Why Does Google Kiss China’s Ass?

I’m one of those people who love Google - but fear Google.  The love is for the fact that they came out of nowhere and did something better - search - and more unobtrusively, that they changed the whole state of the art.  I love the fact that they used the core values and spirit of ingenuity that made them a successful search engine and monetized the net for the masses through their better ad program.  I love Google labs … the list goes on.

I hate the fact that they condone and act as China’s censorship police.  I hate the fact that they stand up for their values only in the countries like the U.S. where they have rights.  In its relationship with China, Google has lost the mantle of “revolutionary.”  Google’s principle of “don’t be evil” is rendered meaningless when it becomes, “do no evil unless it means missing a business opportunity in a huge market.”

For some years now, Google has been allowed to do business in the Chinese cyberspace because it allows the Chinese government to use the Google search engine to effectively block out news and other information from the Chinese people.  Today, Google and others said they were sorry to the Chinese government for the fact that some searches yield naughty links among their results.

Google is big enough and popular enough that it could tell the Chinese to go pound salt.  If the popular search engine and other Google apps were taken away from the Chinese people, perhaps they would bring them back through a popular consumer uprising.  Google would rather take the path of least resistance - even if it means doing the harm of being the handmaiden of an oppressive national government.

I was in a bookstore the other day and took note of the smut mags atop the magazine rack.  Although not a consumer of those magazines, it’s always comforting in a way to see even a mainstream bookstore keep a few around.  Why do they?  Because they can.  They’re just making a small statement that this is American and we don’t censor — and neither should an American company.

Being “not evil” means not helping others (Chinese government) be evil as well.