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Only a few of the search behemoth's 88,000 workers were briefed on the project before The Intercept reported on 1 August that Google had plans to launch a censored mobile search app for the Chinese market, with no access to sites about human rights, democracy, religion or peaceful protest.
The customised Android search app, with different versions known as Maotai and Longfei, was said to have been demonstrated to Chinese Government authorities.
In a related development, six US senators from both parties were reported to have sent a letter to Google chief executive Sundar Pichai, demanding an explanation over the company's move.
One source inside Google, who witnessed the backlash from employees after news of the plan was reported, told The Intercept: "Everyone's access to documents got turned off, and is being turned on [on a] document-by-document basis.
"There's been total radio silence from leadership, which is making a lot of people upset and scared. ... Our internal meme site and Google Plus are full of talk, and people are a.n.g.r.y."
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday August 07 2018, @01:07AM (10 children)
Google is a business, and answers to the sharemarket like any other business. If management decide to not offer search in China I imagine shareholders would want to know why they would leave so much money on the table.
If you want to do business in China, you have to play by China's rules which include all sorts of censorship. Try searching for Winnie the Pooh from China and see how you go.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Mykl on Tuesday August 07 2018, @02:15AM (8 children)
Yes, it's a business. However, by deciding to buy their way into China, Google has damaged their reputation in other markets (in my opinion, probably losing more than they gained). I doubt that the Faustian bargain they just made will prove to be worth it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday August 07 2018, @02:58AM (2 children)
There might be a few people like you, who take a principled stand, but I suspect the vast majority either don't understand, or don't care.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday August 07 2018, @06:10AM
And a lot of the principled people, Google already lost anyway.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Tuesday August 07 2018, @06:49AM
It's not necessarily a matter of principle. Do you trust a search engine company that has expressed so much willingness to censor search results in China to not ALSO censor search results it may return to you?
If so, why?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by c0lo on Tuesday August 07 2018, @03:37AM
Your opinion looks more like wishful thinking.
Google is eating the consumer privacy on every second basis for practically as long as they existed. And the loss of privacy affects each consumer personally - have you seen a consumer exodus away from Google because of that? No?
And you think the consumers will give a damn about the censored search in China Google plans to offer, a thing that does not affect any consumer in non-Chinese markets? I mean... really?
Yes, I know consumers aren't the customers, they are the merchandise. However, the customers/shareholders are sensible only to the number of consumers; as long as this number stay high, I don't think I'll ever see customers/shareholders objecting.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 2) by lentilla on Tuesday August 07 2018, @06:03AM (3 children)
What is worth remembering is that China has 1.511 billion people. That's "only" twice the population of Europe, or "only" 4.6 times the population of the United States. Yes, selling out makes you look (a little) bad, but nothing that can't be spin-doctored away, and certainly not enough to ignore that absolutely massive untapped market.
Google also faces a secondary problem - if they don't expand into China, a Chinese competitor will simply eat Google.
Now ask yourself the question: which master would you prefer? Google - now a company of questionable ethics, or "Chinese Google" - a company with "different" ethics and squarely in the pocket of the world's largest totalitarian government?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Tuesday August 07 2018, @12:44PM (2 children)
Neither. You present a false dilemma. Let us also keep in mind that Chinese Google will happen simply because China won't allow for Google to obtain a dominant position no matter how much Google attempts to appease China.
(Score: 2) by lentilla on Wednesday August 08 2018, @02:51AM (1 child)
Technically - yes - it is a false dilemma (and not a particularly ingenious one at that). Practically speaking; however; this is the actual dilemma that we face - and that is why I presented it as such.
In a way, this is a real problem with capitalism - the end-game appears to be monopoly or at best oligopoly. In an ideal world, capitalism has many players competing but what actually happens is one of the players buys out the competition until only a one or two remain.
You are also quite correct in stating that China will not allow Google to obtain a dominant position in the Chinese market. Google's best efforts will simply slow down the inevitable. They will be tolerated; for now; providing they make the required "reasonable accommodations".
Unsporting as it might be, the West really needs to have a good, hard think about foreign ownership - otherwise we will end up ceding control of our assets, infrastructure and lives - and we won't notice it until it's too late because it is happening little by little.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday August 08 2018, @03:53AM
I disagree. It's just not that hard to create a search engine. It just isn't that profitable at present to create endless numbers of them.
Unless, of course, the end game appears to be something else. The problem here is that there are so many confounding factors that have nothing to do with capitalism messing up the situation. My view is that oligopoly may be an end-game for capitalism, but it's not that bad for end games nor the worst way that monopolies and oligopolies get created.
For example, if one looks at the highest rates of creation of monopolies, oligopolies, and such, it's not the Gilded Age that stands out, but the early years of the FDR administration which created legal cartels in hundreds of industries over the course of a few years. Even when such cartels were undone (and they weren't always undone), the result was often a more stagnant and uncreative industry, such as the automotive, airlines, shipbuilding, broadcast, and movie industries. Labor unions are another example with virtually no competition. That wasn't capitalism that created that mess.
Today, we have a huge regulatory burden that naturally favors large businesses over small. This is going to create natural dynamics that result in oligopoly situations.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 07 2018, @03:09AM
Aren't they still controlled by the founders? In that sense, they are not like most other public companies.