Google--good at search, bad at censorship

I'm not sure if this is good news or bad news, so I'll just fill you in and let you decide:

There has been a lot of hubbub recently over Google's creation of a self-censored search option(www.google.cn) for tightly restricted China, such as here.

Curious to see how this censorship would work in practice, I chose a suggested topic of controversy, "Falun Gong" and headed over to check it out. My first result was:

Falun Dafa & Falun Gong - [ 翻译此页 BETA ]
Falun Dafa and Falun Gong: what they are and why the Chinese government is terrified of them.
www.religioustolerance.org/falungong.htm - 14k - 网页快照 - 类似网页

hmmmm. Personally, I might have censored that. Clicking on the page I quickly found tidbits like these:

"The movement has experienced horrendous levels of persecution in China."

and

"The Chinese government has relentlessly suppressed religious groups since achieving power in 1949. The rest of the world is most familiar with its oppression of non-registered Christian groups. However, the government has also persecuted many types of new religious and spiritual groups, including the Falun Gong. In fact, its suppression extends beyond such groups to include organizations that teach only simple meditation and gymnastic techniques. The government appears to fear any national group that is capable of organizing its followers into direct action"

hmmmm. Again, I might have censored that.


I guess Google just needs a little more practice at not giving you the information you're looking for.

Sunday
Night, January 29th

the
place to be is the

OSBORNE
VILLAGE FREEHOUSE

for

Chelsea
Crawford's CD Release Party

debuting
the album THE
MASQUERADE

Doors
@ 8pm (No Cover)

This
will be an evening of great live music, including international
musicians,

great
food, drinks and lots of friends.

(If
you and your party would like a table you need to make reservations,
the place will fill up fast!)

 

 

"Chelsea's
music is lush and rich.  Listening to it, my immediate reaction
was that she has dusted off sultry jazz and brought it into the 21 st
 century. To my ears, her compositions are both nostalgic and
contemporary. ….   She's taken all that's good about
older jazz standards and somehow updated it for a new listening
audience. I kept thinking, this sounds 'new' to me."

                                                                         
  Nigel Moore of Café 100.7 - Winnipeg

This just in...and out!

Are you unhappy in your current job and wish you could earn a better living? Stratford Career Institute can offer you the perfect solution!

Honest, I swear!

They sent me a neat little letter and told me all about it. They must be really busy with all the people they're helping to become millionaires, because they even forgot to put my name on the envelope. They must know me, though, because their letter begins, "Dear Friend" and I'm not generally friends with people I don't know.

Because they had been kind enough to send me an exciting, albeit impersonal piece of undirected advertising, I did to them what I try to do to all my friends: I returned the favour. They had included a prepaid return envelope, so it was easy. I have plenty of advertising material sitting around, so I grabbed the closest piece and slipped it in. On the front it reads:

"Cremation. You might think it's the last decision you have to make..."

and on the back:

"What you don't know could make all the difference..."

Just to keep everything square, it too has a postage-paid tear-off reply option. It's going in the mail tomorrow. I don't know how my career has improved as a result of this letter, but I can certainly tell you my happiness has.