On Saturday night, we reported that Rupert Murdoch had taken to Twitter to blast the Obama Administration’s position on SOPA, and how he tweeted:
“Piracy leader is Google who streams movies free, sells advts around them. No wonder pouring millions into lobbying.”
This is nonsense, according to Google (and quite a few other people). CNET shares a statement from a Google spokeswoman in response to Murdoch’s accusations:
“This is just nonsense. Last year we took down 5 million infringing Web pages from our search results and invested more than $60 million in the fight against bad ads…We fight pirates and counterfeiters every day.”
“We believe, like many other tech companies that the best way to stop [pirates] is through targeted legislation that would require ad networks and payment processors–like ours–to cut off sites dedicated to piracy or counterfeiting.”
Here are a few more high profile responses to Murdoch’s tweets:
@rupertmurdoch Accusing Google of piracy is like accusing the library of copyright infringement. Access to knowledge is a human right.
.@rupertmurdoch. I am so happy I pulled my book from you.
Google doesn’t pirate and it doesn’t hack dead girls,@rupertmurdoch you weren’t complaining much when google was paying you big ad dollars for MySpace, that hosted some “pirate” stuff #SOPA
.Zing. Granted, Murdoch did admit that News Corp. screwed up in every way possible with MySpace.
Murdoch has since tweeted some follow-ups regarding Google and piracy:
Understand more than all allege! Google great company doing many exciting things. Only one complaint, and it’s important.
Just been to google search for mission impossible. Wow, several sites offering free links. I rest my case.
Sure misunderstand many things, but not plain stealing. Incidentally google blocks many other undesirable things.
Agree about cinema prices which out of our control – but even more offensive are prices for popcorn and sodas.
More pirates. Whole entertainment ind employs 2.2 million ave salary 65 g. Good jobs and expanding foreign earnings. Made in America, too!
Just for the record, cinemas average well over half ticket money.