Google, the increasingly pervasive search engine and Web service provider, has apparently weighed in on Sweden’s right to formalize the word “ogooglebar,” or “ungoogleable.” According to the Swedish Language Council, the government agency was pressured by Google to remove it from a list of new words because of copyright concerns. She also points out that anyone who now googles "ogooglebar" will not only find the original Language Council definition, but also all of the surrounding coverage about the decision to take the word off the list. According to the Swedes, its users. “If we want ‘ogooglebar’ in the language, we should use it, and it is our usage which determines the meaning, not a multinational company with its means of pressure,” Ms. Cederberg said. Rather than give in to the company's demands to change the definition to refer to a Google search rather than any old web search, the council has decided to drop the word entirely.
– How to describe something that can't be found in a search engine? Don't say "ungoogleable" or you'll risk the wrath of the company. The Swedish Language Council has officially removed the term from a list of newly coined words after the company objected on trademark grounds, reports the Week. (The word is actually "ogooglebar" in Swedish.) Not that the council was all that happy about the move, notes the Wall Street Journal. “We neither have the time nor the will to pursue the outdrawn process that Google is trying to start,” its president writes. "Who has authority over language? We do, the language users. If we want 'ogooglebar' in the language we will use the word, and it is our use that will determine the meaning—not the pressure of a multinational company." Click for more.