Could Your Website Be Liable For The Way Google's Algorithm Summarizes It?
from the that-doesn't-seem-right dept
Ruby writes in to let us know that a Dutch website, Miljoenhuizen.nl, has been found liable for the way that Google summarized the content on the website. Google, of course, has algorithms that try to summarize the contents of a page in a snippet so that you know what's behind the link, and how it relates to the search that you do. As a part of that, it often will show parts of sentences connected by ellipses, and that's what happened here. The snippet on Google read:Complete name: Zwartepoorte Specialiteit: BMW...This company has been declared bankrupt, it has been acquired by the motordealer I have worked for Boat Rialto...This upset Zwartepoorte, an auto dealer, who felt that this summary falsely stated that it had gone bankrupt... so it sued the underlying site. It's quite surprising (on a number of different levels) that it didn't sue Google as well (or instead). However, the court actually agreed that this was the fault of the original website owner, and told Miljoenhuizen.nl to fix the website so that Google wouldn't summarize the site that way. It's hard to fathom how this could possibly be Miljoenhuizen.nl's fault, though apparently someone from Miljoenhuizen.nl suggested that it could control that in the courtroom -- which likely resulted in the judge's ruling.
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Filed Under: liability, search, snippets, summaries
Companies: google
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If they had replaces "This Company" with "Bob's Car Parts", there would be no confusion.
It's a weird case, but if one of the defendants admitted they could control the summary, perhaps they could have acted to avoid confusion.
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Um
So yeah, the site could have changed it if they had wanted to. I'm still not seeing the liability, though. It'd be like requiring someone to change their signage because of what a newspaper wrote about it.
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Shallow Pockets
We should rejoice...and yet we just die a little more inside.
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Re: Shallow Pockets
Then, totally Google.
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Google Can't Be Sued
Even though a website can try to control its description through various HTML commands, the ultimate decision about which information to present is Google's, not the individual website. http://ssrn.com/abstract=635803 So it would be ironic if a website would be liable for a description that it didn't actually create.
Eric.
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Re: Google Can't Be Sued
Well, since the case took place in Holland, there maybe different laws. :)
But yes, I agree. Neither should be liable...
Mike
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alternatives
Was there any motive for the defendant to do this on purpose ?
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It's Zwartepoorte fault for being incompetent. It's no one elses fault that Zwartepoorte is incompetent so they shouldn't try to blame others.
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Wow, still using Google?
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Re: Wow, still using Google?
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Yet another incompetent judge
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Hm
If so, a lawsuit was correct next step. And they sued the correct party. And the finding of the court was that "yes, it could be done" with a judgment of "do it".
Not enough info to know. Would seem to me to hinge on whether the client asked for the changes and what the website's response was.
I find it difficult to believe that the first reaction of the client was to sue. It's expensive and, more importantly, time consuming.
I would bet there was a back and forth of emails first. With growing frustration on the part of the client that this was not being fixed.
Especially since the solution would have taken all of a minute to implement. And the only people in a position to implement it *is* the website.
This seems like it *could* be a perfectly reasonable case, but the details will tell.
Can anyone read the court case for actual details, rather than simply re-quoting already info-scarce articles and blogs? Following the links in the articles did not result in high quality data.
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