npwsol - 3:35 pm on Jun 12, 2008 (gmt 0)

It strikes me yet again that a lot of people here have a very negative view of Google, one which I only moderately understand. They make the big bucks, so it must mean they're another big, bad, corporation. Any time they say anything, it must be a smoke screen to hide the truth from us!

I don't see what most of the people here see in Google. In this I see two things: a PR move (Google knows the best thing it can be is a household name), and a truly legitimate attempt at being transparent in areas where it makes sense. Do you want them to be transparent in the way they weight their searches? Because you might as well just ask them to opent he flood gates and let the spammers through. Google's stance is that the best content on the internet is developed to standards without a focus on the search engine.

Do you want them to be transparent in the way they handle the AdWords bidding system? Sorry, boys, trade secret. Wouldn't want M$ or Yahoo copying that model; not to mention it's highly dependant on PageRank (by all accounts).

Evil is a relative term. As humans we all need to know and understand that. Morality? It is relative to you, me, and our seperate viewpoints. A strict judge might say it's always wrong to steal, where a more compassionate one might argue that it's okay to steal, say, to feed your family. Neither is right, neither is wrong; they are opinions, and morality always is. Simply because there's a strong consensus on certain things doesn't mean it's fact. Killing, for instance, is considered to be universally wrong; yet we have the death penalty. A better question still: If you could go back in time, would you kill Hitler before he rose to power? (don't cop out and argue for all of the technological advances WWII gave us; this is a question of morality, not gain)

To me, "Don't be evil" definitely sounds like a term that's meant to foster debate. If something strikes you as wrong, call it evil and ask why. Would you be comfortable if M$ started doing this? etc., etc.

I contend they use the word evil because it carries more weight. I don't know this for a fact, but if it were something I were to impose, I'd say evil, because you would want to think much harder before becoming associated with something considered "evil."