Tag Archive | "Europe"
Google Does An About-Face On China Policy
San Francisco, CA -- In a surprise announcement late Tuesday, Google Inc. said it may turn its back on the huge Chinese market after a sophisticated cyber attack on the e-mail accounts of human rights advocates in the Asian nation. Some have dubbed the country's censorship efforts, which apply to Yahoo Inc. and Microsoft Corp.'s search engines too, the "Great Firewall of China." Users of Google.cn in China generally couldn't look at images of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, dig up information about Tibet's Dalai Lama or access the Web site for journalism watchdog organization Reporters Without Borders, according to reports. "While Google should never have agreed to censor search results in China in the first place, it is doing the right thing by ending the practice now," said John Simpson of Consumer Watchdog in Los Angeles. "The company should be commended."
Continue reading...Google, Authors Try To Answer Book Deal Concerns
Saturday, November 14, 2009
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Google and the Authors Guild filed a new version of a deal to create a massive online library on Friday in hopes of answering antitrust and copyright concerns in the United States and overseas. Critics of the deal have been a varied group that includes Yahoo, Amazon, Microsoft, the National Writers Union, Consumer Watchdog and singer Arlo Guthrie.
Continue reading...Now’s Your Chance To Spy On Google
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
The Google Dashboard tool is also limited to information gathered on users when logged in to Google. It doesn’t give consumers access to information that might be tied to individual consumers in other ways -- such as searches associated with individual computer IP address or cookies. That means it falls short of being a true privacy tool, according to privacy rights advocacy group Consumer Watchdog. "The dashboard gives the appearance of control without the actual ability to prevent Google from tracking you and delivering you to its marketers,” said John M. Simpson, a spokesman for the nonprofit organization. "It doesn't reveal anything about what is at the heart of what I call Google's 'black box' -- what is associated with your computer's IP address."
Continue reading...Google Offers Users A Peek At Stored Data
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Google, which has been criticized frequently for amassing large amounts of data about people, is giving users an easy way to find out what information it stores in their accounts. John Simpson, of Consumer Watchdog, a frequent critic of Google, said Dashboard gave users the appearance of control over privacy but did not really prevent Google from tracking users across the Web. “What the Dashboard does is list all the information linked directly to your name, but what it doesn’t do is let you know and control the data directly tied to your computer’s IP address, which is Google’s black box and data mine, Mr. Simpson said in a press release. “Google isn’t truly protecting privacy until it lets you control that information.”
Continue reading...Google Creates Privacy Dashboard
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Google, which has had a bullseye on its back when it comes to Internet privacy, on Thursday launched a Web site that shows people what data Gmail, Google Calendar and more than a dozen other Google products store about them. John Simpson of consumer-advocacy organization Consumer Watchdog said the dashboard focuses on data that people have consciously shared with Google while they are logged into various Google accounts, but ignores all the data that Google collects and ties to a user’s computer address and through other software, known as cookies. “The dashboard is really the appearance of control without giving users the ability to see how Google tracks them all over the place,” he said.
Continue reading...Critics Of Google Online-Books Deal Seek Delay
Thursday, October 22, 2009
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Critics of Google's deal with an authors' group to put millions of books online have asked for a delay in a hearing set to consider the settlement in a court filing on Thursday. A long list of critics of the deal, including Yahoo, Amazon, Microsoft, the National Writers Union, Consumer Watchdog and singer Arlo Guthrie, argued on Thursday that the original class action settlement was long and complex and any changes would only add to its complexity
Continue reading...Google Working To Modify Settlement, Publishers Say
Tuesday, September 22, 2009
Google Inc. and groups of authors and publishers are working to modify a $125 million settlement to create a digital library following criticism from parties including the U.S. Justice Department, the groups said. “Google and the authors and publisher groups are back at square one,” John Simpson, an advocate at Consumer Watchdog, a group in Santa Monica, California, said in a statement.
Continue reading...U.S. Urges Court To Reject Google Book Deal
Friday, September 18, 2009
John Simpson of Consumer Watchdog said he was pleased with the filing. "As the Justice brief makes clear, the proposed class-action settlement is monumentally overbroad and invites the court to overstep its legal jurisdiction, to the detriment of consumers and the public," Simpson said in an email.
Continue reading...Google Strives To Build Biggest Online Library
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Internet-search giant Google is making conciliatory gestures in an effort to blunt mounting opposition to a copyright deal that is the foundation of its plan to build the biggest online library, Google Books. Urging the court to reject the Google Books deal, Consumer Watchdog, a consumer group, said last week the proposed settlement conflicts with international copyright treaties such as the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works. It "would strip rights from millions of absent-class members worldwide, for the sole benefit of Google," referring to authors and publishers who did not or could not opt out of the deal between Google and the Guild for the Google Book Search.
Continue reading...Lawmakers Created Google Settlement Mess, But Some Urge Staying Out Of It
Friday, September 11, 2009
By failing to pass orphan works legislation in previous sessions, Congress practically guaranteed a messy settlement would result from Google's scanning and display of millions of out-of-print works found only in libraries, several lawmakers said at a House Judiciary Committee hearing Thursday. Consumer Watchdog's John M. Simpson, perhaps Google's most vocal nonprofit critic in Washington, said the settlement "simply furthers the relatively narrow agenda" of Google, the Authors Guild and Association of American Publishers. Congress should pass orphan-works or fair-use legislation, so Google won't get an "unprecedented monopolistic advantage" over some books.
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Wednesday, January 13, 2010
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