Week 50 of POOP

I've neglected this feature in recent weeks, because I was distracted by the repeated home invasions, but now I'd like to bring you back up to speed on Google's incompetence.

One of the issues we've had with Google isn't just its refusal to respect users' privacy and copyrights by failing to fix the post removal tool that once let users delete their own posts. (Now Google claims users need a court order - even though Google-owned YouTube accepts fourth-party DMCA takedown notices from entertainment companies.) It's also the fact that Google offers no method to remove forged posts.

Google also refuses to act against defamation. Now a teacher has alerted Google to vulgar posts from 15 years ago that defame him. His students keep looking him up on the Internet and finding these old posts. When parents saw the posts, they complained to the principal, thinking the teacher had written them. So now his career is on the line.

Naturally, Google refuses to do anything about the defamatory posts. Surprise, surprise.

The teacher then asked whether Google has e-mail support. Of course it doesn't. Google no longer has any customer support whatsoever. Instead, it has that so-called help forum, and the only time anyone from Google posts there is once every few months when they announce they've fixed some feature nobody gave a damn about anyway.

And that's why Congress needs to step in.

As for the defamatory posts in question, Google really has a way of opening itself up for lawsuits, doesn't it?