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points by paulvnickerson 17 hours ago | 0 comments

Google is an American company. America's President asked the name be changed. Kinda stupid to accuse them of anything untoward.

[–] snayan 13 hours ago

I don't think anyone is saying it's untoward, just sycophantic to keep entertaining the tantrums.

[–] brookst 17 hours ago

Just following orders, eh?

[–] paulvnickerson 16 hours ago

Yes, this is exactly like the Holocaust

[–] GaryBluto 14 hours ago

First they came for the names of bodies of water…

[–] jordanb 17 hours ago

Google lied and claimed the change came from the USGS when the USGS metadata hadn't changed.

There exists no mechanism in the US for the president to force a private company to change the name of anything.

They did this to curry favor with the regime. It is naked sycophancy that shows exactly where the leadership of this company stands.

[–] wombat-man 13 hours ago

It's in USGS now: https://www.usgs.gov/news/featured-story/directed-president-...

Idk what timeline you're looking at, but if they knew it was changing anyway, might as well.

Also, the President in many ways has a lot of control over all three branches of government. Do they really want to risk contracts because USGS hasn't technically been updated yet?

[–] jordanb 13 hours ago

Google claimed that they pull from USGS and they had no control of the name.

But the USGS database (GNIS) did not update when Google (and Apple) changed the name. Google's claim that they pulled from GNIS was untrue

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/08/google-maps-renames-...

[–] wombat-man 12 hours ago

Yes, I understand they changed it before GNIS, but it's updated now: https://edits.nationalmap.gov/apps/gaz-domestic/public/searc...

So again, it looks like they changed it to align to an upcoming change to official sources. They probably should not have claimed it was wholly dependent on USGS.

[–] jordanb 12 hours ago

Google lied when they said the pulled it from GNIS because they made the change manually at Trump's direction. They got caught lying because GNIS hadn't updated yet.

[–] hardbass 16 hours ago

American president can ask many things. Trump could ask an american citizen he wants to enter his property. The citizen can say "Fuck off you fucking moron" and slam the door in Trump's face since it is the citizen's personal property. So just saying the American president asked something doesn't necessarily mean you have to do that. If a citzen runs a map software, he is free to name that waterbody The Gulf of Orange Pedo if he wishes to, etc.

[–] Maken 16 hours ago

>American president can ask many things. Trump could ask an american citizen he wants to enter his property. The citizen can say "Fuck off you fucking moron" and slam the door in Trump's face since it is the citizen's personal property.

I'm sure that's not how it would go.

[–] hardbass 13 hours ago

With a normal President that's how it will go. To this one the law is irrelevant, you need to have some good firepower in your home of course.

[–] whoanoway 16 hours ago

You will discover, as I have discovered, that it's not so easy to sever ties with people you dislike. Prepare yourself for a life of forced entanglement with some of the dumbest, most reckless people in society. They'll worm their way back into your lives, just to punish you.