The “don’t be evil”, long ago, was meant to be something like “don’t be like Microsoft”. Ambiguous, meaningless and badly oriented. And even that didn’t happen.
According to the article he sites, at the start of the debate, the polling showed:
Intelligence Squared U.S. polls its audience on each motion before and after the debate. At the start of Tuesday's debate, the audience voted 21% for the motion that "Google violates its 'don't be evil' motto," with 31% against and 48%, nearly half, undecided.
The blogger said that 48% were FOR google before the debate, but only 31% were for google before, with 48% undecided.
So while more of the undecideds went against google than for google, some of them did support google after the debate.
But google IS evil. According to the article, one major argument AGAINST the "google is evil" proposition was that if google wasn't as bad as Hitler, it couldn't be called evil.
When you have to appeal to Pol Pot, Hitler, and "Dr. Evil" for comparisons, I think you have already lost your argument.
The argument further said that if google is evil, then line-cutters are evil.
Well, of course line-cutters are evil. They waste people's time, they consider themselves more important than others, they have no concern for civilized society.
When we tolerate line-cutters, we are contributing to the breakdown of the moral fabric of our country.
The big question is missed.
“If Google is evil, so what?”
>It seems pretty bad.
The debate? Or Google?