT.
I think we can also safely conclude that Google's stock going down implies vi is the superior editor
I would rather buy from a company that observed the due process of law and was not cavalier with my and others data.
Microsoft and Yahoo! will lose out for kao-taoing to China government over the rights of its customers.
In China in years to come those who died for democracy and freedom will be remembered as will Western companies greedily betraying the hard won Human Rights of their customers.
Now it is clear that these companies will do this at home in the U.S. and probably anywhere.
Investors getting prissy isn't the same as losing the respect and custom of those whose data you keep. I think this is a good move for google not just morally right but it is commercially right and right by its customers, i.e. those that pay the bills.
If I were in charge at Google right now, I'd be taking a sledge hammer to the disks those query logs are stored on...
Register the editry.
Take a look at GOOGs price the day before the news broke. It was already on the decline in high volume (almost as high as after the news broke)...insider trading.
In other business news, Microsoft was unable to confirm or deny receipt of a large shipment of reel-to-reel tapes with no return address and a Fort Meade, MD postmark.
One might ask the same about birds. What ARE birds? We just don't know.
I have a stupid question:
Google is not being asked to hand over any IP or personal information related data, right? And the government wants this data it's asking for to review/revive the COPA, right? The purpose being to prevent children from accessing porn, right?
How do the search results help them at all? Say I go and serch "Hardcore P0rn" on Google right now. If they don't know if I'm 15 or 50, how does it help the government?
What am I missing?
"I am the state".
But maybe you live in China, Cuba or North Korea, that wuld excuse your sorry confussion.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
They did the right thing by resisting the subpoena in my opinion and I hope in most Americans opinions (if they value living in a free society).
The other thing is that their stock was (and still is) insanely overvalued.
I hope they stay the course and resist. It wouldn't surprise me if the "Justice" Department went after them under some bullshit pretense; especially with the government we have in the US now, one that has grown and gotten out of control over the years; one that does not represent the people and is unaccountable to them in any real way; one where dissent is being criminalized; one that is a racket; full of racketeers and corruption, (both institutionalized corruption that masquerades as legitmate government practices) and the completely illegal kind.
America. Heading deeper into fascism at record speed.
By fighting legitimate inquiries by the U.S. justice department.
If we can save even a single life of a US soldier, on the front lines in Iraq fighting the people who attacked us on 9/11, it's worth giving the government the limited information they requested.
Google's revenue would be hurt if people beleived that Big Brother were watching their surfing/searching habbits. If people believed that they were being tracked while searching, they would probably start using another service. Since Google's revenue is largely dependent on Adsense, this decrease in searching would lead to lower revenue. It would also allow a new company to more easily dethrone Google.
The market is lowering their price because they believe that Google may have to one day give up search data which will lower their revenue.
I find it so silly to digest that the stock is down because of Google's opposition to subpoena. Does it going to hurt the bottomline ? Gimme a break guys! Ramani and his team have been flexing their muscles as they haven't had any action unlike their engineering team.
Yahoo lacks innovation and is letting the whole sector down. Hopefully Google will reverse the trend soon.
All of the financial markets are based on a simple concept. It is the "some shmuck" theory. It goes something like this. I buy X and I buy it under the belief that "some shmuck" will buy it from me later for more money. The company performance, world economy, etc, do not matter. All that matters is the ability for you to find another shmuck.
Think about it for a moment. After the IPO for a stock is over, what value does a share of their stock really have if they don't offer a dividend? If the company is worth $200,000 or $200,000,000,000, the stock's value is completely arbitrary based on the number of shmucks lined up to buy it.
Good example: VA Linux. At IPO it went from $30 to $300. Why? There were a lot of shmucks who wanted it. They wanted it because they thought some other shmuck would but it at $400. As it turns out there were no such shmucks.
The housing market is the same way right now, though a bit different because everybody has to live somewhere. So there's a definite value in property other than the "some shmuck" value. Having said that, you know there's a lot of people buying $500,000 postage stamps on the assumption that some shmuck will pay them $600,000 or a million.
Of course, eventually, you run out of shmucks. You can tell when a crash is coming because everybody you talk to talks about whatever the hot commodity is at the moment. Suddenly everybody's a dot com developer, or they're a realtor making scads of money. They talk about how housing prices always go up 5-10% year (even though incomes have dropped relative to inflation for the past few years). They say crazy things about how we've eliminated the business cycle and we'll have steady low inflation growth until the infinite future. Then he shmucks run out and it all comes crashing down.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service
I had a private eye contact me because a young runaway teen (~15 yo) was using my e-mail services. I had previously enabled all logging (another fun story) and so I checked the logs, verified the story (I also found the kid listed on the missing and exploited children website) and tracked down where the kid was. I call up the private eye and not too long later the kid was returned home.
One could bitch about privacy but frankly the safety of child is a little more important. Nobody but me read any of the logs. All the PI got was an IP address that ended up verifying his hunch.
I think Google should consider the consequences of NOT using it's resources to save children.
If Google both refuses to offer up it's logs relevant to people searching for child porn AND refuses to do it's own investigations and reporting to the proper authorities then Google is allowing evil where they could easily do something about it.
And that quite simply is pathetic and I wouldn't be surprised if their stock continued to plummet. Instead of "Do No Evil" their motto would degrade to "Be Apathetic To Evil"
Sure the child porn people could do their searches elsewhere but with years of backlogs, it's a little late for a significant number of them. Google no doubt also has a cache of numerous child porn sites which could be used as evidence in trials.
The other fun story I mentioned earlier resulted in a dead end because I traced the alledged criminal to an ISP in the UK which refused to do anything about them. Later their account at the ISP was disabled so the authorities may have knocked some sense into them. In the meantime I had to call people up myself (I bet you can guess what was being stolen) and let them know what happened.
It would be pretty stupid of me to ignore the fact that people's information and SSN numbers were being stolen simply because of a privacy statement. I think people would rather not have their identity stolen when someone with a simple phone call could have prevented it or at least mitigated the damages.
Imagine brick and mortar stores allowing customers to commit criminal activity within their walls and then hiding them behind a privacy statement or defending their blindness to it because of a privacy statement. That is exactly what Google is doing. And it is indefensible. If you try to develop child porn photos at a store you will be reported by the store to the authorities. What makes Google so special? Right now they sound like every other company that doesn't care two cents about its customers.
Yes they have a lot more data making it more difficult to find the things I easily found but that's what the government is for.
Work Safe Porn
...Nothing pisses me off more than people who don't understand informal fallacies using them in lieu of addressing an actual argument.
Deductive Logic is a GIGO machine, but a very efficient one. The formal structure assures the integrity of the machine. However, philosophers over the years (starting with Aristotle) have recognized that some types of input tend to lead to garbage output. (Note the word 'tend' for it will be important later.)
Not all language is argument. Thus, when someone observes "you seem to believe..." or "sounds to me that you...", they are not making an argument, they are making an observation (whether correctly or incorrectly). Observation processes are primarily inductive, and are thus formally flawed (affirming the consequent), and so do not guarantee the integrity of the result. If that observation happens to be incorrect, and they later use that observation as an element of that argument, it will likely not be a correct argument, though the argument itself is sound (valid and avoids the usual informal pitfalls).
What is really important in all of this is that informal fallacies are general guidelines for analyzing an argument for soundness, not hard and fast rules. Sometimes, an observation about a person is a legitimate element of an argument (such as if the argument deals with the veracity or tendency of action of that person) and as such are not automatically 'ad hominem' if introduced. It all depends on the overall context of the argument.
The same is true of other informal fallacies; they are guidelines for input of argument, and so are in fact a good starting point when one is looking for weaknesses in an argument. However, except in extremely egrecious cases, simply citing them is not sufficient to effectively critique an argument.
All the techniques ever used to make men moral have been themselves thoroughly immoral... (Nietzsche)
Look at the charts. These things have stages. It has nothing to do with the DOJ. And, it might still rally before it crashes. But what you are seeing in the charts, is the smart money getting out, and the public feeling fear. Have a look at the charts from 2001. You will see the exact same thing.
Or, if you want to be frightened, have a look at Radio in '29. Same thing.
Read Rothbard while you are at it.
Wild fluctuations in stock prices always take place the third Friday of each month due to Options expiration. Insiders who knew Google stock would decline 8 percent on Friday made 10,000 percent or more by buying a "put" option on Thursday. The MSM never attribute price fluctuations
to options expiration, in this case they blamed "GE earnings reports." Next Feb 17 it will be the same story, the pros will target some other stock to go way up or down on that date and insider trading fortunes will be made.
Google OBVIOUSLEY has the upper hand.
What are the Jew-Mafia supporting Feds gunnu do, shut down google?
So the fud starts.
No doubt those in authority at Google have/are being threatened to submit.
You will continuely see these despicable acts done by the Jewish Mafia, via the spinleless U.S. Federal Authorities-- until, well, we stop them.
-- SlashDot's Moderation System is not broke. It is fixed.
I will gladly loose all of life's battles.. in order to win the war..
Yahoo missed their targets and analysts got jittery about google suggesting their growth might slow this quarter.
All this happened at the same time as a general market decline. It has nothing to do the Justice Department, go read the financial news.
He probably thought the editors and the submitter misspelled it in the first place ;)
Think about it.
....
Google values the privacy of their customers more than Microsoft, AOL,
If you're searching the net, and you want your privacy protected, use Google
But the grandparent poster's point, if I understand correctly, is that that is precisely the reason not to split. Companies that avoid splits do not want to make it possible for smaller investors to own shares.
Are you adequate?
This case has NOTHING to do with "child porn". Please read the facts again.
There is no harmful behavior going on here, and there is no evidence of criminal behavior being asked for.
The government is trying to force a company to do its legal research for them.
PageRank is patented. From the Google IPO Prospectus
PageRank has now evolved to become an umbrella term covering the original patented PageRank technology as well as a variety of other technologies. However, this is the Google marketing division's attempt to deceive people just like you. LOL, seems to have worked, hasn't it?
By the way, Stanford's Office of Technology and Licensing had a policy of only allowing licensees (ie the developers of technology patented by Stanford) to have a non-exclusive license. This apparently changed when Google lobbied the President of Stanford, John Hennessey, by giving him 65,000 shares of the company.
Since when is bribing not evil?
You missed the point. Google gave in to Overture (therefore Yahoo), thereby validating the specific software patents and legitimizing the general concept of software patents. If Google were "not evil" (as advertised), they would either have fought the legitimacy of the patents or at least tried to devise a solution around the patents, much as Microsoft tried to do with Eolas. Instead, giving in to the lawsuit is a little like giving hostage takers what they want, which encourages more hostage taking.
Consider what happened when evil SCO tried to sue IBM for billions of dollars? IBM refused to cave in, and now SCO is in financial upheaval.
Consider what happened when Anna Ayala claimed to find an amputated finger in her chili bowl at Wendy's in San Jose, California? Wendy's refused to cave in, refused to settle out of court, refused to blink an eye. As a result of Wendy's strong stance and declaration of innocence, confessions were made, the owner of the finger came out of hiding, and the whole thing was revealed to be a hoax. Recently Ayala and her husband were each sentenced to about a decade in prison. Wendy's not only scored a victory for itself; it sent a strong message to other criminals who might be targeting businesses with similar lawsuits.
The moral of the story: If somebody evil is trying to take advantage of you, you fight back. You can fight back non-violently like Gandhi. But you still fight.
Remember when Luke Skywalker, whose HAND was amputated, refused to join Darth Vader during The Empire Strikes Back? Luke fought the only way he could: he let go of the platform, risking his life, so that he would not be an ally of evil, and therefore not evil himself. Luckily he didn't break his back while sliding out of Cloud City onto that antenna.
If you join forces with known evil, you can't claim to "Do no evil." Google's settlement out of court essentially subsidized Overture/Yahoo's ability to entangle others -- including open source developers -- into costly litigation over the Overture patents.
In any event, Google and its groupies should just shut up about the "Do no evil" tagline because it's not true, it's self-indulgent, and ridiculous.
I purchased some Google at the IPO and decided to hold it long-term. I've been watching it in amazement ever since. As far as I can determine, the reason for Google's dip is because a certain analyst (and a disgraced one, at that) announced that Google was going to drop, and several news outlets picked it up. I'd been watching it closely over this week, wondering whether or not I should bail.
Then I heard the news about Google's resisting that subpoena. That decided me; I'm happy to help support their stock price and maintain my investment indefinitely so long as they maintain their dedication.
One way Google can live up to it's "Don't be evil" policy is by handing over the information that will help stop sexual predators from preying on young teenagers. In the end they will have to overturn their evidence or face the consequences of 'obstruction of justice'. Maybe Google should change it's policy to "Do the right thing". :)
I'll tell youm what happened and WHY it happened. Some major news organisations claimed that google was "protecting search information about terrorists". I have proof as well, 'The Daily Buzz' is a major news show on in the morning, and they DID claim that google was protecting terrorist information, and in the words of one of the guys who was anchoring for the show: "gooogle should give up with terrorist information". I believe google has the right to sue 'The Daily Buzz' for this blatant lie.
much trouble is that this was made into political issue. I have a child and to put it mildly, when a billion dollar company refuses to help in working on law that may help to defend children from porn, I want this company out. -- cheers
BFD! If google believes it needs to take a stand then all the power to them. Just because some government agency wants information doesn't mean they are entitled to it, and there proof is in the suponmea. If the DOJ can't get a Subpoena than they don't need that information. AOL, MSN, and Yahoo are just plane old spineless worms who can't or won't stand up for there rights and the rights of there customers.
Yes, but if the private eye had said "there might be pr0n" and asked for all your logs, would you have complied? That's essentially what the DoJ are doing, as far as I cas see. The courts care about crime too, but don't necessarily allow "fishing expeditions" in case there may be some evidence of something somewhere.
Paul "Say no to feeping creaturism"
Google must have forgotten to let in mr Bush and on the IPO.
I am really sick of Google's inflated stock. The sooner it tanks the better it will be in the long run.
> Actually, unless they recently changed it - California property taxes are based on the purchase price of the house.
Don't know about CA, they are the crazy ones after all, but most places tend to behave as you describe in the typical case, only changing a property value when it changes hands. But you can challenge and get a new apraisal if the value has changed greatly. And of course the opposite is also true, the government can also come and reappraise your property if they think the value has gone up enough to justify the bother.
Democrat delenda est
My apologies, your question was sincere. I use the word libertarian to mean maximum personal freedoms, with minimal government. Therefore I do not believe a society where a minority of people are allowed to dictate rules to the rest of the populus is very libertarian, so from these two flavours meritocracy is closer to my views. I am however not a voter of the U.S. libertarians, but I do vote for the libertarians in my country. Sadly it seems libertarianism isn't very popular anywhere, but I have a feeling that will change in time.
I can hear a chair being thrown in Redmond summoning the correct opinions to be drawn up in the usual places that ran out of nice things to say about SCO, and are looking for another Microsoft friendly topic. This one is going to take months and maybe years to wind through. Plenty of time to craft some anti-Google FUD.
Would it be evil for Google to dig up search and browser info of some prominent Senators/Justice Department/White House types and uhhh, twist some arms? Yeah, I guess so. Google is sitting on the informational(?) equivalent of the Saudi oil fields and the secret of nuclear fission combined.By this I mean they are sitting on a resource any government would _need_ to have. They can either:
1) Go to bed with the Feds and sell their soul.
or
2)Fight the Feds by morphing into something even more evil.
I'd like to hear a third option. Even if Google wins this battle I fear the war can't be won. Perhaps a third option is enough folks lose faith in the free internet that we go back to pencil and paper. Not likely I admit, but that might be the healthiest outcome.
Be heard || Be herd
Analyists downgraded because Google will fight this.
God fobid we have constitution, so buy on the dip.
I didn't lose my ass in the crash, what they are are doing is American which is more than George Fucking loser.
"No good deed ever goes unpunished"
(It's never too late to join the Renaissance)
There's no scam. Everyone that invests in Google is aware of the stock structure and concedes to it when buying shares. There are lots of companies set up this way.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
Your ignorance is showing. That you ask such questions shows you not only lack moral clarity but are morally bankrupt.
No. The fact that I asked that question only shows that evil depends on your point of view. Its relative.
While Child-Porn is almost universially regarded as bad, adult consensual porn and drugs are not agreed upon. Some think that porn and drugs are evil, others don't see that view.
My Sysadmin Blog
Comment removed based on user account deletion
http://www.e-thepeople.org/petition/14787/view
Send-out date : March 1, 2006
Recipients :
John Ashcroft, Attorney General
Jay B. Stephens, Associate Attorney General
Larry D. Thompson, Deputy Attorney General
The Bush administration has asked a federal judge in San Jose, California, to force Google to comply with a subpoena for information which would reveal the search terms of a broad swath of the search engine's visitors.
We the undersigned believe this is a violation of privacy, oversteps the boundarys of the US Goverment's constitutional authority, and applaud Google's resistance to this further erosion of liberty in America.
Explain that to me? Is it because Google doesnt know how to say it in Chinese? I am sorry, I think it is good they bring debate into the public, then what about being a tool for Chinese gov't that has even worse (i know hard to believ for some) human right violations that USA?
Really don't understand, unless they care more about money and market share.
I guess google is a victim of a diaper bombing... I wonder why would they not want to side with me... and side with those other guys... fud or not there are things going on that are real... and those things are not protected by law or men... the Google now protects them... this is going to linger with google for as long as they are around and then some...
The main reason Google's stock went down was because their earnings report was disappointing. The Wall Street Journal sent out an alert to its subscribers and has an article specifically on that story.