Google Bows to Scientology!

[Derleth]

A news-in-progress page from Operatingthetan.com

The morons.org article where I first learned of this. (The owner of morons.org uses nonstandard advanced features so this page may not be accessable to everyone.)

Yes, Google has bowed to the Cult of Scientology, removing links to Operation Clambake, the pre-eminent anti-Scientology website, from its directory. You cannot find any reference to it by searching for the word 'scientology'. Why? The DMCA. The CoS threatened legal action if Google didn't stop linking to sites that spread copyrighted religious material. Yes, you read right. The Cult of Scientology has copyrighted all of its religious material and will use the DMCA to prevent people from being critical of it. The Cultists have no concept of Fair Use, and neither do our courts, anymore.

This comes after the CoS had managed to artificially raise the Google-assigned relevance (PageRank) of its pages by obssessively cross-linking them. My first link explains in some detail how they did it (scroll down to the pictures). Basically, Google assigns PageRank based on how many other pages that meet the same criteria link to a given page. By maniacally cross-linking, the CoS has managed to artificially inflate the scores of its own pages and, by the same token, deflate the scores of those that criticize it.

Google is still the best, technically-speaking. It is owned, however, by a bunch of goddamned collaborators who deserve nothing but contempt. Link to Operation Clambake!

http://www.xenu.net/

[Vic Ferrari]

The Daily Rotten story where the morons.org page points to claims that "The search engine Google is censoring the Internet's leading critic of the Church of Scientology, Operation Clambake. The site has been completely removed from the search engine and from the Google Directory, which uses data from the Open Directory Project, DMOZ."

I just went to Google and searched for "scientology clambake" and the first hit was for a www.xenu.net page. So it would appear that the article is either outdated or just plain wrong.

[CalMeacham]

I just went to Google and searched for "scientology clambake" and the first hit was for a www.xenu.net page. So it would appear that the article is either outdated or just plain wrong.

I went to the morons.org article and scanned down the viewer comments. They point out that the article states that Operation Clambake had been removed from the Google Directory, but this doesn't affect the Search engine.

It might be a subtle thing (I'm sure more folks use the search engine), but it's still disgusting. I've done many searches on various engines for material critical of the CoS, where I've been inundated with the Church's own sites. They're evidently trying to prevent access to critical sites.

[Ike Witt]

I searched for Clambake and xenu.net did show up as the first return in Google.

I then search for $cientology and almost everything was either pro $cientology or strictly "information". However on the 4th page of the search results a linkXenu.net in Italian showed up. I should point out that my knowledge of Italian is very, very limited, so I don't know if that site is anti-$cientology or not.

[JRDelirious]

"scientology critical" in the Search Engine just gave me at least 4 opponent links (including Scientology Lies and the Canadian site for Xenu) in the first page, among other, favorable sites. The ElRons raise the listing rank of their own sites and try to drown out the visibility of their critics' through the use of "googlebombs" -- embedding the most common search phrases into numerous mutual links betwen their own sites.

Apparently what Google has removed are direct links to Xenu from Google's own directory section -- still a display of rank wussness; but by now entirely unsurprising coming from corporate America.

And BTW, way to fucking go, distinguished gentlemen who approved the DMCA.

[black rabbit]

Hmmmmmmmm.

What's the first link in the list?

[black rabbit]

BTW, Operation Clambake is in the "Opposing Views" section in the Open Directory, too. No conspiracy here, cheif!

[kaylasdad99]

Originally posted by adam yax
I searched for Clambake and xenu.net did show up as the first return in Google.

I then search for $cientology and almost everything was either pro $cientology or strictly "information". However on the 4th page of the search results a linkXenu.net in Italian showed up. I should point out that my knowledge of Italian is very, very limited, so I don't know if that site is anti-$cientology or not.

Actually, your knowledge of Italian doesn't need to be that comprehensive. The first two words are ALLARME SCIENTOLOGY, followed by

Biblioteca di informazione critica su Scientology/Dianetics la contorversa mulitnazionale fondata da L. Ron Hubbard

I'd say it's probably anti-$cientology.

BTW, did anyone try a Google search actually using the dollar sign in place of the "S"?

[Vic Ferrari]

Originally posted by CalMeacham
I went to the morons.org article and scanned down the viewer comments. They point out that the article states that Operation Clambake had been removed from the Google Directory, but this doesn't affect the Search engine.

I realize that black455 hadn't posted when you made this comment CalMeacham, but I want to make sure that what black455 has posted is clear.

Operation Clambake is still in the Google directory. You can find it here:

Society > Religion and Spirituality > Opposing Views > Scientology

It's even the first link.

[Mr. Miskatonic]

Originally posted by adam yax
I searched for Clambake and xenu.net did show up as the first return in Google.

I then search for $cientology and almost everything was either pro $cientology or strictly "information". However on the 4th page of the search results a linkXenu.net in Italian showed up. I should point out that my knowledge of Italian is very, very limited, so I don't know if that site is anti-$cientology or not.

The very use of the word "Xenu" should be a tipoff that this is a site critical of scientology. "Xenu" is one of those embarassing aspects of the scientology fairy tale that they'd just as soon not mention or let be known.

[Ike Witt]

Originally posted by kaylasdad99


Actually, your knowledge of Italian doesn't need to be that comprehensive. The first two words are ALLARME SCIENTOLOGY, followed by

I'd say it's probably anti-$cientology.

Please don't make me add roll eyes to every sarcastic thing I post.

BTW, did anyone try a Google search actually using the dollar sign in place of the "S"?

You get some funny stuff

[Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor]

I've heard those jokers are on their last legs. True? False?

[Mockingbird]

Originally posted by black455
Hmmmmmmmm.

What's the first link in the list?

http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/ is the first link that I see. Operation Clambake isn't even listed.

[Vic Ferrari]

Originally posted by Hastur
http://www.xs4all.nl/~kspaink/ is the first link that I see. Operation Clambake isn't even listed.

It's changed within the last hour. Very strange.

[Chief Crunch]

I think the point is this. If you did a google search for "scientology" xenu.net would come up as the fourth link, now it won't come up in the regular links at all as a result of that search.

[Bren_Cameron]

Originally posted by Chief Crunch
I think the point is this. If you did a google search for "scientology" xenu.net would come up as the fourth link, now it won't come up in the regular links at all as a result of that search.

Um, actually, I just did exactly that search, and Operation Clambake was the fourth result.

[red_dragon60]

Mr. Miskatonic, what's this Xenu sham thingy about?

[red_dragon60]

oh, and on the $cientology search thing, I found this as the first hit: http://www.peghole.com/mare/vis/cartoon.html hilarious! Anti-sci cartoons!

[Derleth]

Notice the 'News' link at the top of this page: Google search for scientology

Yep, it says 'Google pulls anti-Scientology links'. It's from CNET. Google has acknowledged the negative press and decided that it isn't worth losing business over a bunch of loony cultists.

In other words, reason has prevailed. This is proof that the open market can fix problems like these much better than legal action. The clams threatened with the law, we threatened with horrible, horrible press, and we won.

I'm feeling good right now.

[Derleth]

I want to state something for the record: I posted the OP at around 0100 MST (or 0800 GMT), and it was true and (relatively) recent news at the time. The problem had been resolved after this thread was started.

So don't look at me like I'm an idiot (any more than you already do). I was doing some late-night surfing and came across something I could not let stand, which I verified at the time. Changes after the fact could not be reflected in my OP.

[RTA]

What's this Xenu sham thingy about?

Ahem - Allow me!

Xenu was a galactic warlord who ruled this sector of the galaxy 75 million years ago. One day he policed up all the rebels and brought them to Earth (only back then it was called "Teegeeack"). He put them all in the caldera of the great volcano on the big island of Hawaii and dropped hydrogen bombs on them, killing them (for a re-enactment of this event, consult the picture of the erupting volcano on the cover of Dianetics).

Unfortunately for us humans, the ghosts of these rebels (the "thetans"), having been vaporized and scattered by the explosion, now infest all our bodies in varying numbers. They cause headaches and phobias and basically every type of sickness, disease, and dysfunction you could name.

Thank God that L. Ron Hubbard came up with a way of exorcising these spirits, otherwise I don't know WHAT we'd do! Oh, but you have to be a member of the cult. And you have to pay to have each thetan removed. And, you can't tell for yourself how many thetans you have left in you, only a trained "auditor" can do that. And sometimes a thetan will infiltrate back into your system, causing further inconvenience and requiring more "auditing" etc.

You might say, "what a wacky story". Well actually, it is. But if you join the cult of $cientology, you don't actually get to hear it until you reach a level called "OT 3" ("Operating Thetan 3"). One might go a few years in the cult before being allowed to purchase and read the story of Xenu! OT 3 comes after OT's 2 and 1 and a few other, lesser levels of spiritual enlightenment. By then, most $cientologists will basically believe anything the cult tells them, or are too afraid to ask questions.

BTW, I am happy to see the wicked cult discussed on this board. (Used to be, many moons ago, I was the only 'Doper who wanted to talk about how sick and weird they are.)

[Vic Ferrari]

I certainly believe you Derleth, I saw Google's directory change practically before my eyes. Obviously, they were fiddling with things while we were trying to find out what was happening. Hopefully it's true that Google has learned the error of their ways.

[CRorex]

Hrrm I thought the Xenu thing was plagerized by Hubberd... or maybe he wrote it....

All I remember is I read some dumb-ass short story in some SCIFI collection book in some used bookstore that sounded a lot like the premise behind Scientology.

Hrrm actually ya know, that sounds almost exactly the same as the plot from BattleField Earth. I wonder why?

Hrrm 75 million years ago you say? Wasn't HI underwater at that time? Oh wait reason... must stop thinking...


So here's a legitimate question, one that I've posed a few times before:

Why isn't there any organized counter-scientology effort out there?

There is some work, the vast majority of it in Europe, but nothing systemic...

Here's my plan: We, anyone who will help (like people who remember HTML), should launch our own anti scientology attack. After all we are trying to fight ignorance aren't we?

I'm picturing doing exactly what scientology did to google. We make web sites for out own little group, exactly the same as scientology, but with enough fundamental differences that we escape copyright infringement. (Think a whole new generation of Ohm meters using whatever high tech gizmos we can generate)

Then after we generate our organization we launch an effort to get scientologists away from the CoS. Shortly after that begins we start throwing up 'personal' web pages of people caught between the two warring cults.

And of course we need to log everything that happens so when we're done we can launch our "Behind the Scenes" page.

any takers?

I'm really bored..

[Derleth]

CRorex, Operation Clambake is the big Anti-Scientology Front (ASF). It is run by dedicated individuals, plenty of them former clams (clam = Scientologist/wog = non-Scientologist), and spreads - get this - the copyrighted materials of the CoS itself. You can download the OTs that the Cult doesn't want anyone to see before they've paid thousands of dollars and have done thousands of hours of unpaid work in the Orgs (Scientology Labor Camps/Brainwashing Centers). How? Lawsuits. Through various lawsuits at various times and places, bits and pieces of the OTs have become public knowledge through court records. Operation Clambake people, and various other ASFers, go to those courts and secure copies of the OTs perfectly legally.

All Operation Clambake is doing is displaying materials in the public record.

Of course, the DMCA might yet give the CoS the power to kill Operation Clambake, but even if it does, the ASF will not die. It is too spread out. Too many people with computers already have a problem with the CoS. They can't Fair Game them all. (Fair Game = The Cult practice of making someone the target of Cultist anger. A Fair Game implies that anything a Clam does against the person is 'fair game' and that no mercy should be shown, laws be damned.) If Operation Clambake dies tomorrow at midnight, a replacement would spring up before noon and that would be mirrorred globally before the next day.