Boycott Google! 10 Reasons To BOYCOTT GOOGLE!

Nice topic here.Forgo my bad english as it's not my native language. I got the point. Google were not as bad as we think but they also not good as we might know.

I found that most people here were defending google as not to boycott them. And boycott is not a good way though. After what Google had benefit us all webmasters, it is not nice to say some sorts of word like that. But we also, the users, who make them to be what they are now.

1) PageRank- This "authority scale" that google made were the most problem for paid link or what so ever. And now they want us to report about that. For me, what is the best to do it was to make the pagerank invisible. means that only they know what pagerank of sites are. Though it will hurt many directories and paid link sites owners, that is the good way to stop all of this.(and can't stop the hype about the spammy pagerank thread in the digitalpoint.). It maybe make us pain a little bit but if the directories and the sites are too good, there is no way to turn out to not advertise with them.

2) I admit that google brings more traffic than other search engine for some webmasters here.And it brings many good quality visitors to mine too but Google is not a God. And sometimes, Live and Yahoo also bring me a very much traffic too after I realize that I can benefit from it.

But the conclusion is, I will not boycott Google for no any concrete reason.Not only for Google, but for other search engine too.

 

All good points. Unfortunately, if we did try to educate the common people by boycotting Google, I'm wondering if the common people would find us seeing as they are often using Google to find the various sites in the first place.

Remember the streaker that ran around at games with "soy bomb" on his chest? Maybe we should all run naked through the streets with "Boycott Google" on our chests (and our URL on our backs). It's win-win! Especially if we're running the whole time, seeing as running is good for us.

 

Ok, then this is my mistake ( broken english ). I appologize and would like to clear thing up. Google have a lot of divisions:
google.com - search engine ( for information )
google map - show imagery with street name if you use the hybrid fuction
gmail - web-based email service ( free )
adwords - for publishers
adsence - for webmasters
and more http://www.google.com/options/

Regarding adwords, yes, something is really funny. I use adwords for years and now i quit.

tnk, i agree that dependency and monopoly can be very harmful for any industry but this is the way those big "shark " doing. Example, dell purchased alienware ( best notebooks for gamers ).

 

What a right point..

Use Google or not, that's simple. Boycott doesn't help you.

 

If yoiu didn't have succes in adsense or google seo

Don't blame google blame yourself

Funny reading your thread )

 

At least with Yahoo you can speak to someone on the phone, especially if you've got some real problems with accounts that generate several million dollars annually for publishing programs. At Google, there is a Great Wall and then beyond that an Ivory Tower.

 

Iam 100% in favor of this we should stop the monopoly

 

Unless other search engines clean up their act and start indexing aggressively, nothing is going to happen.

 

Not being mean by any stretch, but I just felt the need to counter some of the points made here, or address them as they can be countered with simple common sense. And no, I don't work for Google.

Allow me a few moments of your time...

Actually, they only control their own search engine. The internet does not have one search engine, or it's own search engine, that everyone dips in to. there are still the Yahoo and MSN engines, smaller engines, directories and listings sites can be a part of. And if you've done something bad enough to catch Google's attention and get yourself banned, you should reconsider how you're designing your sites or the content within.

As a web-based email, I would never use GMail for legal or financial "record keeping", where I risk exposing my information to a hacker. You can't keep a hacker out of the best of systems, but to risk your important information on a web-based email system is asking for trouble. I always tell family, friends, co-workers to keep as much personal info out of Hotmail/GMail/whateverMail. In fact, keep it out all together.

Not unlike the contextual ad serving it does on web sites through AdSense. In fact, it is. Much like Yahoo is now getting in to, as well as MSN. Plan to boycott them, too.

How, exactly? You make the claim but fail to support it. Do you get suspicious when the local grocery store pays the weekly newspaper to slip in their flyer each week? they also may pay to slip it in other publications, pay for flyer boxes, or pay people to hand them out.

No, they identify it them tracking cookies, not malware that destorys your system. If you don't want your activity tracked in order to advertise to you, delete them. I do it every day.

Please support this claim. If you can, I'll believe it. But simple claiming it does without supporting evidence isn't enough.

But you are working with them.

Hate to break it to you, but Google aren't the only ones. Many, many sites, developers, advertisers, marketers, and others do it.

So it's your opinion, then. And others here have stated their opinion that it works well for them. Me? I use all three, but Google most of the time. I don't see the spam results you say you do, but maybe I don't search topics that bring up those results. So I'm happy with my searching.

In effect, you also punish the web site owners. If they lose money, the sites go down. No money to operate means no site. Yes, it's not a lot in most cases, but it can be enough to keep the sites alive. Why punish the sites? I have a sport forum I visit that makes anywhere from 1/3 to 1/2 of it's operating expenses through AdWords. The rest comes from personal income and the odd advertising deal. The site might not survive without AdWords. I'm not going to punish them this way.


Sorry, but while I do see your point, I felt it necessary to point out the above. Google's methods might not be to your liking, but a lot of what they do has been done in some form over the years-personal data collection, sharing data, buying other companies to grow and expand...just not in the way technology allows Google to.

 

Good post, but 90 % of my website trafic came from Google.

 

Yahoo is my main source of traffic so far even though I am at No. 1 on Google for my main keywords. Slightly puzzling.

 

I agree G is almost a monopoly and this is not good, but it happens because the competition is too weak. Yahoo and msn have their homepages filled with too much crap and their search results are too inaccurate. G keeps it simple and straight.

 

Google is becoming a failure.

I have stopped using adsense on all sites, except adshare on this site, and i dont even earn $0.05 a day from impressions. It is pathetic. I believe google needs a replacement, and we need 10-20 members from here to invest money into a new google style company, but is ran from digitalpoint and is ran from donations and suggestions for DP's members.

I am in if anyone wants to join me.

Anyone have any suggestions for a brand name for the "new google"?

ROb

 

Google lost it's claim to doing no evil when it bowed down to the Chinese government and let it impose it's people controlling censorsip restrictions in exchange for letting Google past the great firewall of China. Shame on you Google for helping the Chinese government hide it's human rights abuses.

Shame on me for continuing to use Google, but then I never claimed to be doing no evil. Idealism is a luxury I can only engage in after my bills are payed. Google could stay out of China without comprimising it's billions.

 

This thread is quite funny! Let's boycott Google and while we are at it let's make a whole list of companies to boycott.

WalMart : They are too big for our liking! Oh not to mention they were are financial wizards who became the largest retailer in the world. They make too much money!

Microsoft: Bill Gates is a nerd and one of the richest men in the world. He kicked every other companies ass to get to the top. Gotta hate him !

eBay: They are buying everything and making a lot of money. I got ripped off on an auction once. We have to boycott them!

Anybody else want to add to the boycott list. They are all businesses trying to become the best and make tons of money. We can not put up with that!

If you don't like Google, here's a thought, don't use them or any other company you do not like but you can't fault a company for being number one and trying to protect what they have.

 

google runs this plant. get over it. they own you and your children. google for the win!

as for them being a monopoly, we the people let them. we all use google on a daily basis thus helping them build their empire. so who is to blame here? you, that's right. you. the every day user of teh intarweb.

 

90% Webmaster Depends on google, how can they survibe without google?
but we know what google is doing not 100% right, but also different people have different opinion , so lets move on...

 

And that's the point. We've all collectively given Google this power, and their abusing the hell out of it. So you know what, I personally made a decision to stop helping them. Maybe if they turn around and stop abusing the power we gave them, I'd feel differently about them. My point is the same as yours, only where you say we gave Google the power and now we're stuck with them, I say we gave Google the power and now we should show them who put them there in the first place.

That's a valid argument, but it conveniently ignores the very point that I was making. The FTC is investigating Google for anti-trust practices for a reason. Sure, theres MSN & Yahoo, but who uses them (64.2% Google, 25.3 Yahoo!, 10.5% Live out of the top 3, according to NetRatings Inc. for Apr 2007)

When I say that Google is becoming a monopoly, and that once they are a monopoly, if they delete you from their listings, they've effectively deleted you from the internet, I am talking about them abusing their power. I am talking about them censoring those they don't agree with, not banning black hat and spam sites. Yes Google only controls their own search engine, but if they become a monopoly (if we allow them to become one, I should say) then they control what sites are effectively seen on the internet.

I hope that clarifies my argument on that point.

Yes, I completely agree with you. The problem is that Google is marketing Gmail to businesses with their Gmail for your domain service.

A good argument. I'll definitely give you that. And I agree, YPN and MSN both have an intrusive ad system as well. You know though, I block them all. Yep, sorry all you contextual ad publishers here, but I don't like marketing data being collected from me unless I am being paid. Sure, there's the argument that it's private, but the reality is that they do get my IP address, ISP, operating system, screen resolution, browser, the duration of my visit to the page, my exit click, etc, for each and every ad impression. So yeah, I definitely call GMail's scanning of my emails and collecting of my information a security threat, and fail to see the difference between it and other adware.

Think about this for a second. I am going to describe adware: it uses my browsing habits, collects my personal and system information and reports it back to a central server, all in an effort to get me to make them money. In whatever you way you describe spyware and adware, AdSense can describe as well. Hell, the name AdSense describes it well.

How exactly? Hmm, well let me see. Google is paying companies to bundle their toolbar checked by default (that if you're not careful and just click OK when you install it will collect personal information about your surfing habits.) Geeze, have you never dealt with spyware? This is a classic spyware distribution method, and the Google toolbar does some very classic spying, and recording of your usage data. Like I said, you don't have to opt-in to any of this stuff, but if you're the casual user just trying to read a PDF and clicking OK (like so many casual users out there) you'll have Google collecting your personal information and using it for marketing purposes in time (and a lot of spyware is "opt-in" as well.) So yeah, all of that stuff kind of makes me a little suspicious. Kind of like if my newspaper was to slip in a flyer that reported back to the newspaper about all the articles I read. I would definitely boycott that newspaper.

This has nothing to do with my point. My point is that Google bought a spyware company. Yes they are tracking cookies, and yes, those tracking cookies spy on you and your web usage.

This was my understanding back when I wrote this article in April. It was a misunderstanding, and I should've edited before posting it. More details can be read here.

What? How? I have an AdSense account that I used back when I still liked Google, but I haven't used it or ran an ad on one of my sites in over 3 months. In fact, there's $90 sitting in that account, just $10 until payout, and yet I do not use it. I refuse to put anymore money in their pockets. So how am I working with them? By blocking all their ads, boycotting every website they own, and writing articles encouraging people to stop supporting them?

True, but none of them can and are doing it on the level that Google is. They have Analytics, so they have many people's sales and web statistics. They have feedburner, so they have stats on your readers and readership. They have DoubleClick, so they have the largest database of web user information on the planet. They have their search engine, so they have the data from every search, and virtually every IP address in the world's search habits. They have AdSense, which is displayed on millions of sites, and also mines data on every single ad impression. And as I mentioned before, Privacy International gave Google the lowest possible privacy... and this is the company with the most information! What a horrible combination!

I understand where you're coming from, but sorry. It's not my responsibility to view or click on your ads, and there are hundreds of alternative ways to finance your websites. AdSense is by far the only solution. You're right though, if everyone blocked those ads, the internet would be a much different place and many smaller sites would die. Luckily for you and your forum, it's unlikely that most of your casual users are going to have adblocking software installed (just like it's unlikely that people will actually boycott Google.)

Crying because people are blocking your ads is like the music industry crying that people don't like CDs or DRM and are pirating their music. If your market changes, fit to the market. Stop trying to force it to stay in the past. Like I said though, the markets unlikely to change, and AdSense will most likely continue to be a viable revenue stream for a long time.

I see your points as well, and figured you'd spent some time giving an honest and intelligent reply, I might as well honor you with what I hope amounts to the same. I think your last line sums up why I am not particularly happy with Google.

 

I agree with you. Moreover, Google adsense is absolutely useless for making money. I personally have started to hae google. It's being very pushy.

 

haha, well something tells me we'd definitely attract a lot of attention (at least until we got caught).

But on a more serious note, are you thinking that google would ban a website if that site put a link saying "Boycott Google, Read Why Here"?

Personally, I think a lot people don't know about what goes on behind the scenes of the internet. People don't like when others are getting screwed either. Especially by big companies like Google. I think we could get a lot of support from internet users.

Getting the common internet users up to speed with what Google is doing to us could have an impact. As webmasters, we do have the power to do that much.