Google Gets Its Videos in a Twist

Google, the socially conscious internet search engine which could seemingly do no wrong, has owned up to a ‘big mistake’ in its latest online venture. The blunder, affecting Google’s new online video store, comes at the end of the most difficult week in the company’s short history, as it faced worldwide criticism for bowing to government censorship of its new search engine in China.

Marissa Mayer, a company vice-president, has admitted that the new Google Video store had suffered from a poor design which made it difficult to access popular TV shows such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and the reality show Survivor

‘We made a big mistake,’ Mayer said. ‘You can’t come out and launch a product like Google Video and say CSI and Survivor are there if they’re not on the home page.’ She added that the home page had been changed to make it easier to find clips, and that the response to Google Video had been ‘absolutely fantastic’.

But the service has been under sustained attack since it was launched by Google co-founder Larry Page earlier this month in Las Vegas at a glitzy event, featuring a comic turn by Robin Williams, which seemed to reaffirm Google as the company of the moment.

David Pogue, technology critic of the New York Times, complained that the site ‘doesn’t live up to Google’s usual standards of excellence’. He added: ‘If it all sounds a bit chaotic, you’re right... the site is appallingly half-baked.’

Google’s reputation was already reeling after its launch of a self-censored search engine in China last week. The Free Tibet Campaign said: ‘Through its collusion, Google is endorsing censorship and repression.’ Google argued it would be more damaging to pull out of China altogether.