German Government Asks Users to Boycott Google

The currently discussed law suggests changes to Germany's copyright law that would enable large publishers to charge Google for the common first sentence or paragraph of an article that appears in search results.

Google Germany has reacted with a video ("Defend your Net") that encourages users to voice their opinion against the proposed law as it would threaten a user's ability to find content. The video ends with the statement

For more than 10 years you can find everything that moves you.
A proposed law is designed to change that.
Do you want that?
Get involved.

Germany's government, however, believes that Google isn't playing fair and basically asked people in Germany to boycott Google. In a tweet, Secretary of Justice, Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger wrote that "there are other search engines than Google". The BDZV und VDZ, which represent Germany's print and online publishers as industry organizations, accused Google to use "perfid methods" to create fear among consumers and described Google's video as "slander".

Verteidige Dein Netz

_{Contact Us for News Tips, Corrections and Feedback}

Ask a Category Expert

Create a new thread in the US News comments forum about this subject

Title
Subject
Title

This thread is closed for comments

23 comments

Comment from the forums

Your comment

Top Comments

john15v16 5 years ago

OK..sooooo since Google has most of the search market world wide Mrs. Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger thinks that it's hurting German publishers to have their work easily accessible across the planet...I'm just not getting the logic behind this. I mean, Google isn't giving away entire books or chapters or even paragraphs for that matter...What folks would do for a Deutsche Mark...
blazorthon 5 years ago

I'd describe what the German government said about Google to be slander and a lie about what Google said, but that's me. Google disagreeing with them over a law being made to screw with Google should be a given. If anything ,they probably could have resolved any issue by talking with Google about this privately until they had a greater need to go public. It's not fair to users nor Google to just throw something like that out there IMO. I'd say the same about Microsoft if they did this to Bing, especially since both are not trying to falsify search results AFAIK.
cats_Paw 5 years ago

I hardly belive ive ever seen google do something i disagree with. I mean, most companies fak you in the ass ( excuse my language ) every single day, while google most of the time just gives you a poke in the arm.

Its hard to really be on the side of govermnets that "allowed" the world to become such a mess.

Other Comments

blazorthon 5 years ago

I'd describe what the German government said about Google to be slander and a lie about what Google said, but that's me. Google disagreeing with them over a law being made to screw with Google should be a given. If anything ,they probably could have resolved any issue by talking with Google about this privately until they had a greater need to go public. It's not fair to users nor Google to just throw something like that out there IMO. I'd say the same about Microsoft if they did this to Bing, especially since both are not trying to falsify search results AFAIK.
john15v16 5 years ago

OK..sooooo since Google has most of the search market world wide Mrs. Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger thinks that it's hurting German publishers to have their work easily accessible across the planet...I'm just not getting the logic behind this. I mean, Google isn't giving away entire books or chapters or even paragraphs for that matter...What folks would do for a Deutsche Mark...
cats_Paw 5 years ago

I hardly belive ive ever seen google do something i disagree with. I mean, most companies fak you in the ass ( excuse my language ) every single day, while google most of the time just gives you a poke in the arm.

Its hard to really be on the side of govermnets that "allowed" the world to become such a mess.
alidan 5 years ago

john15v16OK..sooooo since Google has most of the search market world wide Mrs. Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger thinks that it's hurting German publishers to have their work easily accessible across the planet...I'm just not getting the logic behind this. I mean, Google isn't giving away entire books or chapters or even paragraphs for that matter...What folks would do for a Deutsche Mark...

how much of a news article do you need to read to get the big picture? they think that the first like to paragraph is enough, and because of that think people wont click the link to their site.

i get it, but i think its VERY stupid.

Cats_PawI hardly belive ive ever seen google do something i disagree with. I mean, most companies (sanction avoidance removed word) you in the (sanction avoidance removed word) ( excuse my language ) every single day, while google most of the time just gives you a poke in the arm.Its hard to really be on the side of govermnets that "allowed" the world to become such a mess.

there are legitimate complaints about google... but most of the major ones are so stupid...
oh no, a robot saw a word in my email, and gave me an ad that goes along with that word, how dare they.
but fact is, all those emails are already going through them

oh no, they track my web habits, OH NO
and i say so what? again its all about the ads, and making more money off targeted ads its not invasive, and its hardly wrong. tell me this is a major issue once dumpster diving a hospital/doctors office for social security numbers is no longer a thing.
fuzzion 5 years ago

And I thought only Apple were pigs.
in_the_loop 5 years ago

Google should just boycott Germany (and France that also have a similar proposal), then the government would see how their voters would react.
No need for google to waste their time on idiotic countries where they give companies the ability to reach more people (via search hits) and then have to pay for it, despite that!
If anything it should have been the other way around(if google wasn't ad-supported)!
acerace 5 years ago

Anonymous said:

Google should just boycott Germany (and France that also have a similar proposal), then the government would see how their voters would react.
No need for google to waste their time on idiotic countries where they give companies the ability to reach more people (via search hits) and then have to pay for it, despite that!
If anything it should have been the other way around(if google wasn't ad-supported)!

Yeah, 'Murica.
Anonymous 5 years ago

Don't they have enough of a crisis to bother with other than do such ridiculous stupidities over "search engines?"
Firehead2k 5 years ago

How about Tomshardware stops misinterpreting news by giving it grandiose titles.

- The minister in question isn't "[The] German Government"
- A newspaper (who is affected by the proposed legislation) ran with that tweet to generate a headline "Minister indirectly calls for Google boycott"
- The tweet itself is subject to interpretation, and from the context I would interpret it as "not only google is affected by this law, other search engines are aswell", since it contains a link to a short governmental FAQ that adresses some of those issues.
kensingtron 5 years ago

Like German humour, this is no laughing matter.
eiskrystal 5 years ago

Firehead, so 2 headlines are abused just while talking about this and yet this minister thinks that cutting what we see down to a headline is a good idea... LOL.
Parrdacc 5 years ago

So much for all that talk of America should be more like Europe. With all that is going on over their I think they might have some slightly bigger issues to worry about. I know I lived in Germany for quite a number of years and traveled all over. Europe's great, till you have to deal with anything their governments have a hand in. I imagine its like that all over (never been to the East). Grass is always greener syndrome I guess.
shocky_19 5 years ago

You know Germany as well as all of Europe should really get their own houses in order first before they go around telling their people what they should be doing. Really, boycott Google? Over this? Lack of priorities I see here. Can't trust anyone in any government.
besterino 5 years ago

To me it's quite simple: As a general rule google should be able to quote for free.

However, if they make any money from or because of the third party content available on their site/services, they should have to pay an adequate share to those who delivered "google's content". The one who does the work should get (at least part of) the monetary benefits (if there are any).
JonnyDough 5 years ago

shocky_19You know Germany as well as all of Europe should really get their own houses in order first before they go around telling their people what they should be doing. Really, boycott Google? Over this? Lack of priorities I see here. Can't trust anyone in any government.

I'm not in the government (lying).

The military is government. Or is it? It's funny cuz my oath talks about tyrannical government as well. Part of my job is loyalty to the public and to keep an eye on Uncle Sam. I think politicians forget this.
bllue 5 years ago

Google is just trying to protect their asses and revenues, they don't care how this would affect users. People realize that and refuse to ride their monopolistic bandwagon and boycot.
frank_drebin 5 years ago

what's "perfid"?
Anonymous 5 years ago

Problem is google is making a lot of money and they are no paying any taxes to anybody ,google in not playing fair in that regard.
f-14 5 years ago

because germans hate the french, google should make a point to redirect all german traffic to a competitor french version with a redirect note citing this being done due to german government with a small picture of chancellor hitler next to it for fun.
murzar 5 years ago

What is wrong with this world? That is plain moronic, it would only hurt the websites.

Display All 23 comments

Display more comments