Court confirms Google’s search results are protected free speech

I’m not sure how many more companies are going to challenge the search rankings bestowed upon them by the mighty Google, but a judge in San Francisco just ruled Google is protected under the First Amendment.
In a one sentence ruling Judge Ernest Goldsmith of the superior court of California declared:
“The defendant has met its burden of showing the claims asserted against it arise from constitutionally protected activity.”
The lawsuit was brought by CoastNews.com against Google, claiming that its search results were being unfairly penalized. Google responded with an “anti-slapp” motion, often used by defendants facing lawsuits that try to stifle free speech.
The new ruling, which is the first since 2007 to address Google’s rights under the First Amendment, came after a website called CoastNews argued that Google had unfairly pushed it far down in its search results – even though, CoastNews claimed, its site appeared at the top of results created by Bing and Yahoo. CoastNews suggested the poor rankings were because Google wanted to eliminate CoastNews as a potential competitor.
It had been 7 years since a judge had made such a ruling, so hopefully this will be the end of it for at least another next 7 years.

Source: Marketing Pilgrim
Link: Court confirms Google’s search results are protected free speech