Don’t be evil, much

It was bad enough that the government has gone “in house” on copyright issues.  Now not only is the government looking more and more “bought” on this, but the “Don’t be evil” kids — again, via Glenn — also continue to confirm everyone’s worst fears.  (No they’re not the government… not yet…)  First it was the turnover of YouTube to the RIAA.  Now it’s Google’s Blogger empire. This from TechDirt:

[M]any music bloggers are now fighting a much more invisible menace, with posts they’ve written suddenly disappearing from their sites (via Tyler Hellard) hosted on Google’s Blogger platform. An RIAA source says that the group sends Google a list of URLs it doesn’t like, and Google “then deals with the problem.” Google says that it notifies bloggers after their posts have been taken down, in accordance with the DMCA. But it should hardly be surprising that many of those affected say they’ve gotten no such notice, nor that the offending material was either legally posted and/or supplied by the labels themselves.

Maybe.  Let’s see if this ends up getting confirmed.  I can only say two things:

1. My professional dealings with Google Legal have been mainly an exercise in being treated like something meant to be scraped off one’s shoe.  So nothing would surprise me.  They’re the new New York Times, after all.  Only faster and, maybe, more powerful than the Times once was – hence, more arrogant.
2. If you’re wondering why Google is all of a sudden acting increasingly like a bought-and-paid-for whore of the copyright industry, think “slow ad sales.”

Meaning it should get a lot worse before it gets better.  And if you were hoping for help on this from “progressive” government… keep “hope”-ing.

UPDATE:  If there is indeed hope… it’s this.

Originally posted 2012-01-25 17:19:44. Republished by Blog Post Promoter