The Google Voice: Free Speech in Search

Posted by Amy
April 24, 2008
11:59 AM

"There is no human involvement or manipulation of results, which is why users
have come to trust Google as a source of objective information untainted by paid
placement."

(1) This is what Google's Technology Overview page used to say. Now, this phrase is noticeably missing.
(2) Human involvement or not, Google's search results have been recognized as having what seems like a very human right - freedom of speech.

From the beginning, Google founders recognized that their search engine was a business and not merely a resource. Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin wrote a paper about the creation of Google as Ph.D. candidates at Stanford. In that paper they stated, "we expect that advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of the consumers."

(3) Today, 99% of Google's revenue comes from ads.
(4) Brin and Page's early acknowledgement that search results would likely be biased toward advertisers, combined with Google's search results being considered protected free speech, could change the way users view Google's search results. But how did Google's search results become recognized as protected free speech? It started with one company: Search King......(read more)

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