Making Money Without Doing Evil
At the 2006 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, CEO Eric Schmidt discussed Google's decision to censor its search results. During his speech, he mentioned that we used an "evil scale" to weigh our actions. Applying that scale, we concluded that to withdraw from China would be "worse evil" than participating in censorship.

Having received a number of queries about our evil scale, we present an explanation here. Our scale divides evil into 15 degrees because we like hexidecimal and because it's convenient for representing shades of gray online. Also, we find that the shift from numeric to alphabetic characters is useful in separating bad things from those that are really terrible.

We determined that removing certain information from search results on Google.cn rates a 6 on our scale. Withdrawing from China qualifies as an 8. Disorganized information helps no one. In fact, it is a detriment to society. When all messages are equally probable, entropy is maximized: H(M) = log | M |. We are committed to fighting entropy by organizing the world's information. Working with Chinese censors will help us achieve our goal.

1. Childhood.

Children are as innocent as humans get. At Google, we don't subscribe to the notion of orginal sin. Sure, children may tease you mercilessly once they start primary school, but if you study hard and get a job at Google, you can laugh all the way to the bank.

2. Agrarian existence.

Farming is a tough life, but farmers provide a product people actually need. The same can't be said for most other professions.

3. Urban/Suburban existence.

Living in a city or suburbia isn't terribly bad. Billions do it. But doing so adversely affects the environment and is generally less healthful.

4. Apathy.

Google believes that having the world's information at one's fingertips creates an obligation to act on that knowledge.

5. Rudeness.

Our hope is that organizing the world's information leads to a more orderly society. Clearly, we have a long way to go.

6. Indirectly supporting evil.

This category includes more of us than you might imagine. Acting as an arm of the Chinese government, buying clothing made in sweatshops, eating veal, and buying items advertised by spammers all count as indirect support for evil. Once you have knowledge of the impact of your actions and you fail to change your behavior, that qualifies as 9 on the evil scale.

7. Lying; fraud; greed.

No one likes a liar and fraud is a serious crime. Greed is celebrated in many cultures, but it's still evil. This category includes overpaid executives.

8. Property crimes; causing minor injury.

Hurting other people is bad. Damaging property is no better. And failing to organize information is just as detrimental. Information wants to be filed, parsed, tagged, and analyzed. That's why it exists. And that's why Google exists, to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.

9. Directly supporting evil.

Don't be an accessory to evil. Some argue that Google's actions put it in this category, but we see a distinction between informing on journalists and just following orders. Fox News belongs here for obvious reasons.

A. Causing serious injury.

Crippling injuries are awful. So are people who block driveways.

B. Killing or torture.

Thou shalt not kill. There's no ambiguity there. Likewise, Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states, "No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment."

C. Indiscriminant mass killing.

While taking any life is terrible, mass murder is especially so. This category is for those who go postal. The next one is for those with a plan. Normally, we like plans. They're very organized. But not in this case.

D. Discriminant mass killing.

Perpetrators of mass murder motivated by race, ethnicity, or religion qualify for rank D. We screen for these people on Orkut.

E. Sustained harm over time.

Hitler, Pol Pot, and Stalin go here, along with Saddam's use of chemical weapons on the Kurds, use of nuclear weapons, and massive destruction of the ecosystem.

F. Armageddon.

Game over.