Google Inc, Bans Australian-based Military Space News Website

Google Inc, Bans Australian-based Military Space News Website

24 February 2006

Date: Fri, 24 Feb 2006 08:33:10 -0000
From: J Armitage <j.armitage@UNN.AC.UK>
Subject: [CSL]: Google Inc Bans Australian-based Military Space News
Website
To: CYBER-SOCIETY-LIVE@JISCMAIL.AC.UK

From: Irving [mailto:irving_goh@yahoo.com.sg]
Sent: 24 February 2006 07:03
To: John Armitage; Jordan Crandall

Subject: Google Inc Bans Australian-based Military Space News Website

Google Inc, Bans Australian-based Military Space News Website

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Gerroa, Australia (SPX) Feb 24, 2006

http://www.spacewar.com/Google_Bans_Australian_Based_Military_Space_News_Website.html

Google Inc. has banned SPACEWAR.COM, a news site covering military space.
Reasons for the ban by Google are unclear. The company did not communicate
with Space.TV Corp., the owner of SPACEWAR.COM, prior to its action, and
Google representatives did not respond to requests for comment.

Google Inc.'s preferred method of banning a site is to delist its primary
domain URL - www.spacewar.com - from
the Google search index. Google also can reduce a site's page rank, or eliminate
it entirely, as it has done to SpaceWar.com. SpaceWar.com is owned and operated
by Space.TV Corp., a Delaware registered company that publishes a range of
space, science and technology Web sites. In operation since the mid 1990s,
the Space.TV network enjoys a monthly audience of more than 1 million visitors
to its sites - with more than 100,000 monthly visitors to SPACEWAR.COM.

Google Inc in the wake of pressure from the Chinese government has begun
blocking access to various websites deemed unfriendly to the "Boys From Beijing"
(TM).

At this stage we have no evidence to suggest this is the reason why Google
has banned SPACEWAR.COM. The lack of any forewarning that SPACEWAR.COM was
operating in violation of Google's increasingly strict search engine compliance
requirements, however, leads us to suspect the ban is politically motivated.

Google Inc.'s corporate mantra is "Do No Evil." Obviously, this is not true
given Google's willingness to submit to the censorship requirements of the
Chinese government.

Space.TV Corp is consulting with legal advisers in the United States and
Australia, where production of the company's Web sites is conducted. We consider
the ban a violation of the recently enacted US-Australia Free Trade Agreement.

Following a previous search engine compliance issue with Google, the Space.TV
Corp. board of directors voted to remove and delete all links and pages that
may have fallen within the area of practices deemed unacceptable by Google.

Our effort to achieve network-wide compliance with Google's requirements
was completed in mid-January, and Google's army of Web robots was advised
of this effort to comply.

Google Inc. is mostly operated by robotic systems agents with a brick wall
between its human customers and human workers.

The only method of contacting a human at Google Inc is via its AdWords business,
where Google's human employees will happily sell you an advertising package
to get your site listed in its top-of-page sponsored links section.

What makes this case even more interesting is Space.TV Corp, decided in November
2005 to convert 90 percent of its advertising inventory base to Google's
AdSense program, which enables publishers to run Google context-based text
ads.

As a result, Space.TV Corp. now receives over 50 percent of its advertising
revenue from Google, and this figure is forecast to rise to 80 percent by
April.

Space.TV Corp is obviously now reconsidering its position as a Google Ad
Sense partner site.

However, Google is has become now the dominant advertising network for owner
operated sites, and its competitors come a very poor second in terms of available
advertIsing inventory. Essentially, Web sites such as those operated by Space.TV
Corp. have little choice but to run Google AdSense text ads.

The only other network advertising available in any significant volume comprises
ads for Smiley Icons and ScamWare Scanning Software, which we removed almost
entirely from our network sites in November 2005.

We have done our best to provide a network of news sites that are informative
and diverse in opinion, and free to readers.

As President of Space.TV Corp. and the nominal publisher of our network of
news sites, I am deeply concerned by the implications of Google banning
SPACEWAR.COM.

We consider Google's action as an attempt to dictate what information will
appear on Web sites, and what links will be allowed between Web sites. If
true, this constitutes a gross abuse of market power, and it should cause
our political leadership in the United States, Canada, Europe and Australia
to investigate fully the business operations of Google Inc.

We are deeply concerned about retaliatory action by Google Inc. against our
company and its various Web sites. In recent months, we have bet the business
on Google advertising revenues, which has left us dangerously exposed to
major revenue losses should Google cancel our AdSense contract, and delay
payments and/or sue us for going public.

We ask that you communicate your concerns about Google's action in banning
SPACEWAR.COM by contacting your local political representatives using the
enclosed form letter. We also ask that you to communicate your concerns to
Google's public relations officials via the following email address:
press@google.com.

Simon Mansfield
President and Publisher Space.TV Corporation

Contact Details
Simon Mansfield
Publisher
Australian Office
02-4234-3841

simon[at]spacedaily.com