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Comment by elliottcarlson | Hacker News Reader

While some people are voicing their disapproval, I think this is more than enough on Google's side. It seems ridiculous to assume a for-profit company that has to answer to shareholders would shut down completely for the day, however the fact that both their homepage as well as the logo on all search result pages link to a detailed explanation that your average user should understand is more than enough. We should be applauding this action and hope that it spreads the word even further.

Edit: Also for those concerned that the Google Doodle isn't enough; here were stats from Wikipedia on a Google Doodle search query: http://stats.grok.se/en/201109/Albert_Szent-Gy%C3%B6rgyi - I believe 4.2 million views is significant.

Edit 2: And a HN discussion on click-thru rates for the Google Doodle topic searches: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3004392

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I'm totally happy with what Google did to their homepage. It will definitely get attention. I'm disappointed about their call to action. It vaguely points users to a message that "Congress" (who in Congress?) is doing something bad. Sign another worthless petition. Why not give people a way to call them? Why not list the bill's co-sponsors? The companies that are supporting it?

Because I don't think your average user will bother to call. They will be made aware of the problem - perhaps it will come up in conversation at the water cooler - but I doubt they will care enough to place that actual call. I wish there was more call to action - and more importantly, an easier to read info graphic.

You're right. Most users won't. But if 1% of users actually do that's an enormous impact. Right now, there's nothing to even push them in that direction. Even users who get riled up will probably feel their work has been done by signing that aimless petition and not bother looking up how to contact their representatives.

Since we're on the topic of messaging effectiveness, can we all agree that the infographic Google selcted is nearly impossible to view?

Google maybe think that anyone who saw this, and want to call the congress, they will use Google to find out the door way to contact the congress?

Well said. As much as I love the HN community, sometimes the negativity really gets to me. To all of the naysayers, let's see you run a multi-billion-dollar company better than Google does. I say they do a fine job of balancing business, fun, innovation, politics, community, and a thousand other things.

I actually think this will do better than a total outage, anyway. Many people go to Google several times a day. Now, each time they go, they'll see this message and be reminded of it, rather than seeing it once, getting annoyed, and moving on to another search engine.

I agree. This isn't just 1 day protest for Google if they shut down. If 1% of their regular user base find a better experience elsewhere whilst they are shut down then their potential loss is in the millions a year.

It's not like it is just 1 site either, with a few major players showing support then the total audience reached is far into the millions

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