I'm going to repost what I posted earlier because I like your thread better.
http://www.google.com/transpa...
I'd be careful about calling those all government actions. Here's the fuller breakdown of takedown requests, charted by reason for takedown request and source of request.
It looks like the majority are from court orders. A court order is a different beast than a government request; it's harder to corrupt the system and is generally based on a legal requirement. For instance, in the defamation category 53 came from court orders (which are probably legitimate) and 5 came from executive/police sources (which I'd be far, far more leery of).
Some of the requests also may be legitimate. For instance, 10 requests to take down 14 youtube videos for violence could be reasonable. Look at the controversy about the second-rate porn star who videotaped himself murdering the guy in Canada; I think taking that down would be a reasonable request. However, it's impossible to tell from this data whether those requests are reasonable like that or unreasonable (like "oops, we got filmed beating a guy, that's VIOLENCE!").
Even the smaller number of executive/police takedown requests are still troubling.
"Google reports 'alarming' rise in censorship by governments" What are you thoughts on this?
XENON23
2012/06/18 18:14:51
Search engine company has said there has been a troubling increase in requests to remove political content from the internet
Read More: http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/jun/18/g...
Top Opinion
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Zuggi 2012/06/18 18:19:11
http://www.google.com/transpa...
I'd be careful about calling those all government actions. Here's the fuller breakdown of takedown requests, charted by reason for takedown request and source of request.
It looks like the majority are from court orders. A court order is a different beast than a government request; it's harder to corrupt the system and is generally based on a legal requirement. For instance, in the defamation category 53 came from court orders (which are probably legitimate) and 5 came from executive/police sources (which I'd be far, far more leery of).
Some of the requests also may be legitimate. For instance, 10 requests to take down 14 youtube videos for violence could be reasonable. Look at the controversy about the second-rate porn star who videotaped himself murdering the guy in Canada; I think taking that down would be a reasonable request. However, it's impossible to tell from this data whether those requests are reasonable like that or unreasonable (like "oops, we got filmed beating a guy, that's VIOLENCE!").
Even the smaller number of executive/police takedown requests are still troubling.
And I do agree with you that many of the requests are called for.
Please try to remember that I just post the new and I may agree or disagree with the content.