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Getting this to "hit the court" is a non-trivial problem for someone without access to the legal system. So in order to help the OP should we suggest she conta

Getting this to "hit the court" is a non-trivial problem for someone without access to the legal system. So in order to help the OP should we suggest she contact...whom? the EFF? The ACLU? Who can help with these sorts of legal issues?

auggierose 5y ago
Doesn't every US citizen of legal age have access to the legal system?
- zrobotics 5y ago
  Are you offering to pay for OP's lawyer? Edit: This is Google, so what is actually needed is a legal team, not just one lawyer.
  - gpm 5y ago
    Many lawyers are willing to work for something like 30% of whatever payout they manage to get, OP (or rather the pastor) likely doesn't even need to pay for a lawyer, just convince one that they have a good case. I'm not a lawyer, but my understanding of the legal standard is "reckless disregard for the truth", which seems like it has been met. An entire legal team is not needed to litigate a simple case against Google, that's just not how the legal system works...
    - hpoe 5y ago
      It shouldn't need to be like that but it is the case. It has nothing to do with the merits of the case itself the tactic a company like Google employs is to just file reams of paperwork, discovery, delays, motion for this and that and each of them have to be considered and discussed and pushes thibgs out at least another day or two. They then use this tactic to extend cases into years. Although a lawyer will work for a certain cut of the reward they need to eat in the meantime and won't because the case isn't being completed, and isn't going to trial, plus it eats up an enormous amount of time and effort for the lawyer involved cutting into other potential cases. Eventually you have to call it quits and Google wins because the case never went to trial because Googles legal army was able to delay everything by abusing the legal system. In short as the PHB from Dilbert once said "we're using the law to keep justice away." That's what's happening right now.
      - gpm 5y ago
        You have an unrealistically negative view of the legal system. Google cannot just file unlimited amounts of paperwork and expect either the judge of the opposing attorneys to review it, if they tried the judge might well sanction them, but also it would just cost Google a lot of money for no benefit. You can go look at cases involving Last Name v Alphabet on the recap archive, they are typically represented by a single attorney. Below are a few examples, I manually filtered out pro-se actions with no attorneys, and class actions, but other then that just went through the list of cases looking for cases with titles fitting the format: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8060229/parties/el-mawardy-v-alphabet-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8060229/parties/el-mawa... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6237000/parties/gottlieb-v-alphabet-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6237000/parties/gottlie... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8054663/parties/olson-v-google-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8054663/parties/olson-v... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8067002/parties/lee-v-google-llc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8067002/parties/lee-v-g... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8133814/parties/kaufman-v-google-llc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8133814/parties/kaufman...
        TomSwirly 5y ago
        > You have an unrealistically negative view of the legal system. Your links would be more convincing if some of these were successful, completely cases. The question is not, can you sue Google/Alphabet without a team of lawyers, but can you _successfully_ sue them.
    - jrockway 5y ago
      > Many lawyers are willing to work for something like 30% of whatever payout they manage to get The printer screwed up the ad, it was supposed to read "Works on contingency? No, money down!"
    - TomSwirly 5y ago
      > Many lawyers are willing to work for something like 30% of whatever payout they manage to get, 30% of nothing is nothing. Can you explain why the writer would get _any money at all_? What financial losses have they suffered? Are they being defamed? Has it affected their reputation? --- Civil courts can't fix things like this! It will never be worth Google's time to correct these mistakes unless they are forced to by the government. Searching the Internet finds thousands of cases against Google, 95%+ of which are settled in Google's favor. In fact, I only found one successful case like this, in 2012, but it was in Australia which has stronger rules on defamation, and Google had also implied that the plaintiff was a major figure in organized crime, not "simply" got the photo wrong. https://slate.com/technology/2012/11/milorad-trkulja-australian-man-wins-lawsuit-against-google-over-defamatory-search-results.html https://slate.com/technology/2012/11/milorad-trkulja-austral...
  - auggierose 5y ago
    I am not a US citizen and luckily not subject to its shitty jurisdiction which renders people that are not billionaires without access to the legal system. I mean, just say that out loud, and think about what that means.
- michaelgrafl 5y ago
  I don't understand why your comment has been downvoted. I'm European and was wondering the exact same thing.
  - tobltobs 5y ago
    In which way would being a European help in this case?
    - gpm 5y ago
      I believe they were suggesting that they aren't intimately familiar with the US legal system...
- labster 5y ago
  "If you're a single-digit millionaire like Hulk Hogan, you have no effective access to our legal system." - Peter Thiel
  - Beaver117 5y ago
    A single digit millionaire can barely afford a home nowadays
    - sgregnt 5y ago
      I disagree, the Median house price is ~350k.
      - paulryanrogers 5y ago
        Home ownership is not necessarily evenly distributed. Houses are becoming a safe investment for plenty of folks and entities that aren't living in (all of) them as a primary residence. Though I'd agree that millionaires can still afford a house in most of the world.
      - brewdad 5y ago
        Single digits millionaires tend to concentrate in areas where the median house price is much higher than that.
- Bjartr 5y ago
  In theory? Yes. In practice against a large company like Google? No, not without several years and tens of thousands of dollars (at minimum) to sink into it.
- elliekelly 5y ago
  It's paywalled unless you're charged with a crime and even then there's a soft paywall.
bryanrasmussen 5y ago
the pastor who did not write the book has access to the courts, it's obviously a tort case and probably has affected her ability to work as well so I suppose that means Google should end up paying a lot. The next person Google does that too gets even more money! Obviously this thread is evidence in the pastor's favor. on edit: obviously the OP has been harmed by Google's actions, but I think the pastor can show they have been harmed more. Also being a pastor and stuff, it's a good thing Google is made of money.
- dathinab 5y ago
  The OP might also want to avoid a curt case to protect their privacy.
- rolandog 5y ago
  I'm thinking it could be almost anyone, at this point. In my case, I'm sure I've been rejected from job applications because anyone inexpertly Googling will find there are many people that have the same name as I do, but have been arrested for misdemeanors or even a murder. Just last week, a guy from a BnB told me he was nervous because he thought I was a dangerous man because of the Google results he got. So, it would seem that you are involuntarily being dragged to try to compete on Google's search results, even if you're a privacy-minded person.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    Knowledge panels arguably add a layer of authoritativeness. But your beef is really with individual names being used as a web search key generally (whether on Google or something else). And the reality is if you have a less common but not unique name, you may end up confused with other people in situations where the searcher isn't really interested in putting in much effort to disambiguate the results. The only real (imperfect) thing you can if it becomes a problem is to adopt some working name variant that is unique. But that only really helps if you do it up-front. ADDED: You're probably reasonably safe with a common name. No one expects Joe Smith to be unique. The real problem is when you share a name with only one or two people and they have a big and negative Internet presence.
- 5y ago

auggierose 5y ago

Doesn't every US citizen of legal age have access to the legal system?

zrobotics 5y ago
Are you offering to pay for OP's lawyer? Edit: This is Google, so what is actually needed is a legal team, not just one lawyer.
- gpm 5y ago
  Many lawyers are willing to work for something like 30% of whatever payout they manage to get, OP (or rather the pastor) likely doesn't even need to pay for a lawyer, just convince one that they have a good case. I'm not a lawyer, but my understanding of the legal standard is "reckless disregard for the truth", which seems like it has been met. An entire legal team is not needed to litigate a simple case against Google, that's just not how the legal system works...
  - hpoe 5y ago
    It shouldn't need to be like that but it is the case. It has nothing to do with the merits of the case itself the tactic a company like Google employs is to just file reams of paperwork, discovery, delays, motion for this and that and each of them have to be considered and discussed and pushes thibgs out at least another day or two. They then use this tactic to extend cases into years. Although a lawyer will work for a certain cut of the reward they need to eat in the meantime and won't because the case isn't being completed, and isn't going to trial, plus it eats up an enormous amount of time and effort for the lawyer involved cutting into other potential cases. Eventually you have to call it quits and Google wins because the case never went to trial because Googles legal army was able to delay everything by abusing the legal system. In short as the PHB from Dilbert once said "we're using the law to keep justice away." That's what's happening right now.
    - gpm 5y ago
      You have an unrealistically negative view of the legal system. Google cannot just file unlimited amounts of paperwork and expect either the judge of the opposing attorneys to review it, if they tried the judge might well sanction them, but also it would just cost Google a lot of money for no benefit. You can go look at cases involving Last Name v Alphabet on the recap archive, they are typically represented by a single attorney. Below are a few examples, I manually filtered out pro-se actions with no attorneys, and class actions, but other then that just went through the list of cases looking for cases with titles fitting the format: https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8060229/parties/el-mawardy-v-alphabet-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8060229/parties/el-mawa... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6237000/parties/gottlieb-v-alphabet-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6237000/parties/gottlie... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8054663/parties/olson-v-google-inc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8054663/parties/olson-v... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8067002/parties/lee-v-google-llc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8067002/parties/lee-v-g... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8133814/parties/kaufman-v-google-llc/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/8133814/parties/kaufman...
      - TomSwirly 5y ago
        > You have an unrealistically negative view of the legal system. Your links would be more convincing if some of these were successful, completely cases. The question is not, can you sue Google/Alphabet without a team of lawyers, but can you _successfully_ sue them.
  - jrockway 5y ago
    > Many lawyers are willing to work for something like 30% of whatever payout they manage to get The printer screwed up the ad, it was supposed to read "Works on contingency? No, money down!"
  - TomSwirly 5y ago
    > Many lawyers are willing to work for something like 30% of whatever payout they manage to get, 30% of nothing is nothing. Can you explain why the writer would get _any money at all_? What financial losses have they suffered? Are they being defamed? Has it affected their reputation? --- Civil courts can't fix things like this! It will never be worth Google's time to correct these mistakes unless they are forced to by the government. Searching the Internet finds thousands of cases against Google, 95%+ of which are settled in Google's favor. In fact, I only found one successful case like this, in 2012, but it was in Australia which has stronger rules on defamation, and Google had also implied that the plaintiff was a major figure in organized crime, not "simply" got the photo wrong. https://slate.com/technology/2012/11/milorad-trkulja-australian-man-wins-lawsuit-against-google-over-defamatory-search-results.html https://slate.com/technology/2012/11/milorad-trkulja-austral...
- auggierose 5y ago
  I am not a US citizen and luckily not subject to its shitty jurisdiction which renders people that are not billionaires without access to the legal system. I mean, just say that out loud, and think about what that means.
michaelgrafl 5y ago
I don't understand why your comment has been downvoted. I'm European and was wondering the exact same thing.
- tobltobs 5y ago
  In which way would being a European help in this case?
  - gpm 5y ago
    I believe they were suggesting that they aren't intimately familiar with the US legal system...
labster 5y ago
"If you're a single-digit millionaire like Hulk Hogan, you have no effective access to our legal system." - Peter Thiel
- Beaver117 5y ago
  A single digit millionaire can barely afford a home nowadays
  - sgregnt 5y ago
    I disagree, the Median house price is ~350k.
    - paulryanrogers 5y ago
      Home ownership is not necessarily evenly distributed. Houses are becoming a safe investment for plenty of folks and entities that aren't living in (all of) them as a primary residence. Though I'd agree that millionaires can still afford a house in most of the world.
    - brewdad 5y ago
      Single digits millionaires tend to concentrate in areas where the median house price is much higher than that.
Bjartr 5y ago
In theory? Yes. In practice against a large company like Google? No, not without several years and tens of thousands of dollars (at minimum) to sink into it.
elliekelly 5y ago
It's paywalled unless you're charged with a crime and even then there's a soft paywall.

bryanrasmussen 5y ago

the pastor who did not write the book has access to the courts, it's obviously a tort case and probably has affected her ability to work as well so I suppose that means Google should end up paying a lot. The next person Google does that too gets even more money! Obviously this thread is evidence in the pastor's favor. on edit: obviously the OP has been harmed by Google's actions, but I think the pastor can show they have been harmed more. Also being a pastor and stuff, it's a good thing Google is made of money.

dathinab 5y ago
The OP might also want to avoid a curt case to protect their privacy.
rolandog 5y ago
I'm thinking it could be almost anyone, at this point. In my case, I'm sure I've been rejected from job applications because anyone inexpertly Googling will find there are many people that have the same name as I do, but have been arrested for misdemeanors or even a murder. Just last week, a guy from a BnB told me he was nervous because he thought I was a dangerous man because of the Google results he got. So, it would seem that you are involuntarily being dragged to try to compete on Google's search results, even if you're a privacy-minded person.
- ghaff 5y ago
  Knowledge panels arguably add a layer of authoritativeness. But your beef is really with individual names being used as a web search key generally (whether on Google or something else). And the reality is if you have a less common but not unique name, you may end up confused with other people in situations where the searcher isn't really interested in putting in much effort to disambiguate the results. The only real (imperfect) thing you can if it becomes a problem is to adopt some working name variant that is unique. But that only really helps if you do it up-front. ADDED: You're probably reasonably safe with a common name. No one expects Joe Smith to be unique. The real problem is when you share a name with only one or two people and they have a big and negative Internet presence.
5y ago