MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – At its founding, search behemoth Google adopted the motto “First, do no evil.” Judging by recent behavior, the company dropped the “no” somewhere along the way.
Acclaimed counterculture artist Dennis Cooper said Google subsidiary Blogger removed 14 years of his work from the web on June 27 with one swipe. Visitors to DennisCooper-TheWeaklings.blogspot.com are greeted by the statement, “Blog has been removed. This address is not available for new blogs.”
So far, the only explanation Blogger has offered is that Cooper’s blog violated the outfit’s terms of service. The artist is perplexed about that, since the blog carried an adult content warning because, he admitted, some of the material was “controversial.”
According to the Guardian, Google’s minions also deactivated Cooper’s Gmail account, including his contacts and offers of commissions.
Understandably, Cooper is upset about the unexpected, unexplained erasure of 14 years’ worth of underground, subversive, queer and experimental art, photography and writing. Among the irreplaceable items lost: an incomplete gif novel representing seven months of work.
Repeated attempts to contact the octopus that is Google have been met with utter silence, he noted.
“Not a comment, response, explanation, nothing,” Cooper wrote in a Facebook post.
Members of the artistic community are outraged…and worried. Google’s parent company, Alphabet, and its subsidiaries control not only the majority of the online search market, but also a significant share of online video (YouTube), blogs, etail (Google Play), high-speed internet access (Fiber), online maps, computer and mobile device operating systems (Android) and internet advertising.
“I think this is definitely censorship,” Museum of Modern Art curator Stuart Comer told the Guardian. “The problem is nobody knows what the specific issue is, and certainly Dennis has posted images that one might find troubling.”
For his part, Cooper is spreading an urgent message: Don’t let this happen to you.
“Back everything up,” he warned, admitting he had neglected to take his own advice.
A Change.org petition asks Google to restore the blog.
Image: Dennis Cooper, via Change.org.
