'It's not that we believe Google is evil. What we believe is that Google, Inc. is at a fork in the road, and they have some big decisions to make.' -- Google Watch

Once there was HotBot, then AltaVista, now it's Google. Yahoo never was in the running.

The top four search engines are: Alltheweb, Google, Inktomi, AltaVista. Two factors determine a good search engine, the ability to crawl the web and fast searches. About 75% of search request are through Google.

There are many more than four search engines, but only about four have the technology to crawl most of the web on a regular basis. Alltheweb (now owned by Overture) does the best overall crawling, followed by Google and then Inktomi (now owned by Yahoo). Google's bizarre crawling can be unfair for large sites with low or average PageRank. They may not get to many of the pages each month on such sites, even though by the end of that crawl Google is grabbing pages in spasms, at a rate of several per second. Then the next month Google's crawlers start all over again and do the exact same thing.

Of these top three crawlers, Alltheweb has the smallest number of users in the US. Many web masters wouldn't notice if Alltheweb disappeared -- despite the fact that they have good technology, both for crawling and for searching. Hopefully Overture can do something with Alltheweb and AltaVista (which they also bought in 2003). While AltaVista has good search technology, their crawling is extremely poor. Now with both under the same roof, Overture has the assets it needs to compete.

Also worth watching is Teoma/AskJeeves. Their search technology is good, and they have begun to expand their crawl.

Google uses some 15,000 cheap Linux boxes!

Microshit was once seen at the threat on the net, that threat is now seen as Google. If your website does not appear on Google, then it effectively does not exist.

This is one reason why we provide a lot of links. It helps web crawlers, but also helps you to know what is out there. It is also why we ask you to spread our newsletters around and to provide links to us. Such cross-referencing helps spread alternative information outside of corporate control.

There is a struggle going on for who controls the net.

Does this matter? To answer the question try searching for items know to be on Indymedia using Google. We are also aware of key websites 'disappearing' at crucial moments in history.

Google is a privately owned corporation. If they have a privacy policy its details are not known. They are squirrelling away oodles of data. Every website is cached somewhere on Google. This can be useful when websites, or web pages mysteriously disappear. But raises the question of who has access to all this data. Google has strong links to spooks inc. Matt Cutts, a key Google engineer, used to work for the National Security Agency. Google wants to hire more people with security clearances, so that they can peddle their corporate assets to the spooks in Washington. Post-9-11 has created a climate in which Google can flourish.

Immortal cookies were outlawed. Google uses a cookie that expires in 2038. They were the first, others followed. This cookie places a unique ID number on your hard disk. Every time you land on a Google page, you get a Google cookie if you don't already have one. If you have one, they read and record your unique ID number.

Google records everything they can. For all searches they record the cookie ID, your Internet IP address, the time and date, your search terms, and your browser configuration. Increasingly, Google is customizing results based on your IP number. This is referred to in the industry as 'IP delivery based on geolocation'.

Google retains all data indefinitely. Google has no data retention policies. There is evidence that they are able to easily access all the user information they collect and save.

Google's toolbar is spyware. With the advanced features enabled, Google's free toolbar for Explorer phones home with every page you surf. Yes, it reads your cookie too, and sends along the last search terms you used in the toolbar. Their privacy policy confesses this, but that's only because Alexa lost a class-action lawsuit when their toolbar did the same thing, and their privacy policy failed to explain this. Worse yet, Google's toolbar updates to new versions quietly, and without asking. This means that if you have the toolbar installed, Google essentially has complete access to your hard disk every time you phone home. Most software vendors, and even Microsoft, ask if you'd like an updated version. But not Google.

Please sign the on-line petition re Google censoring of IndyMedia


www.petitiononline.com/IMCgoogl/petition.html

Google was nominated by Google Watch in 2003 for a Big Brother award.


www.google.com