[November 2005] Miscellany

[Laurent Van Winckel]

Google.org
In our 2004 initial public offering, our founders committed one percent
of our profits and equity toward Google's philanthropic efforts.
Regarding these efforts, they wrote, "We hope that someday this
institution will eclipse Google itself in overall world impact by
ambitiously applying innovation and significant resources to the
largest of the world's problems." We're calling the umbrella under
which we put all of these efforts Google.org. It will include the work
of the Google Foundation, some of Google's own projects using Google
talent, technology and other resources, as well as partnerships and
contributions to for-profit and non-profit entities. As we continue to
define the goals, priorities and approach for Google.org, we are
focusing on several areas including global poverty alleviation, energy,
and the environment.
http://www.google.org

[G2TheEmini]

Is there a place where we can sign up to have the articles emailed to us?
Or is it just something that you write on hear and then people can come hear and read them??

[mondine]

Originally Posted by G2TheEmini

Is there a place where we can sign up to have the articles emailed to us?
Or is it just something that you write on hear and then people can come hear and read them??

Sign up for the Google Friends Newsletter

[Mr Unhappy]

P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"I don't have a choice. I can use google or yahoo and that's pretty much it in the way ofdecent search engines. Hooray for that, the best wins out, it's the capitalistethos and the customer gets the best value for their money (or time).?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comfficeffice" /o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"So sure google and other companies have a financial responsibility and google seems to realise that they have a moral responsibility, but when does financial responsibility eclipse moral responsibility?o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"Let’s look at ?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comffice:smarttags" /st1:country-regionst1laceChina/st1lace/st1:country-region. The last communist regime on Earth (that works anyway) and one of the most repressive governments in existence today. Yet it is undergoing a technological boom, a revolution you might say. With a market of at least 200,000,000 who could resist right? You'd be a fool not to try to get into some of that.o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"So google and yahoo and Microsoft and others get in on the ground floor, but the Chinese government is one that likes to control and they say something like "If you want access to our enormous markets you have to help us" And google et al says "Yes sir! How can we help?" and st1:country-regionst1laceChina/st1lace/st1:country-region says "You provide us with the tools to keep our people in line, to censor information to stop dissidents from having a say, to find and execute those dissidents" And google et al say "Yes sir!" with a barely measurable pause. Now if you search forSPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman'; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"Tiananmen[/color] Square from a Chinese server you get tourist pictures and nothing else.P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"And who provided China with the technology and technological expertise to do that? That's right good old google.P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"We have a company whose motto is "Don't be evil" doing something very, very evil. And they justify it with "Well if we didn't do it someone else would" and "We don't ask what the information is for we just provide it" and "We have a responsibility to our shareholders to expand our markets" and no doubt many other excuses. And people die.o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"How much do you want google? I expect Microsoft to do this, I'm disappointed but not surprised that Yahoo would do this but google? Google!!? How much money do you need? You have the western world sewn up, you are at the forefront of IT, you create the next big thing. More importantly you had the moral high ground.o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"You could've said no. Just one word that's all. Just no and let someone else have blood on their hands. If all of you had said no then st1:country-regionst1laceChina/st1lace/st1:country-region would be forced to stop treating its people like cattle.o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"I'm disillusioned by all this and that's a terrible thing. I won't stop using google it's a great tool but I would just once in my lifetime like to see a non-hypocritical company somewhere in the world. Just once.o/oP class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"o/oP

[andrew247]

Mr Unhappy, you just replied to a year old topic...