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Piracy Advertising Google

Google Changes 'To Fight Piracy' By Highlighting Legal Sites 160

mrspoonsi writes Google has announced changes to its search engine in an attempt to curb online piracy. The company has long been criticised for enabling people to find sites to download entertainment illegally. The entertainment industry has argued that illegal sites should be "demoted" in search results. The new measures, mostly welcomed by music trade group the BPI, will instead point users towards legal alternatives such as Spotify and Google Play. Google will now list these legal services in a box at the top of the search results, as well as in a box on the right-hand side of the page. Crucially, however, these will be adverts — meaning if legal sites want to appear there, they will need to pay Google for the placement.
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Google Changes 'To Fight Piracy' By Highlighting Legal Sites

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  • Is Google Losing It? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Forgefather ( 3768925 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @10:42AM (#48186833)

    The more I see this kind of stuff about Google being forced to modify search results based on dumb things like 'right to be forgotten' the more I can't help but feel that Google's results just might not be reliable enough anymore. I know that right to be forgotten is only a European thing but I still can't help but get the feeling that I am no longer getting the best results for my search.

    Although it brings bile to the back of my throat I think it may be time to see how Bing lines up against Google.

    • by ameen.ross ( 2498000 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @11:01AM (#48186965)

      And what makes you thing Bing doesn't have to obey EU laws when it does business in the EU [searchengineland.com]? The situation with Bing could in fact be even more dire than with Google. Duckduckgo will be closer to the real thing.

      • Finally some judge understands how the internet works, and now you complain that he has.

        • Yep, the judge understands that the internet is global but he has totally forgotten how international law works. You cannot prevent a company from doing something outside of your borders just because it is illegal inside your borders. What if China decided that if Google wanted a Chinese presence they had to filter all results for all users globally? How is that any different other than the subject matter being blocked?

          • by Jason Levine ( 196982 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @01:00PM (#48187763) Homepage

            What if China decided that if Google wanted a Chinese presence they had to filter all results for all users globally?

            China really wants to be able to do this. Whenever you see UN statements about taking control of the Internet away from the US and putting it in the hands of a UN committee, what they really mean is "We want China, North Korea, Syria, Iran, etc to be able to say 'This website violates our laws so it must be removed from The Internet even though it is located outside our borders."

            This isn't to say that US control is a great thing, but when you get into a "lesser of two evils" choice of US or UN (i.e. China/Iran/etc) control, I'll pick US control every time.

            • by Richy_T ( 111409 )

              China already could do this. Likely Google would decide in that case that it simply wasn't worth having a presence in China and China apparently doesn't care or doesn't think the trade-off is worth it.

              • S/could do/does/.

                Google only has a presence in Hong Kong; it has no presence in Mainland China. The two already went through this in the past. Eventually, with the way things currently look in HK, we'll likely see Google vanish from HK as well.

      • by Anonymous Coward
        Duckduckgo is really improving lately. They now have a number of features such as auto complete search terms, image search, etc. that I missed from Google. Plus I like how they present results when searching for an obscure term or TLAs (three letter acronyms). For a while I had Duckduckgo as my default search engine, but found myself drifting back to Google more and more. Now I'm doing that less and make a conscious effort to use Duckduckgo exclusively. They've come a long way. No I don't work for the
    • by Njorthbiatr ( 3776975 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @11:22AM (#48187111)

      Google isn't modifying their search results.

      They're adding advertisements for legitimate content at the top of searches and on the side... For a price.

      It's brilliant. I love you Google.

      • by Richy_T ( 111409 )

        Just like the other search engines were doing when we all decided we liked Google more. What goes around comes around.

      • Google isn't modifying their search results.

        Yes, they are. According to OP, they'll be putting what THEY deem to be "legitimate" sites at the top. And asking for pay to be listed as "legitimate".

        If that isn't "modifying search results" for money, I don't know what is.

        Google just found a new way to be evil.

        • Google doesn't really change anything. They just check the ads against a supplied list of providers that bought the searched content and won't place an add for a site that hasn't legally got the content.
          Just like now. The illegal content providers didn't pay for ads anyway.
          It's genius!

          • Google doesn't really change anything.

            YES, they ARE! It's a search engine. Changing the order of the search results changes EVERYTHING.

            And by their own admission, they're doing based on [A] payment, and [B] their subjective perception of whether the content is real.

            I repeat: that *IS* modifying search results, and they're doing it for money.

            When I search, I'm not searching for the highest bidder.

            This is why I am using Google less and less now. I have actually started using Bing (which in some ways isn't much better), and I'm giving

            • They ALREADY put ads on top. They have for years. This is the same. They just check the ads against that list (which doesn't change anything because the illegal content providers don't have the money to pay for the ads.

              Now you may argue that the ads are wrong. OK. That is arguable. But that is a different discussion.

              • They ALREADY put ads on top. They have for years.

                No shit, Sherlock. Figured that out, did you?

                This is the same.

                No, this is NOT the same. The ads they put at the top are separated from the rest of the search results, and clearly marked (as required by law... at least it is for newspapers) as advertisements or "sponsored" content.

                This is different. The claim is that they will rearrange based on some subjective measure of the "legitimacy" of the content. That is not the same at all. It's not just advertising, it's changing your search results according to endorsement by G

                • They ALREADY put ads on top. They have for years.

                  No shit, Sherlock. Figured that out, did you?

                  What I haven't figured out yet is why you seem to have that figured out but you still argue like this changes anything. It doesn't.

                  • What I haven't figured out yet is why you seem to have that figured out but you still argue like this changes anything.

                    Yes, this much is obvious.

    • Don't you think Bing is doing the same?

    • by pjt33 ( 739471 )

      If they're highlighting Google Play then I can see a new anti-trust investigation in the near future.

    • It doesn't sound like Google is being "forced". It sounds like Google found some companies willing to cough up a bunch of money to be promoted when the user searches for online music/video [not that Google Play will have to pay, but they needed another company to pay so Play could also be promoted, otherwise it's more of pushing their services over competitors].

  • by Anonymous Coward

    And if it exists on the web, google should be able to find it.

    By all means, go after (Via legal methods) sites hosting content illegally, but stop fskering with my search results. Half the damn web is now unsearchable for one reason or another.

    Time to look at distributed, un-censurable search tech?

    • by meustrus ( 1588597 ) <.moc.liamg. .ta. .surtsuem.> on Monday October 20, 2014 @11:08AM (#48187015)

      Google is not an agnostic search system. Google is the king of search, and everyone is trying to hack around their algorithms to boost their search rankings. Is it really so terrible that Google itself should be outright asked to prefer search results that are "better for society"?

      Don't get me wrong. I want a truly agnostic search engine. Badly. I want to be able to find the best source for what I'm looking for, not a couple dozen support forums with great SEO and an actual honest-to-goodness answer buried on page 47 of the search results. Google used to be the closest we could get to that, but that was a long time ago. Now they're basically a public utility, much like the internet itself. Although since so many people are stealing from it and its customers, I'd say it's more like cable TV.

      • You seem to be contradicting yourself, so may I ask what's your point? That you personally want something from Google that (in your opinion) is bad for society?

        • Notice the air quotes around "better for society". I would rather avoid discussing whether that's true, because that discussion is happening elsewhere.

          What I want is a a "truly agnostic search engine". That would mean nobody can mess with the search results, not by law and not by hacking. Perhaps I didn't make this clear, but I don't expect Google will ever be that again.

          I feel like musing a bit on what would satisfy this desire. There are a few problems with search results: 1) They lack context; 2) They ar

      • Is it really so terrible that Google itself should be outright asked to prefer search results that are "better for society"?

        Who gets to decide what is "better for society"? Also, do these decisions happen on a country-by-country basis without affecting other countries? Because I'm sure China would love to censor search results world-wide for "the good of society." I'm also sure that the RIAA would love to make sure that their member organizations get more Google ranking than Indie labels for "the better

        • Who gets to decide what is "better for society"?

          Society does. Society makes laws, and people are expected to follow those laws, whether or not they believe in them personally, or face the consequences. If they disagree, they should get the laws changed, and not simply break them.

          • Who gets to decide what is "better for society"?

            Society does.

            This. Notice my "scare quotes" [wikipedia.org] around "better for society". mattack2 has hit on the head exactly what I would have said if it wouldn't have distracted from my point. There's no way to perfectly determine what is best for society, but we do have mostly-good-most-of-the-time ways.

  • by i_want_you_to_throw_ ( 559379 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @10:48AM (#48186869) Journal
    Google isn't going to change anything, just charge legal sites to place their ads on piracy searches.

    Good on you Google for exploiting this for profit. 'Murika!
    • by johanw ( 1001493 )

      Yes, a browser plugin that removes the first boxed ad results would be sufficient (for now).

    • by JonahsDad ( 1332091 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @10:54AM (#48186921)
      What I want to know is: If a piracy site wants to pay to place their ads in this box, will Google allow it?
      • What I want to know is: If a piracy site wants to pay to place their ads in this box, will Google allow it?

        Probably, but I guess those on the anti-piracy side figure they'll now have more of a paper trail to follow to find and deal with those paying to get those ads up.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      Piracy stopped being about morality long, long ago. It's about profit and nothing but profit.

      Google is merely doing the same. In fact it makes perfect sense considering their main business model.

      Also, debating the morality of an advertisement company?

    • by c ( 8461 )

      Google isn't going to change anything, just charge legal sites to place their ads on piracy searches.

      Seems reasonable. How else is Google supposed to know the difference between honest content providers and those dirty pirates?

      The whole DMCA takedown debacle shows us that you clearly can't take someones word that they're a copyright owner; they frequently lie about it. But we've been told time and time again that those dirty pirates expect everything for free, so you'd expect that charging money for listing

  • Shareholders wave your hands in the air!
  • by Anonymous Coward

    "legal alternatives" to torrents reminds me abstinence-only sex education where they list "healthy alternatives" to sex for teens. Bake a cake together! Go on romantic walk on the beach! Have a pillow fight!

    • by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 20, 2014 @11:21AM (#48187101)

      1. Bake a cake together
      2. Go for a romantic walk
      3. Have a pillow fight
      4. Shag like animals

    • Good grief. "Abstinence-only sex education" is like swimming lessons where they teach nothing but how to stay out of the water.

      • by Rande ( 255599 )

        Certainly, sex education where you figuratively got into the water and taught how to do the various strokes would have been a lot more fun.

  • What if I am looking to download a ROM from an 8bit NES game? What if I want to watch a movie that isn't available to stream anywhere and hasn't been on DVD for years (yet still has a valid copyright which the owner is exercising and yet not selling copies of said movie)? What if I want to see episodes of TV shows that have never ben on DVD? What will google highlight for options then?
    • Yeah, they should not change a thing because 0.03% of the population needs their NES games or other form of entertainment nobody cares for.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      It would not be the end of the world. I'm sure you could easily find some other entertainment.

      And guess what: the situation of the 8-bit ROMs not being available on every warez site might actually encourage the copyright holders to republish them as part of retro compilations by legal means.

      • by Anonymous Coward

        You do know that the only reason that copyright holders are re-releasing as retro games, is that the success of the warez sites have showned to those thick headed copyright holders that there is a market for it.

  • by UnknownSoldier ( 67820 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @11:12AM (#48187041)

    When "piracy" became hijacked from meaning the naval context, copying was rampant. In the 80's as kids we couldn't afford all the games so we (illegally) shared them. Hell, I got into computers simply because it was a fun challenge to "krack" software. In the 90's In college/university we used BBS's, FSP (how many know about _that_ protocol!!), FTP with hidden directories containing control characters, IRC with XDCC, binary newsgroup with split .RARs., in 2000's we used Torrents and/or P2P such as Emule, etc. It wasn't until years later did we learn that piracy = lack of respect for the author's distribution. As adults we buy things because we want to support the author(s) to produce more. And if it is crap we vote with our wallet -- and tell others to not buy it.

    What is kind of ironic and completely counter-intuitive is that those who pirate tend to spend more but that is a discussion for another day. (Part of the problem is that certain "assets" are not even available to be legally purchased, etc.)

    IMHO Piracy begins AND ends with education. Futurama's Bender made fun of this "archaic philosophy" that "Sharing is illegal" by joking "You wouldn't steal X, right? Or would I !" [youtube.com] meme along with the popular "You wouldn't download car?" Because most people are able to separate the issue from money vs freedom. i.e. Artists want to share their creations. Consumers want to share those same creations -- that is what culture does -- preserves "popular" art in whatever medium. Unfortunately the context behind those same reason's don't always sync up. You have bands like The Who who don't care about "bootlegging"; other sellout bands like Metallica that only care about the money and could care less if fans help "market" the band.

    Kids these day's aren't stupid. They are questing the status quo that: "Why is illegal sharing illegal? Because of arbitrary financial reasons??" id software created the shareware model -- give part of the game away for free, customers can spend money to buy the rest. These days Humble Bundles let people pay what they want. IMHO this is the correct way to do things. Compromise between 2 conflicting ideals. Open Source or Creative Commons [creativecommons.org] is another approach.

    Google making it harder to find digital goods is not going to change a dam thing. Google wasn't around when we were kids and piracy was rampant. Removing a search engine will only drive the process back underground when it peaked with The Pirate Bay in the mid 2000's.

    Piracy has existed since the beginning of the network. Any technological means to try to remove it is like pissing in the ocean. Yeah good luck with that !

    • The vast majority of piracy is a necessity for the majority of the world's population. In most parts of the world a student cannot even afford half of the textbooks he needs and certainly cannot afford to buy video games for 60 USD each. Modern economy spends billions on advertising to create artificial demands, so it is not suprising that people who cannot afford all these shiny things copy them if they have the opportunity.

      When I was a poor student many years ago (in the 90s), I pirated everything, every

    • Piracy has been used to mean copyright infringement since the 1700s.

    • by naich ( 781425 )

      FSP (how many know about _that_ protocol!!)

      I remember FSP. You'd set it going on a file, log out, go on holiday for a couple of weeks, survive a nuclear war that reduces man back to the stone age, rebuild society and rediscover lost technology, rebuild the internet, and FSP would start downloading it again as if nothing had happened. Slow as hell, but you couldn't kill it with a bad connection.

  • Let's just hope you can filter for those legal sites.

  • wrong headline (Score:5, Insightful)

    by whyAreAllNicksTaken ( 3865693 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @11:25AM (#48187137)

    Google Monetizes 'To Fight Piracy' By Charging Legal Sites

    Fixed that for you

    • This is a good thing. Private companies unrelated to piracy should not have to foot the bill for implementing the hopes and dreams of another company.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    The worlds most profitable advertising company has agreed to sell advertisements? Color me shocked.

  • by qbast ( 1265706 ) on Monday October 20, 2014 @11:37AM (#48187217)
    Most people are already conditioned to not even notice adverts. So pulling 'legal sites' from normal results (where they would be close to top anyway) to advert box will have exactly the opposite result.
  • I used to listen to music, but I hate the music industry so much I just don't care anymore. I spend my money elsewhere.
  • Legal: adj.; the ones who pay us money.
  • by tepples ( 727027 ) <tepples.gmail@com> on Monday October 20, 2014 @12:21PM (#48187415) Homepage Journal
    I tried six queries on Google from a PC running Firefox for Windows in a U.S. state bordering Lake Michigan. One produced ads alongside a bunch of bootleg organic results:
    • song of the south download brought ads for a bootleg DVD [reddogvideo.net] and another bootleg DVD [alamodvd.com]

    The rest produced a bunch of bootleg organic results and no ads:

    • song of the south torrent
    • spartakus and the sun beneath the sea download
    • spartakus and the sun beneath the sea torrent
    • pinocchio and the emperor of the night download
    • pinocchio and the emperor of the night torrent
  • by Anonymous Coward

    Why are google even indexing them if they are "illegal"?

  • If they can tell legal from non-legal, why do they even show the illegal stuff?

    • They should index them because it isn't the job of a search engine to censor the internet. If the site is illegal, it is the job of legal authorities to take it off line. It is a dangerous road to take to let Google edit what content is findable. I want a free and open internet, not the internet according to Google. How long before they start taking suggestions from the government about hiding anything they don't want you to see? After year years of consolidation in search our options are Google, Bing and a

  • I heard it yesterday on TV.
    I was thrown aback by such an incredibly smart and useful move. Impressive.

    Now instead of googlig for "free porn pictures to download" we will have to actually type in "www,thepiratebay.info" or "www.torrentz.com"... this will no doubt deter so many people that it will render all the P2P networks useless.

    Google = Evil geniuses!!

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