Jay replied already, and as far as the general issue is concerned, I agree
with him completely. Follow some additional comments.


> having said that, i still agree that google should be allowed to say what
> they want, but advertising is NOT them saying something, it is them
> allowing someone to buy access to others to say what they want.  by not
> letting people of some views have that same access, they are impeding
> free speech in an unreasonable way.

Take that to the extreme. Every media company has limited ad space, and if
they have enough clients, they need to refuse some of them. According to
your logic, they would not have the right to refuse any. That can't really
be, can it? So they need to have the right to say "no" to a client -- just
as you -- as a contractor -- have the right to say "no" (or charge an
unreasonable high price) to a potential client you don't want. 

If every time a company or a contractor refuses a job (or a client, or
publishing an ad) a lawyer could come along screaming "censorship" or
"discrimination", we all would be in deep sh..., ahem, trouble.

Or take the case of a company that comes up at the 700th position on Google
in a certain search relevant to their business, while a competitor comes up
on 5th position in the same search. Let's say the one at the 5th position
is a gun control freak, and actually promotes his view on his company web
site (but it's not related to his business). And let's say that the one on
the 700th position is a "guns for all" promoter, and also publishes his
views on his company web site (also not related to his business, which is
the same as the other one's). Should the one at position 700 be allowed to
require Google to list him next to (not before, not after) his competitor?
That soon becomes really ugly. 

Where do you stop with requiring "equal access"? Only with paid
advertising? That's not quite "equal", this again promotes only the views
of the ones with money. So access needs to be free and unlimited to be
really equal -- but one reality of life is that there's no free lunch, and
that /somebody/ has to pay for it. I'd rather have the proponents of
whatever view pay for their publication, and I pay for the publication of
my views, than me (through my taxes) having to pay for the publication of
everybody's views, by some government-set rules.

> it's censorship because for speech to have any meaning it must be
> possible to communicate your views to others.  

You can put up a web site, can't you? 

> that means people on both sides of an issue must have equal access to the
> media, ...

I think that's a far stretch. Taken to the extreme, this would mean that
every time I read something in the paper that I don't like, the paper would
be obligated to publish my view of the things -- and this, because I'm poor
and can't afford paid advertising for my views, for free. I can't say I'd
dislike the opportunity, but I'm afraid I wouldn't like the paper anymore
where everybody else has this same right. And I'm quite sure the paper
wouldn't survive a week.

> consider the presidential election, would it be proper for a company to
> only carry advertising for candidates that they liked and refuse to take
> paid advertising from their opponents?  

I think it would be. I think this is the way it should be, and probably
this is more or less how it is. I'm not sure about all the laws involved,
but I don't see that forcing a company to do business one way or another
would be a good thing. If you really want equal access, put up a government
channel (or paper) with clear rules. But even that won't provide equal
access -- there will be rules and restrictions. There always are; things
are not unlimited and free (a requirement for being truly "equal").

> obviously this would let corporate america substantially influence the
> outcome of an election just by restricting communication of the
> alternatives.  

I don't think there's a politically uniform "corporate America" that has an
agenda. There are corporations that want investment in national oil, while
there are others that prefer cheap oil from wherever it comes. And so on.
There's not one "corporate America" agenda. So there's also not one
"corporate America" media. That's always the same: the Democrats bitch that
the media is all corporate owned (and therefore Republican), while the
Republicans bitch that the media guys are all liberal (and therefore
Democrat). Give me a break... it's pretty clear that there is not one
agenda from outside the (media) business that controls the media. The only
agenda they probably all share is striving for high viewer/listener/reader
numbers. 

> if google will take paid advertising from anti-gun groups, but will not
> take paid advertising from pro gun rights groups, that's a form of
> censorship.  

No. That's selection of clients. If you turn down a client (as a
contractor), and the client happens to be smoker, would you like a lawyer
to come after you because you turned down a smoker and that's
discrimination? Maybe it's even a policy of yours not to do any business
with smokers because you can't stand the smell. Your business, your right.

I don't see why media companies should be treated differently. Now you may
think that all publication is public and therefore all publication should
be government-regulated. But then you really are better off with
prohibiting all private activity in publication and make it all
government-run. But that also means that private web sites would be
regulated by the government. I think what you want -- more regulation of
the media --, leads to less free speech, not more.

> owning the media does not give one the right to control advertising
> to the extent that opposing views are no longer heard.  

They are heard, but on other channels. No one channel is balanced. You want
balanced information? You need to watch/listen/read different channels, and
most of all, you need to go see for yourself in real life and think for
yourself. And that's even for free.

> suppose at&t cable (which refuses to run paid nra infomercials..)
> was run by "pro-life" people (which is somewhat likely), would it be
> reasonable for them to take paid advertising or even long infomercials
> from the pro-life groups but refuse to air similar advertising from the
> pro-choice groups?  

I think it would be. It simply would show where they stand. 

> is it proper that media giants can stifle criticism of giant mega
> corporations, or their control of the air waves, newspapers, etc.?  i
> don't think so.

See, I think the real problem is that there /are/ media giants. This shows
a certain tendency of the majority of viewers to go with the stream and not
with the inconformed. But then, that's what they want, and that's what they
get. For the others, there are enough alternatives -- thanks to free
speech, and that we all are allowed to publish one-sided points of views :)


> well, ideally all would be well educated, read the local paper (which
> would ideally be local), and perhaps visit other news sites on the web. 
> unfortunately the reality is that many people don't read the paper, ...

I suppose they don't want to.

> ... many papers are owned by those same or other corporate giants, ...

Many, but not all. There are alternatives.

> ... that many people don't have the time to thoroughly research things. 

For those people, "balanced" Google ads wouldn't help a lot either. Since
they don't have the time to research the issues, they won't do so, and the
ads won't have much effect on them.

> the problem is that many people are susceptible to advertising
> regardless of it's content (which is often the point, most ads don't
> tell you why their product is good or better than someone else's, they
> just show it being "fun" to clean the floor with thier's).  the problem
> is that many people are poorly educated.  

Both of these problems don't really have anything to do with the balance of
ads on Google. We all are susceptible to advertising, so we have to
restrict our exposure to the advertising that we like. And if people are
poorly educated, either they should go more to school, or pay more
attention at school, or go to better schools, or have better public schools
-- none of which has much to do with Google.

> many do not have access to alternative online news sources or don't know
> they exist (certainly microsoft doesn't point their isp customers to
> anti-microsoft content, but do to pro microsoft content).

Should Google be required by law to point visitors to competitors
(alternative search engines)? Should I be required -- or you --, to point
people to my (your) competitors on my web site, because they might not have
the time or the qualification to look for them?

> many people simply do not have the motivation to look for the greater
> truth ...

That's their choice -- or better, your opinion of their choice. You
(gladly) don't have the right to force the (your) "truth" on them. Maybe
their "truth" is "greater" than yours and mine combined?

> ... and hope (perhaps wrongly) or are forced to rely on what is in
> advertising, ... 

I never knew anybody who was forced to rely on advertising. And I knew (and
know) my share of uneducated and/or poor people.

> .. which hopefully has some relationship to the truth and is hopefully
> balanced by advertising by those with opposing views, but it isn't. 

Advertising is by definition not balanced. And there is no guarantee that
for every (unbalanced) ad there are all balancing ads for all possible
other angles of the issue. So advertising as a whole is by definition not
balanced. If balance is your goal, you need to prohibit advertising as a
whole -- and, while we're at it, editorials and books and ... 

> yes, free speech means you can say whatever you want, it does not mean
> that media providers, who take paid advertising, can refuse to take
> advertising they don't agree with or don't think their viewers would
> agree with or worse, that they don't think viewers should see, and that
> is exactly what is happening.  

Of course that's happening. This is the other side of the coin "freedom".
You are free to, but also need to, pick and choose.

> there tends to be a consensus about what should and should not be allowed
> to be revealed to the public for them to make their own decision on, and
> this corrupts the very nature of a free democratic society.  

I don't really think there is such a consensus. Different companies stay on
all possible sides of the gun control issue, of the abortion issue, of the
war in Iraq issue, of the next president issue, of pretty much any issue.
(Even the tax-laws-too-complicated issue has different sides -- the
business and tax consultants don't necessarily want it all that simplified
:)

> when information is arbitrarily controlled for political reasons the
> public simply can not be informed and can not make their own decisions,
> because they've already been sold.

Now here I, as part of the public, almost feel insulted :)  Of course we
can never /know/, but that's a different issue (and has recently been
discussed in a different thread -- the one about Russell's universes). But
we can very well get different opinions, and make our own decisions, and
all that for free. It's just a matter of wanting to do so. 

There's lots of good and free stuff (information, activities,
opportunities) around. Money rules, but not everything.

Gerhard
_______________________________________________
http://www.piclist.com
View/change your membership options at
http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist