Slashdot Mirror
Suing Google Over Pagerank
Yardboy wrote in to tell us about a story from Reuters describing a lawsuit by parental advice company Kinderstart.com against Google for 'charging it unfairly deprived the company of customers by downgrading its search-result ranking without reason or warning.' Kinderssart claims Google is responsible for 'a "cataclysmic" 70 percent fall in its audience -- and a resulting 80 percent decline in revenue.' I guess the courts will now decide: Can google taketh what they giveth?
How so? What does a private company owe someone who simply wants to be ranked high?
;)
If they want to be shown they should pay for advertising. My lastname.com is on page 3 if I search for mylastname. So should I sue google? Maybe I should "advertise" since that is how they exist.
I hate bullshit like this, if you base your business model on a high google ranking you should do what others are to maintain it. Salma Hayek pics are hard to find since those site purveyors have the first 1000 links or so going to some scam *nude stars* sites. lol... maybe that is what i wanted after all
From TFA:
"aggressively defends the secrecy of its patented search ranking system"
Is it patented or secret? I mean it can't be both.
Google is a private company with a private database. They have no obligation to rank any site equally, or even at all! In fact, Google could arbitrarily decide that some company was "bad" and simply remove them from their database. Kinderstart has no case, not even with their fractured English. Google is a corporation, not a public service, even though they seem like it on occasion.
Silence is golden... and duct tape is silver.
"The complaint accuses Google, as the dominant provider of Web searches, of violating KinderStart's constitutional right to free speech by blocking search engine results showing Web site content and other communications"
This is a bullshit suit. I'm sorry you don't have a constitutional right to have your message/voice broadcast/printed/served/displayed by others.
Why does this website think it can sue a company for a service it is providing them for free?
Furthermore, pagerank is explained here and here. Finally, if 70% of their audience and 80% of their revenue SOLELY relies on Google, then they need to change the way they advertise their site and profit from it. Looking at their site, they look just like a plain directory of links; they probably make money from advertising.
And Microsoft won't say how their operating system works, I'll sue Bill Gates and demand the source code. Anyway, KinderStart seems to be another linkfarm, that's why they are ranked so low.
The complaint accuses Google, as the dominant provider of Web searches, of violating KinderStart's constitutional right to free speech by blocking search engine results showing Web site content and other communications.
Google is a private company. It has no obligation to endorse Kinderstart's company than any others.
Like I have said before, the constituion gives you a right to freedom of speech, it does not guarentee you an audience. Saying Google should be forced to index Kinderstart *at all*, let alone that it should enfoce some ranking formula, would be akin to saying that a library should be forced to hold a certain book, or that a televsion station be forced to air a certain show.
Don't like the shows on a network? Change the channel. Don't like the results Google provides? Use another engine. It's not like they have a monopoly on web searching.
Anyone else find it funny they're running Google Ads? THAT's why they're pissed off ... 80% decline in ad revenue from google.
Let me get this straight...
1) Private company freely provides service
2) It is found useful by individuals and companies for finding one another
3) Its use becomes wide-spread and significant in the success of companies (maybe)
4) One particular company sues provider of this free service for not catering to them
Not that this is the first one to bite the hand that feeds.
Your "constitutional right to free speech" is a restriction on the actions of the federal government, and through incorporation, the states. It does not require any private entity to provide you a forum, listen to you, or to treat you fairly, whatever you think that might mean.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
But they don't really do anything, other than linking other sites.
It looks like one of those sites you get when you mispell the name of a website and you end up with some random search. If I hadn't gone there from slashdot, I would have quickly hit the back button for fear of spyware.
A project with people adding sites to an index? You mean like the open directory (http://dmoz.org/ or even http://www.google.com/dirhp)
That's definitely the solution. I can always find exactly what I'm looking for with Open Directory, but not with Google.
Give me a break. Maybe you just need to learn how to search? Or maybe you should click the little link at the bottom of your bad search results that says "Dissatisfied? Help us improve." You won't find that at Yahoo.
What does a private company owe someone who simply wants to be ranked high?
Um, Google is a public company.
However, public or private, Google isn't required to reveal their methods as those methods could qualify as a trade secret. If you try to haul Coke into court and demand they hand over their formulae, what do you think would happen? (besides the judge giggling, snickering, and laughing as though they are wearing feathered underwear under their black robe.
If they don't like the way they're ranked, they have several choices: (a) pound sand, (b) rely upon other search services, (c) take a timeout in the corner, (d) hire a spammed service which promises to put them in the top 100.[1] And in fact, this last item may be why they're acting like their tail is being twisted: they hired someone to rank it, it either failed or was short-liived, and the service they hired said it was Google's fault. I could accept option (d) without too much arm-twisting. "Hey, we did our part. Google screwed you over."
They're mad because they've got a Field of Dreams problem. Everyone thinks they have the next perpetual machine and they'll have to reinforce their doors because people will be knocking them down. No one shows up, no one cares, and after a good crying jag, they figure someone's going to pay for it. After all, they did their part correctly so someone else screwed up.
I've got some advice for them handed down many, many years ago: "No matter how good a product is, the market can be cruel & harsh." If they self-publish a book, are they going to sue the various chains because they won't put it on the shelves? And if the book manages to get onto the various shelves and it doesn't sell, are they going to sue the bookstores?
[1] I still snicker at the logic of placement spam: "Guaranteed to make your site ranked in the top 100 of the following search engines:..." Even if they manage to accomplish this, they don't tell you how long you'll remain there. Simply put: if 1'000 people respond to this ad for a single blast of spam (and the service is legitimate in its efforts), how can all of them be guaranteed top 100 placement? Then look at how many people are spamming this service. For some reason, this logic escapes many who believe themselves to be intelligent.
The bottom line? After the judge stops laughing, it should be dismissed via summary judgement, demand gorilla glue to be liberally applied to each person's head, then lodge it into their tucus.