More on Google
Google last night apparently restored Xenu.net to its site. Congratulations both to Google and, I believe, to the hundreds, if not thousands of weblogs who were up in arms over this act of censorship. Of the major media sites, only CNN seems to have picked up a Reuters story — and the CNN piece (discovered, needless to say, through Google’s own news search) ran after the weblog storm.
The definitive reporting on the Google-Scientology dispute (see below) that I’ve found is on Microcontent News. The author, John Hiler, was originally going to take a tough line on Google, but he reckons they would have risked the business by taking on the Church of Scientology and effectively challenging the DMCA. “Deleting information from the Google Cache would be like stealing holy icons out of the Vatican. Google is well aware of this perception — but of course, needs to balance this with its own fiduciary responsibilities.”