[bestbits] Shoshanna Zuboff: Dark Google

[Nick Ashton-Hart]

Michael, it is hard to even count the number of ways you have got this all wrong.

You’ve read a letter from a publisher and since it goes along with your prejudices you think it is 100% accurate.

What you clearly don’t understand is there is a dispute between publishers and the whole Internet sector going on here, not just Google. The publishers have tried to get the German courts to essentially make *every single* link to *every single* piece of copyrighted work something that all online uses that involve links must pay for.

This would of course result in a disastrous precedent that would be incredibly harmful to freedom of expression.

This has been recognised by scores of NGOs across Europe who have fought against this, any number of whom are on this list.

I will be the first to agree with legitimate criticism of companies, but this is so spectacularly factually wrong - and wrong in the opposite direction of what you have said you stand for - that I really recommend you stop this meme defending Axel Springer until you’ve researched it. 


On 3 May 2014, at 20:04, michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:

> McTim, I have no doubt that you and your techie mates were able to achieve a cheery consensus on the issues which you chose to address.  I have a bit more skepticism about whether a consensus could be reached in a discussion with Google on the future of "search" and its possible regulation as the head of Axel Springer Corp. seems to be calling for and as might be necessary sooner rather than later.
> 
> My guess is that dealing with a group of people representing several billions of dollars in quarterly profits, their armies of very high-priced lawyers, their tame government negotiators and their overtly or covertly paid for allies in the technical and CS communities might be a rather different proposition. But I could be wrong, maybe you all would end up singing kumbaya together and going out for pizza after a multistakeholder consensus was achieved.
> 
> M
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: dogwallah at gmail.com [mailto:dogwallah at gmail.com] On Behalf Of McTim
> Sent: Saturday, May 03, 2014 3:53 PM
> To: michael gurstein
> Cc: bestbits at lists.bestbits.net
> Subject: Re: [bestbits] Shoshanna Zuboff: Dark Google
> 
> <cc list trimmed to match netiquette>
> 	
> On Sat, May 3, 2014 at 2:55 AM, michael gurstein <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:
>> This discussion is currently roiling Europe and beyond.
>> 
>> The discussion and Zuboff's analysis has very significant implications for the matters of Multistakeholder governance which are currently being triumphantly trumpeted in these contexts and beyond. The issues that Zuboff is pointing to with specific reference to Google and surveillance underlie the drive to include companies like Google and others directly in decision making through multistakeholder processes/Internet Governance.
>> 
>> It hardly takes a huge flight of imagination to recognize the signals 
>> concerning the extreme danger that MSism represents in the context of 
>> Zuboff's arguments i.e. giving Google (et al) effective veto power
> 
> This myth of a veto that you and Parminder have been propagating is just not true.
> 
> I've participated in many MS fora over the last decade plus and never seen a "veto".
> 
> NB: This isn't a "pro-Google" email, just a note to provide some reality based observations.
> 
> 
> I would also observe that IF there was a veto (which I've never seen any indication of) then wouldn't CS ALSO have the same "veto" in an equal-footing forum?
> 
> jus' sayin'
> 
> rgds,
> 
> McTim
> 
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