Mar 26, 2011

Google Strikes in the United States Again

Yet again one of my blog posts has been blocked or censored by Google. "Libya and Cuba: Simple Solutions Perhaps" was published over twelve hours ago and is still not available if one searches by its title. If this is a technical problem how is it that Google keeps messing up? If it is not, why is this - repeatedly - happening in the United States?

UPDATE MARCH 28, 2011 - 2;15 A.M.

Almost forty eight hours have now elapsed since I published the blocked post on Cuba and Libya but it still can not be found by its title. The Invisible Cuba blog that contains it as well as this post you are reading can be found. But the blocked post itself can not be found on any search engine by its title.

My post is like that tree falling in a forest empty of humans. Does the tree make a sound? One might think that because no one is around to hear it that it does not. But, objectively, of course it does, although no one is near enough to hear it.

Google Blogger effectively owns an Internet blogging forest. The sound that Google doesn't like for whatever reason is a sound that will not be heard. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) doesn't work with censorship.

Of course, I am aware that I can open a blog outside of the Google blogger forest. But that is not the point and, in any case, it would hardly solve much given that Google controls 84.77% of all Internet searches, 14 times more than its nearest rival. Furthermore, the other search engines obtain much of their information from Google.

Whatever Internet content Google hides or censors is seemingly pushed into virtual non existence and invisibility. If this can be demonstrated to be in fact the case (or nearly so), how could it be in the best interests of a free society?

What if Google's idea of "the Good" is off by even a fraction of a degree?

UPDATE MARCH 29, 2011, 1:49 P.M.

After over three days of invisibility, one is finally able to find Libya and Cuba: Simple Solutions Perhaps on Google's search engine. This is outrageous and I hope that mine is the only case.

UPDATED MARCH 29, 2011, 10:33 P.M.


The post "Libya and Cuba: Simple Solutions Perhaps" has been blocked by Google again after having been briefly unblocked earlier today. Not good.

MARCH 31, 2011, 9:45 A.M.


I last checked a few minutes ago and one can now find the blocked post by its title. But that had also happened briefly on March 29, as I reported then. There is no reason to trust it will not happen again with this post, or with a new post.

APRIL 11, 2011

I just discovered that I had been misspelling 'Libya' as 'Lybia'. Could that explain the block on the post? (Read below.)

APRIL 12, 2011 2011 UPDATE

No, a misspelling can not account for Google's five days http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifof censorship. There are plenty of misspellings in blog posts published by Google blogger.

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