Every day Google updates its front page with a new take on its logo commemorating significant dates or individuals. The bastards. So writes Justin Moyer:

• We’d criticize McDonald’s and Coca-Cola if they used images of Martin Luther King Jr. or Mahatma Gandhi to sell their product.
• Yet Google does the same and gets platitudes for it.
• The company now decides who is and isn’t worthy of recognition. This used to be a role reserved for the creators of stamps.
• Yet in contrast to the stamp commemoration process which includes a Citizen’s Stamp Advisory Committee, Google’s doodles are determined undemocratically by 10 technocrats.
• There is also an element of hypocrisy. While Google celebrates African American leaders it refuses to release statistics on minority hiring.
• Supporters argue that the doodles help bring attention to forgotten icons. After Google featured Zora Neale Hurston her 75 year old book rose to #173 on Amazon’s best seller list.

Read more about how this links to Google’s wider trend towards being evil over here.

Source: The Washington Post