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Google And YouTube Knockoffs Surface in China

by Caleb Johnson on January 29, 2010 at 01:30 PM

In case you missed it, Google and the Chinese government have a tenuous relationship right now. With all the censorship efforts and cyberattacks, it's no wonder things are, let's say, tense. So with Google's future presence in China up in the air, a couple of imitation sites have cropped up on the Web.

According to an Associated Press report, two knockoff Web sites called Goojle and YouTubecn.com appeared in mid-January, just one day after the real Google threatened to leave the country over its dispute with the Chinese government. The faux Google functions much like the search engine it copies, and it includes a request for the search giant to remain in China despite the government's efforts to censor its content. As for the fake YouTube, the site offers videos from the real YouTube, which isn't available to the Chinese people.

On Thursday, both sites were still up and running, but it's probably just a matter of time before the Chinese government pulls them both. The National Copyright Administration issued a code of ethics this month with the goal of cracking down on illegal Web sites. Google is keeping tight-lipped on the subject, with a spokesperson only saying the company isn't "affiliated" with the knockoffs.

For now, we'll just have to wait and watch this digital dance of "he said/she said" between Google and China. For the sake of free-flowing information, let's hope China does the right thing and takes a bow. [From: The Associated Press/Huffington Post]

Tags: censorship, china, google, google vs china, GoogleVsChina, knockoff, search, top, web, youtube

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