Free Republic

Google's online advertising dominance grows -- Don't forget the pending DOJ investigation... Google's dominance of the Internet's business model for monetizing content only grows. "Gap widens in online advertising: Rivals struggle to catch up to Google as buyers favor search over display" reports Jessica Vascellaro in the Wall Street Journal. The article's conclusion is dead on and ominous -- the gap between Google and its competitors in online advertising is widening and will continue to do so because the business that Google dominates, search advertising, is growing significantly faster than display advertising is. While the article focused on the different...

It’s bad enough that most media outlets are falling over silly for Obama, but now it seems Google has joined the fast moving train of Obama supporters. Initially, I didn’t believe the reports that the Obama campaign was intentionally shutting down blogs because these blogs were questioning the validity of Obama’s birth certificate. That was until I received an email from Dr. Mitchell Langbert last night, a blogger and Professor at Brooklyn College, who advised that Google had placed a temporary hold on future posts at his website.

Google defeated in Belgian copyright case; everyone but Google loses By Ken Fisher | Published: February 13, 2007 - 11:48AM CT The group of disgruntled newspapers in Belgium that sued Google for copyright infringement has emerged victorious after a decision was granted in their favor today in court. The judgment echoes a previous ruling from the Court of First Instance in Brussels that found Google in violation of copyright law when the company published extracts of articles from Belgian newspaper publishers. Copiepresse, the Belgium copyright group representing the nearly 20 papers scandalized by Google News, now gets its wish: Google...

A group of environmental activists has enlisted Google to help flood the congressional switchboard with one million phone calls on Earth Day urging lawmakers to enact eco-friendly measures. "We're really excited about this because Congress keeps saying they don't hear from the American public on climate change," said Kathleen Rogers, president of Earth Day Network, which bills itself as an eco-activism group connecting some 17,000 organizations in 174 countries. "The [presidential] candidates are not being asked about climate change. Climate change is the biggest threat to humanity that we've ever faced." Rogers said her group is finalizing talks with Internet...

All day today Google has been pushing an Earth Hour agenda:On Saturday, March 29, 2008, Earth Hour invites people around the world to turn off their lights for one hour – from 8:00pm to 9:00pm in their local time zone. On this day, cities around the world, including Copenhagen, Chicago, Melbourne, Dubai, and Tel Aviv, will hold events to acknowledge their commitment to energy conservation.Given our company's commitment to environmental awareness and energy efficiency, we strongly support the Earth Hour campaign, and have darkened our homepage today to help spread awareness of what we hope will be a highly successful...

Today, Google has decided to celebrate "Earth Hour" in this way on their main page: Here is some text to explain their actions: Google users in the United States will notice today that we "turned the lights out" on the Google.com homepage as a gesture to raise awareness of a worldwide energy conservation effort called Earth Hour. As to why we don't do this permanently - it saves no energy; modern displays use the same amount of power regardless of what they display. However, you can do something to reduce the energy consumption of your home PC by joining the...

Freep. Here is where it stands now.

Privacy International, a human rights research organization, completed a six-month investigation of privacy practices for 23 Internet companies. Results of the consultation report were published this week, and the final report will be published in September. Privacy International is soliciting additional comments on the findings before it publishes the more detailed report. The data used for the consultation report provides a strong indication of which companies rank best to worst for their privacy practices. Google ranked at the very bottom of the list primarily because the research showed numerous deficiencies and hostilities in Google's approach to privacy that "go well...

A state appeals court reinstated a fired manager's age-discrimination suit against Google Inc. on Thursday, saying a jury should hear his evidence that a supervisor told him that his ideas were "too old to matter" and that the giant search engine company gave its older employees lower ratings and lesser bonuses. The Sixth District Court of Appeal in San Jose overturned a Santa Clara County judge's dismissal of a damage suit by Brian Reid, who was hired by the Mountain View firm in 2002 as director of operations and director of engineering. He was demoted in October 2003 and fired...

Given that most of Google's $13 billion in revenue comes from clicks on ads, you would think the words "click fraud" would inspire fear in Shuman Ghosemajumder, the company's senior product manager and resident click-fraud czar. But the problem--publishers who inflate pay-per-click ad fees with automatic clicking software--doesn't fluster Ghosemajumder or other Googlers. In March 2006, as the company faced a class-action lawsuit from online advertisers for damages from fraudulent clicks, Google Chief Executive Eric Schmidt dismissed click fraud as "immaterial." Even after paying a $90 million settlement, Google has maintained its "everything-is-just-fine" answer to click-fraud worrywarts. Not all outsiders...