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Google: Open Letter to Australians

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Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#261

Post by corty »

neiman wrote: post #233
discordance wrote: post #119

Google evil etc etc aside, they have been decent custodians of their users data. I don't really want to trust Google, but they behave much better than the Australian government, who recently admitted they spy on their citizens [0], can coerce citizens and companies to install backdoors into their companies software [1]. I trust Murdoch less than the government, and much much less than Google. Remember when Murdoch in…

> Google evil etc etc aside, they have been decent custodians of their users data. They've been decent custodians to data they force users to give. It's like complimenting whoever stole my bike last year for taking good care of it.

And they lost all their data to foreign secret services (the NSA) once. Google never loosing data and taking "good care" of it is a myth that needs to die.

The only right way forward is to be parsimonius with data. Never pass it along, never collect it (if possible).

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#262

Post by chris_wot »

knorker wrote: post #253
harry8 wrote: post #221

Open comment from an Australian to google: "Pay your f#$king tax like the rest of us or shut the f%$ck up." This comment stands apart from any and all implications of their special interest policy pleadings above which are all pretty tedious in comparison. Google don't pay tax for profit made selling in Australia. To hell with them and literally any case they have to make.

To hell with "them"? Are you saying Australians should cut off their nose to spite their face? I think you missed the whole point of this letter. Let me clarify: "Oi mate, the government wants to force us to fuck you royally. We don't want to. Please help stop yourself getting fucked. Cheers, cunt."

And here is another Australian who says "Oi mate, Google don't want to pay taxes for profits they made in Australia. They don't want to invest in schools, universities, infrastructure or anything else through reasonable taxation. Google are fucking over Australians".

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#263

Post by wombatmobile »

sjy wrote: post #229
wombatmobile wrote: post #207

Obviously the Australian government is trying to make google pay just because Murdoch told it to. But the pretense is bizarre - that google has to pay Murdoch because it steals his content. Google doesn't republish News Corp content! It just lists headlines with URLs that readers click to go through to News Corp! Google is giving News Corp 70% of its traffic. Bizarre. What's to stop google from simply ceasing to inde…

Not indexing news content in order to avoid submitting to the proposed new law is itself prohibited under the new law.

Link to the new legislation or description thereof?

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#264

Post by squiggleblaz »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #228
ehnto wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What the Australian government does well is control information and controversy. The government is a quiet achiever in that regard. Australians have been comfortable for a while, and are generally disengaged from politics. Most Australians I know are more aware of American politics than their own.

American politics that they're happy to mock, whilst the broth they're wallowing in is rapidly coming to the same temperature.

Yes but it's much harder to find out about Australian politics because we all spend our time as a minority on an American web and our media just aren't doing (can't do?) a great job.

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#265

Post by alecthomas »

nl wrote: post #244
alecthomas wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On the Open Web, ABC News should get the exact same treatment at JoeBloggsYT2020. I legitimately don't understand this point of view. Original reporting of the kind that keeps politicians and corporations in line costs money; investigative journalists aren't cheap. What YouTuber gives you this kind of depth? Will the world be a better place without the Fourth Estate?

Sure, this is a legitimate argument. But then why wouldn't the money go to fund the AP Press Pool in Canberra which shutdown recently because of lack of funding[1], or to the ABC or SBS or other public journalism? Instead it goes directly to the big publishers who cut journalists while increasing the salary of people like Andrew Bolt (who is so far removed from a journalist it is objectionable). [1] https://apnews.co…

Your response is unrelated to what I was disagreeing with.

My underlying argument is that a strong free press must be maintained and that the reductionist argument that legitimate news sources and JoeRandomYouTuber should be treated identically is naive at best.

> Instead it goes directly to the big publishers who cut journalists while increasing the salary of people like Andrew Bolt (who is so far removed from a journalist it is objectionable).

The relationship between the rise of populist/sensationalist media and that of the Internet/social media/Google is inextricably linked. Traditional news sources found their revenue declining and so chased whatever attracted consumers, including sensationalist cretins like Bolt. Google should accept responsibility for this.

To be clear, I'm not arguing that the ACCC's proposal is the perfect solution to the underlying problem, but the status quo does need to change. At least they're doing something.

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#266

Post by LatteLazy »

cirno wrote: post #250
LatteLazy wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Conspiracy theory time: that's what this is really about. Murdoch (Fox etc) know that they are next after Facebook gets done banning qanon nonsense. If Google audited the accuracy of Murdoch owned sources, it would have good reason to start delisting them. Murdoch knows he can't afford that. So this isn't about getting 1p per 1000 views or something. It's about being assured a high search result placement for his dis…

Google delisting high-clickbait sources because their claims are blatantly false is something that would never happen.

Are you sure? They're all under pressure, even twitter which was basically the wild west has started adding "get the facts" links, Facebook just closed all those groups.

"What are you doing about misinformation?" is a question execs might like to have an answer to...

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#267

Post by enneff »

harry8 wrote: post #221

Open comment from an Australian to google: "Pay your f#$king tax like the rest of us or shut the f%$ck up." This comment stands apart from any and all implications of their special interest policy pleadings above which are all pretty tedious in comparison. Google don't pay tax for profit made selling in Australia. To hell with them and literally any case they have to make.

As a fellow Australian, we must compel our government to change the laws so that the many large corporations that operate in this country, not just Google, pay an appropriate amount of tax.

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#268

Post by sjy »

wombatmobile wrote: post #263
sjy wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not indexing news content in order to avoid submitting to the proposed new law is itself prohibited under the new law.

Link to the new legislation or description thereof?

Concepts paper and draft legislation published by the ACCC: https://www.accc.gov.au/focus-areas/digital-platforms/news-m...

HN discussed this when the draft legislation was published: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24006150

Re: Google: Open Letter to Australians

#269

Post by jmkd »

BLKNSLVR wrote: post #228
ehnto wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What the Australian government does well is control information and controversy. The government is a quiet achiever in that regard. Australians have been comfortable for a while, and are generally disengaged from politics. Most Australians I know are more aware of American politics than their own.

American politics that they're happy to mock, whilst the broth they're wallowing in is rapidly coming to the same temperature.

Sorry but I just loved this turn of phrase and how well it sits with the issue. Thanks.
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