Google restores Xenu.net's webpages back into its index.

March 21, 2002 11:35 PM

Google restores Xenu.net's webpages back into its index. It looks like this was all started by Scientologists armed with the DMCA which makes an ISP liable for not only its content (cache) but also to where it links! Considering xenu.net is overseas and not subject to US law, this looked like a very easy way for the CoS to silence its critics. In the meantime anti-CoS geeks are buying up adwords on google to celebrate. [google search using just the word Scientology] Refresh a couple time to see the ads.
posted by skallas (7 comments total)

Yikes. I've often wondered why Google hasn't become a bigger legal target due to its cache. Here's hoping that jerks like the Scientologists don't cripple Google with lawsuits.

(My sister is married to Google's head lawyer, maybe I should prod him for comments on this).
posted by beth at 11:51 PM on March 21, 2002

Some are reporting the relisting isn't the full relisting, and is just the homepage URL for xenu.net.
posted by mathowie at 12:01 AM on March 22, 2002

Heheh, thats pretty nifty about the anti scientology people buying text ads. I refreshed a couple of times and each time got 2 links to that clambake site...
posted by Keen at 3:31 AM on March 22, 2002

I would suggest not reloading the page, or the only people who will see the ads are Mefi people, rather than the intended audience.
posted by Outlawyr at 5:51 AM on March 22, 2002

I'm not seeing any text ads....weird. Is this happening to anyone else?
posted by thewittyname at 7:38 AM on March 22, 2002

Well, the news of the ads was posted here, at kuro5hin and at Slashdot. Before we get completely paranoid, perhaps we should consider that all the geeks rushing to see them used up the exposures when they searched "scientology".

That said, maybe Google did pull them in response to a complaint from CoS. I hope not.
posted by maudlin at 7:43 AM on March 22, 2002

Naww, those ads were going to be dead in 24 hours regardless. Google has two kinds of adwords, one that charges you on impressions and another on click-throughs. You could probably write an ad that says something like this:

Operation Clambake
Blah Blah Scientology
Type Xenu.net into your browser
fake url
Xenu.net

Google might have a problem with that though.
posted by skallas at 2:55 PM on March 22, 2002