[ILUG] Mother of God!

[Thomas Bridge]

On 2/15/06, Colm Buckley <colm at tuatha.org> wrote:

> It's very easy to be cynical, and very hard to actually think hard
> about the situation and try to come up with something which actually
> helps people.  I kno Google is in the latter camp, and I'm very glad
> it's not in the former.

I have to say that as Manchester United supporter, this is a slightly
optimistic view of things.    United tried to be both a football club
and a publicly quoted limited company, and in the end the requirements
of the latter over rode the requirements of the former, with the
result that the club is now owned by an American who bears a
disturbing resemblence to a leprechaun.

Google may want to be a force for good, but the result of being a
publicly quoted limited company is that google *had* to cut a deal
with the PRC.     Colm McCartaigh can criticise google for its
position all he wants, but the reality is that Google's "Don't be
evil" motto was diluted when the company floated, not when they cut a
deal with the Chinese government.

Folks, Google is a PLC.   That's it - the moment they did that they
moved away from a position where they could take a principled stand on
things like Net censorship and towards a position where they had to
take a pragmatic view,

Thomas

Thomas

--
Thomas Bridge
CCIE  #14108