Google and China in Talks Over Future Prospects

Google caused an uproar last week when it announced that it might pull out of China if it couldn't start operating an unrestricted and uncensored search engine in the country. There has been a lot of speculation as to why Google would make such a move ranging from sanctifying Google to much more cynical views suggesting the bottom line is the main motivator. Whatever the case, Google has made its stance clear and, while China said officially that it had no problem with Google running a search engine in the confines of the law, that is to say a censored one, it looks like the two sides are engaged in talks over the future of Google.cn.

According to Bloomberg, Google has started talking with the Chinese authorities about their options. The company left the door open when it first made the announcement by saying that it plans to consult with the authorities. China has also put on a brave face officially, but it would prefer if Google didn't leave altogether, the company has over 1,000 employees in China and actually generates quite a bit of revenue. More important than the financial incentives, China would rather have Google in the country if only for the image boost.

The report, citing an email conversation with Google officials, said more talks were planned in the coming days. There are no details on the nature of the talks, though this can be assumed with a fair degree of certainty, or the progress so far. Some talks were to be expected, but the outcome isn't looking too promising.

Google couldn't back off now and accept any sort of limitation and restriction in China or it would be trashed by the media and the public. Chinese authorities, on the other hand, are very, very unlikely to allow Google to operate an uncensored search engine within the country, so things are looking pretty bleak at the moment. If things do go sour, Google.cn will close down soon enough and it is believed that the Chinese will begin to frequently block Google.com, a tactic they have used before against Gmail and other Google proprieties. But if the two sides do reach some sort of compromise, it should be a very interesting one.