A forward doing the rounds in England today is about Blackle.com, a black version of the Google home page which has absolutely nothing to do with Google.
The creators claim that a black screen saves energy and this is good for the environment. It’s also very good for the creators as they are making money out of it from the ads.
Two things here – Firstly, the supposed energy savings are highly suspect. A black screen only saves energy on an old style CRT monitor and does nothing to save energy on an LCD flat panel monitor which most people use. You could also argue that because it is more difficult to read, you spend longer looking for what you want, hence more energy used.
The second issue is that this site is a clear violation of Google’s Terms of Service. They offer no content, and you are simply not allowed to replicate the Google search function on your own site.
Be surprised if it lasts a week…
OCT UPDATE – Well Blackle does still exist. I guess it would have been bad publicity to take it down. For what it’s worth, we had a not dissimilar site taken down a couple of years ago by Google for TOS violation. We should have put it against a black background I guess!