Google President Arrested over Political Youtube Ads in Brazil

Apparently Brazil is serious about their anti-defamation laws. The President of Google Brazil, Fabio Jose Silva Coelho, has an arrest warrant out for him because he refused to take down two Youtube videos slandering candidate for mayor Alcides Bernal.

Google was ordered by the judge to take down the videos last week, but Coelho refused. He did not state his reasoning. In response to his refusal, however, the warrant went out and the Judge ordered Google services blocked for 24 hours within the country.

This is the second major story to hit recently involving Youtube, the other being the trailer for 'Innocence of Muslims', the slanderous, immature work depicting the fouder of Islam as a womanizing buffoon. That, as you remember, resulted in rioting that killed US embassy staff.

While the response is nowhere near as extreme as what 'Innocence of Muslims' saw, there does seem to be some backlash over these ads, if only in the legal system. The videos weren't extremely popular, only scoring about 8,000 hits before the judge ordered the arrest and blocking of Google services. Funnily enough, I fully expect this event to drive the video into the mainstream, generating millions of hits over the next week or so.

...And you can help with that by watching the video here:

Google did review the videos, and the company found that they were not negatively electioneering. The videos were fairly mundane, really, and the blocking feels like an attempt by a politically connected individual to block negative press.

This is hardly the first time that Google's liberal content policies have clashed with governments, and this surely won't be the last. By most cases don't end up with an arrest warrant.

Photo by : YouTube