Google Plays Politics

So far Google has been smart and tried to focus on making their services the best possible, and staying out of the political arena. As we all know, world politics are a dirty matter and with a relatively clean company like Google, it just doesn't seem smart to get involved.

But it seems that Google's profits are on the line now. With the rise of governmental internet censorship, mainly in Asia and the Middle East, Google advertisements have taken a back seat to the sophisticated internet filters of China, India, Vietnam, and others. Google's Ad-Sense program bring targeted advertisement to website vendors through the program. A company can buy ad space from the Ad-Sense program, and Google will post that advertisement to a certain targeted audience. This is Google's primary income source and what allows the company to create such amazing services for free.

Now with governments filtering out certain "questionable" content, some of Google's advertisements have gotten caught and blocked. But the search giant is taking a unique approach to the whole situation. "It's fair to say that censorship is the No. 1 barrier to trade that we face," said Andrew McLaughlin, Google's director of public policy and government affairs. A Google spokesman told reporters said that McLaughlin has met with U.S. Trade representatives on this issue.

Google contests that these firewalls are interfering with international business and trade. They want the filters to be considered an indirect illegal trade embargo on the U.S. Google wants the USTR to get involved, but they want to send the case to the State Department because it deals with foreign policy. Weather Google will get the government involved is still yet to be seen.

I personally think that Google is doing the right thing in trying to get our government involved. The last thing they want is to get their whole site blocked by foreign government for speaking out against their domestic policies. And if our government takes the lead on this issue it will not only help Google, but will benefit other international e-commerce sites as well. So it seems that what is good for Google, is good for America.

Full story here.