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Anyone who knows the best conspiracy theories of the 20th century can’t blame Dylan Stephen Jayne for trying to sue Google.

Every good conspiracy theorist knows that playing certain songs on LPs backwards is a Satanic chant. The number of clues on the Beatles’ Abbey Road and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band album cover that “Paul is Dead” (Paul McCartney) are too numerous to mention.

So it must have come as a shock to the Conspiracy Theory community that Google prevailed in an appeal of the most bizarre lawsuit ever filed against the search engine.

In September of 2007, Dylan Stephen Jayne filed a (handwritten) suit against the founders of the Google internet search engine, alleging that his social security number when turned upside down is a scrambled code that spells the name “Google.”

He was asking for $5 billion for Google’s alleged “crimes against humanity.”

The District Court reviewed the lawsuit and dismissed it sua sponte (on its own will or motion”) for failure to state a claim. In other words, the judge made a decision without having been asked by either party. (ie. never happened: “Your honor, the defendants, Larry and Sergey, move to dismiss!”)

The ever-resourceful Jayne filed a timely appeal. His case was on appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania and guess what? He lost the appeal a couple months ago.

To prevail on his claim, Jayne needed to demonstrate the Google founders acted “under color of state law” and deprived him of Constitutional rights or rights secured by federal law.

The judges concluded, “It is clear that neither of these criteria is satisfied here. As explained by the District Court, Google and its founders are not state actors, and Jayne’s allegation concerning his coded social security number does not constitute a violation of the Constitution or federal law.”

Making it a particularly bad day for Jayne and sending a shiver down the spine of many a conspiracy theorist, the judges noted, “We also agree that any amendment of the complaint would be futile.”

As time goes by, we’re more and more likely to turn to online resources instead of paper phonebooks.  The reliability of those resources has come into question, however, after the discovery of some florist-related mapspam on Yahoo Local.

Yahoo Local Swamped With Mapspam?

Credit for the main exposé goes to Mike Blumenthal (though he, in turn, [...]

The current Internet tax moratorium placed by Congress expires in November, leading Google to join a coalition of firms asking for that policy to become permanent.Siding against additional taxes is an easy position to take in most discussions. One will find very few people in favor of giving Washington more money to spend on an [...]

Searches for amusement parks hit their peak every July, says Hitwise, and this year was no exception, with most searching for parks close to home because of gas prices. Not only did they peak, but they were the most searched-for travel destinations.
The only top 10 destination sending traffic to travel websites that wasn’t theme [...]

Well, I am in my fourth month as a resident of Alabama, settled here like I was born here. Maybe that is because the terrain hereabouts reminds me of my native Pennsylvania. In reality it is because…
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Google has plans to set up shop in Pryor, Oklahoma and will build a data center in the MidAmerica Industrial Park (MAIP).

The local newspaper, The Daily Times, is reporting that Google will make an official announcement about their plans on May 2nd.
 On the MAIP Web site they boast that a company can save between 20 [...]

Online advertised job vacancies saw a six percent seasonal decline from December to January according to The Conference Board Help-Wanted Online Data Series. For the year online advertised vacancies were up 12 percent for the nation as a whole.
“January’s job vacancy data points to a labor market that is definitely holding its own,” said Gad [...]