Wassim benani
1. How does Google’s mission drive strategy at the company?
Through its mission “to organize the world’s information and make it universally acceptable and useful”, Google has driven its strategy to create a search engine that on the basis of key words entered by the user will scan the Web for texts, images, videos and news articles, books, among other thing.
2. Is Google’s stance toward Internet search in China consistent with its mission?
Unfortunately their stance towards the Internet search in China is not consistent with its mission. Its mission and mantra raised hopes among human rights activities that the search engine would be an unstoppable tool for circumventing government censorship, democratizing information, and allowing people in heavily censored societies to gain access to information that their governments were trying to suppress. By entering the Chinese market and agreeing to the restrictions enforced by the country’s government, Google is not sticking to its mission. In essence, Google did not want to miss out on adding 100 million users to its interface.
3. Do you think that Google should have entered China and engaged in self-censorship, given the company’s long-standing mantra “Don’t be evil”? Is it better to engage in self-censorship than have the government censor for you?
I believe that the company was forced into a corner. They wanted to enter a market that promised huge expansion for the company, but had a conflict regarding its mission statement. While they originally wanted to give the Chinese users access to all information, they had to adapt this to the greatest amount of information possible. Google evidently has an obligation to do what is right for all of its stakeholders. It is in this case that the company was obliged to be financially responsible to its stakeholders, and at the same time provide good service to its customers. They believed that even if the Chinese government continued to censor search results, it
Through its mission “to organize the world’s information and make it universally acceptable and useful”, Google has driven its strategy to create a search engine that on the basis of key words entered by the user will scan the Web for texts, images, videos and news articles, books, among other thing.
2. Is Google’s stance toward Internet search in China consistent with its mission?
Unfortunately their stance towards the Internet search in China is not consistent with its mission. Its mission and mantra raised hopes among human rights activities that the search engine would be an unstoppable tool for circumventing government censorship, democratizing information, and allowing people in heavily censored societies to gain access to information that their governments were trying to suppress. By entering the Chinese market and agreeing to the restrictions enforced by the country’s government, Google is not sticking to its mission. In essence, Google did not want to miss out on adding 100 million users to its interface.
3. Do you think that Google should have entered China and engaged in self-censorship, given the company’s long-standing mantra “Don’t be evil”? Is it better to engage in self-censorship than have the government censor for you?
I believe that the company was forced into a corner. They wanted to enter a market that promised huge expansion for the company, but had a conflict regarding its mission statement. While they originally wanted to give the Chinese users access to all information, they had to adapt this to the greatest amount of information possible. Google evidently has an obligation to do what is right for all of its stakeholders. It is in this case that the company was obliged to be financially responsible to its stakeholders, and at the same time provide good service to its customers. They believed that even if the Chinese government continued to censor search results, it