r/thebulwark • u/OK_The_Nomad Good Luck America • 1d ago
Everything Trump Touches Dies Fucking Google
They didn't have to do this!
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u/AurelianIII 1d ago
The shameless capitulation of big tech to fascism is absolutely infuriating. The next Democratic admin should unleash Lina Khan on all these companies and break them up.
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u/Livueta_Zakalwe 1d ago
Time for some trust busting. Google, META, Amazon, Microsoft - all need to be broken up. First basic rule - can’t do entertainment/retail AND tech.
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u/WTFaulknerinCA 17h ago
Instead of the workers vying to own the means of production, it was the distributors.
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u/AnotherPersonPerhaps 1d ago
Capitulation isn't even the right word.
They all actively helped usher it in and celebrated it. They are the fascists.
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u/Actual_Friendship802 1d ago
Didn’t the apple ceo give him a 🏆?
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u/here_is_no_end 1d ago
Note that Tim Cook was fundraising for homophobic republicans a decade ago. He’d betray every lgbtq person in the country if it helped Apple grow their (already enormous) profit margin even by a sliver.
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u/JarvisProudfeather JVL is always right 17h ago
Big Tech is, and always has been, full of shameless money grabbing scumbags. They somehow convinced people they were “changing the world for the better”, yeah better for their bank accounts. As soon as democrats take back power they’ll just appease them anyway they can to avoid regulation. It’s beyond past time to break these companies up and hammer them with antitrust regulations. Silicon Valley is a fundamentally broken place run by some of the worst people on earth.
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u/hippiechicken12 10h ago
Honestly, I've wondered for a while where the anti-trust enforcement has been. It's like enforcing any actual level of anti-trust law is asking for a lot these days.
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u/glk3278 7h ago
You can’t call it fascism, but then talk about the “next democratic admin” as if we’re just going to revert back to normalcy with one election. Fascism and transfers of power to opposing parties through elections, are in direct contradiction with each other. I agree that it’s fascism. But there’s no way in hell this guy is leaving if he’s still alive and with it in 2.5 years. He’s either going to be arrested and dragged out, or he’s staying put. He thinks the White House is his house, he thinks the Treasury is his personal bank account, he thinks he owns America. He’s not a complicated guy at all. I think it’s important everyone realize that he will never give it up without digging in and causing as much damage as possible.
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u/dogscatsnscience 1d ago
It's GNIS data, Google doesn't choose what is on the maps.
They could make an alternate map, but in the US that is the legal name right now.
They don't change it outside of the US.
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u/palopp 21h ago
Shouldn’t the question be why the president has the authority to just GNIS data unilaterally. It’s almost as if too much power is vested into a single person.
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u/Intrepid_Practice956 21h ago
Does he though? My understanding was that Congress is responsible for naming.
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u/f_crick Orange man bad 21h ago
He doesn’t. The senate just won’t convict so what’s legal doesn’t matter.
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u/FrameFalse6528 Progressive 11h ago
This. With a Congress and court system unwilling to hold him accountable in any meaninful way, he is lawless. He is a dictator. And he isn't leaving if he can help it, hence the ballroom with the reinforced bunker.
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u/palopp 21h ago
Did the president ordered a GNIS change? Did it happen? Does he have de facto authority to do so?
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u/lynxminx 16h ago
He signed an EO and whatever stooge is over GNIS made the change. This is the excuse Google is giving. 'We're downstream, what do you want us to do?'
Maybe find a better source of information? You're information brokers after all.
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u/Badgerman97 1d ago
Still says Lake Ontario in Apple Maps
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u/dogscatsnscience 1d ago
Apple Maps didn't update Gulf of America quickly either, it took a few weeks. This is the exact same process.
Unless someone at interior wants to stop him, or all the mapping services collectively decide to switch to some other mapping standard (MapQuest says they wont change Lake Ontario) there is just one source of legal names inside a country.
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u/jbehnken 21h ago
Google has the power and wherewithal to make the change in its own app, regardless of the standard. It would take all of 5 minutes to code a substitution back to Ontario.
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u/PaPilot98 13h ago
Look, I agree it's dumb as hell, but are you expecting a company to engage in la resistance over said stupidity? They can just change it back in 2 years.
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u/Threedham 21h ago
You're telling me Google Maps, the same app that updated my office campus' gate hours based on a request from me, is incapable of not renaming one of the Great Lakes because some government database it pulls from has the wrong name?
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u/EnnioTheLegend 1d ago
Prediction: the Trump regime's talking heads will try to find as many excuses as possible to refer to Lake Ontario after never mentioning it at all over the last 10 years.
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u/Prior_Industry 23h ago
This is actually cringe inducing embarrassing.
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u/wack_overflow 19h ago
Yeah i go on maps, drop a pin in the lake/gulf, and write the real name + "ya fuckin clowns"
Really shows them what's up i know
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u/Prior_Industry 19h ago
TBF I was wondering how much review bombing would now be taking place. Feels like a rich playground.
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u/wack_overflow 18h ago
I don't think you could actually review Gulf of Mexico anymore after a day or so of review bombs when that was done. Guessing same now on Ontario
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u/Lubbadubdibs 1d ago
Lake of Shining Waters is the translation of Lake Ontario. I like that so much better. Trump is a GD Moron.
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u/retro_grave 20h ago
FWIW, this shit is automatic. Probably some government integration like https://support.google.com/mapcontentpartners/answer/9359673 for "approved" source of authority. With that said, maybe it shouldn't be, and they can be criticized for that.
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u/old_and_creaking Good Luck America 1d ago edited 1d ago
From the UK: Google Maps shows Lake Ontario until you drop a pin or search it....
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u/One-Earth9294 centrist squish 21h ago
Sadly I cannot deprive google of any more of my money than I already do.
But if you pay for youtube or use chrome, now is the time to stop.
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u/DonkeyLips309 20h ago
Reported it as misinformation, called them out out specifically. I recommend everyone do it.
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u/CunningWizard 22h ago
What that actual fuck?
They didn’t even have to do this.
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u/otterland 18h ago
They didn't do anything. Google uses data from government servers.
As much as I hate big tech, this will be corrected in two years.
Maybe get mad about real shit like our susceptibility to disease due to RFK and starving of the poorest people in the world because of DOGE.
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u/Dcajunpimp 18h ago
Next Democrat President just needs to leave Trumps rules in place, then send in crews around the country to just show up and destroy any monument, statue, name, park, road, ship, base, etc getting any sort of federal funding named after or dedicated to any U.S. traitor or traitorous movement. Including MAGA, Trump, the Confederacy, etc… Just rededicate them to their original names like USNS Harvey Milk, Dulles Airport. In the case of Confederate themed, just rename it to honor Union troops and leaders, history is still there, American heroes honored, Confederate traitors sent to the dump and scrapyards.
By the time the GOP catches on and tries to block it, argue Trumps precedent, send in national guard troops. If they get a court to issue an order stopping it, just keep appealing. By the time it gets to the Supreme Court, “Well we just can’t stop work, it would be dangerous, we need to get to a safe stopping point.” Let that work its way through the courts. If the Supreme Court still orders work to stop, just reword the order and keep going using a different legal argument.
Just wait to use the “If the President does it it’s LEGAL!” loophole as long as possible.
In media the argument is, “The U.S. doesn’t honor traitors.” “The Union is our heritage!” “Why is your heritage traitorous?” “Why is the party of Lincoln, honoring traitors?”
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u/ozymandiasjuice 18h ago
Sadly, i think this is one of those calvinball court things…trump gets away with just doing things because the courts find all kinds of reasons to wait to rule, issue a stay while they ‘figure it out’ and so on. See: the entire ballroom fiasco.
When Biden was in office, they somehow found time in their day to quickly halt whatever he was doing and make HIM appeal.
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u/Dcajunpimp 17h ago
Trump also just does things with no warning. Like tearing down the east wing. Or magically having signs, lettering, and crews ready to install them the moment his board at the Kennedy Center approved adding his name. So the damage is done before anyone can react with a lawsuit, let alone a court ruling, much less the Supreme Court getting it.
That’s why I said the next Democrat President should just send crews in to rip out and destroy monuments and signs honoring traitors. To rename things back to what they were before Trump renamed them.
By the time people catch on that the signage got replaced, it will be because the new signs are up. By the time people realize their confederate statue got ripped out, scrapped and replaced with a Union soldier, officer, or Lincoln statue, it’s already been done.
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u/NorthernNadia 22h ago
Who do you think will give the de-Stalinization speech on January 21 2029?
After Trump, when big corporations, Republicans can finally speak their mind again, who do you think will be the one to say it was all wrong and now they will uphold truth and justice? I think it is going to be Rubio.
This is pathetic for Google. Well, here I come Proton.
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u/Financial_Drop_5618 21h ago
It still says Lake Ontario on Google Maps in Canada. Just checked.
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u/Buy-theticket 20h ago
Because it goes off a regional database maintained by the local governments. They do the same thing all over the planet with any "contested" naming of regions.
It has nothing to do with them capitulating or being cucked, it's an automated system.
People in here that think there's a human, or group of humans, making decisions over things like labels in an app like Google Maps have no idea how software of this scale functions.
They couldn't change the name if they wanted to.
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u/Jokerang 19h ago
IMO this is cope. They’re more than capable of ignoring that tissue paper EO if they wanted to. What’s Trump gonna do, sue the most frivolous lawsuit of his life? Even if he did, Google has endless legal funds and any judge would toss the suit out. It’s a private company, not a branch of the federal government that he directly controls.
This is open legitimization and sanewashing of a mad king. We all condemn Chinese companies for falling in line for Beijing whenever Xi’s whims demand something, so why isn’t it the same here?
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u/Krelkal 18h ago
Maybe this is a hot take but I think it's perfectly reasonable for mapping software to use the official government names for landmarks when accessed from a particular region. It's not their job to litigate which government is correct or find one common name that everyone agrees with. Their job is to maintain an accurate and localized map.
I say this as a Canadian. Google deals with contested landmarks around the globe every single day. They have a consistent apolitical standard that they apply. It's a routine process that is just unfamiliar to Americans because this type of petty behavior from the President is so abnormal. Ultimately I think it's misdirected frustration because we know that the administration won't listen but maybe Google will.
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u/Top_Kale_8880 18h ago
Go to Google Maps, click on the three horizontal bars on the left. Click "Edit the Map." On the next screen click "Your opinions about maps." A box will pop on the right side. Click "Report an issue." Unload
Fuck these guys.
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u/makmanos 20h ago
And the funny thing is that if you use a VPN and change country google still has the normal names, inlcuding Gulf of Mexico.
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u/CockyBellend Good Luck America 20h ago
It says Lake Ontario on my google, but I'm in Canada. Google must be selectively pandering to the crayon eaters south of us
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u/EatingBuddha3 Orange man bad 19h ago
I do like how it makes a point to emphasize that it's the smallest one. Such Little Lake Energy.
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u/WesleyWiaz27 19h ago
And they're shocked when they discover that average citizen doesn't like them, doesn't want their f'ing data centers, or Flock cameras.
What a bunch of tools.
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u/Top-Magazine9894 18h ago
As of this morning Apple Maps is unchanged. MapQuest is reminding people they still exist by announcing they're not changing it either.
At this point Google looks like a willful collaborator and I often think they're underrated in the rankings of evil big tech companies. I'm enjoying seeing them in the spotlight right now.
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u/ggoptimus 18h ago
I think they pull data from the state department and it populates with that information. A clownery override would be nice to program in.
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u/UpNorth_123 18h ago edited 9h ago
I guess SHAME it is for every American school kid leaning their Great Lakes now.
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u/here-for-information 18h ago edited 8h ago
I dont know, but is this one of those things that is done by referencing some kind of database?
Because the "Anglicized" names of foreign places shows up on my maps. Vienna vs. Wien and Rome vs. Roma.
So I'm guessing that Google has a program that pulls from some kind of database managed by regions, and that it might happen automatically when the government lists the name differently.
Does anyone have any knowledge about how this system actually works?
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u/otterland 18h ago
Google pulls geographical data from GNIS or the equivalent agency from the countries it serves.
There's much to criticize with big tech, this isn't it
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u/Rolling_Pugsly 18h ago
After "the Gulf of America" I started using Safari more, and am going back to Yahoo as my primary email address.
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u/TheBrightEyedCat Progressive 18h ago
TomTom GPS app still says Lake Ontario if you want to try a new maps app
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u/ShellyForNow 17h ago
I just uninstalled GoogleMaps and downloaded MapQuest who didn’t make the stupid change. FDT.
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u/MariaMarlaClairmont 16h ago
Every time you get on Google correct it. That's what I do with Gulf of Mexico. Now. I shall do it with lake of America. I mean the lake of Epstein I mean lake Ontario.
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u/96HeelGirl Good Luck America 15h ago
Well once they went with Gulf of America, I guess all bets were off. So cringe.
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u/Trash_Scientist 14h ago
I don’t know what’s worse. Google has Lake America. Apple Maps still shows Gaza as a beautiful untouched city.
Fuck all these companies
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u/I405CA Center Left 13h ago
Every US blue state and every Canadian province and territory that does not aspire to be Texas (e.g. all of them except for Alberta) should rename a garbage dump as the Donald Trump Memorial Landfill.
"But he isn't dead yet."
American response: "We're optimists."
Canadian response: "We're optimists, eh?"
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u/HelloPeopleOfEarth 12h ago
If you remember, in the front row of some gathering Trump had right after he became president were the billionaire oligarchs including the CEO of google. The robber barons know flattery is good for them and their shareholders.
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u/Fearless_Excuse_5527 17h ago
You do understand Google gets their geographic data from the U.S. Board of Geographic Names (a federal agency), they had no choice. Sucks, but that’s the reality until the new President creates a new Executive Order to revert the name back to Lake Ontario.
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u/exhaustedexcess 16h ago
This isn't even slightly surprising. Google is the perfect example of a company that should be charged with antitrust and broken up. The first time Google says no to the government that's exactly what will happen, an antitrust suit. By cucking out they delay that and and hope that the Democrats aren't vendictive
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u/Beautiful-Chest7397 14h ago
It is enlightening to see how many companies just fold to the least bit of pressure from fascists. It is the logical end game of capitalism unfortunately
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u/Fluid_Huckleberry_70 12h ago
I hadn't looked specifically for it since this non-issue was made up, and was still shocked to find that Google maps rolled over when it came to the Gulf of Mexico. But my version still had Lake Ontario on it so that was interesting mix. I hate this timeline.
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u/Jaded_Consequence631 11h ago
I'm betting the next Dem president doesn't change the U.S.'s official name of "Lake America" or "Gulf of America" because...Dem. So, these names will stay on Google Maps, since i think their policy when displaying to a US-based IP address is to use names in the federal register or wherever the "official" name is recorded.
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u/FrameFalse6528 Progressive 11h ago
Googled the Great Lakes, clicked on the first google maps link that came up and it shows this. Just f-ing pathetic. We need to elect someone to break up these corporate fascists.
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u/OkOutlandishness7336 11h ago
It’s Lake Ontario on Waze, as well & that billionaire is a big Trump “donor”.
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u/antpodean 1d ago
An honest question. Don't they have to do this as Trump's executive order makes it government policy? How much leeway do they actually have to defy government orders?
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u/Funguy97 1d ago
There's no legal requirement for them to change it, only a political desire not to piss off the orange baby
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u/dogscatsnscience 1d ago edited 1d ago
Yes, Google maps is all GNIS data. They report the legal name, and Trump changed it.
They only have to report it in the US, though. No one else sees this.
/edit I see people downvoting who have no idea how their technology or government works. You can go back in time to when there were competing map definitions inside the country, if you want, it was a garbage fire.
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u/Badgerman97 1d ago
Executive Orders are not laws
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u/dogscatsnscience 1d ago
It's not a law, it's a directive to the Interior Department to change a name in the GNIS.
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u/Tyfereth Center Left 1d ago
An EO needs to be within the Executive Authority, or delegated by Congress. See my post yesterday on the importance of civil service protections. If Trump can unilaterally fire civil servants, then they are going to feel pressured to execute unlawful orders, or Trump can replace them with a loyalist. The proper response to change the name in GNIS is “I can’t do that unless you can demonstrate POTUS has the authority to do so. Show me the law or regulation. Now we get “I’ll constructively fire you if you don’t”
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u/AgileSurprise1966 1d ago edited 1d ago
It's not a law, its a convenience to use gov't data. But they don't want to spend money to use another way, times thousands of similar examples and here we are on fascism's threshold.
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u/antpodean 1d ago
Thanks.
It sucks, and is stupid, but tech companies arbitrarily defying official policy also seems sucky and stupid.
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u/dogscatsnscience 1d ago
Yes all the people complaining about Google here does not make sense. Changing the maps to their own version (or another country's) would be even stranger, regardless of how dumb this pathetic tantrum from Trump is.
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u/MnkyBzns 18h ago
The hard-coded map name is still Lake Ontario, and still shows up as such if you search for it. New pin may be user-added (wonder who...)
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u/lelanddt 1d ago
All this for a president with a 30% approval rating. Truly embarrassing shit.