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• Regarding Education
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• Better questions about climate change

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Some Google News

It is being reported that a court has ruled that Google News breaches copyright law by linking to articles on the internet without consent. A group of Belgian newspapers brought the suit, which Google may appeal. Two thoughts:

1. This image is one of the most delicious I have ever seen. There is nothing wrong with irony, my friends.

2. Why bring this suit? I can't see the point. As the Times OnLine notes:

Analysts said they could not understand why the group, which has filed a similar action against Yahoo!, was pursuing the case, and that newspapers benefited from having stories indexed on Google News, which made their sites more prominent and boosted traffic.

“It’s utterly mad what they’re doing,” David Bradshaw, principal analyst with Ovum, said. “Google makes you relevant, it helps people find you. I can’t see how these people think being listed would be damaging.”

[point finger] Exactly. I'd love to be listed on Google News. They can even have free access to the AtlasBlogged cache, with no complaints from me (though technically Rammage owns the site). But the suit really does seem stupid on its face.