this post was submitted on 30 Aug 2026
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If it's true, it's probably geolocked to only the US seeing it.
Guaranteed is. This is not new to Google, they have disputed territories, disputed names, they have gone through this before. This is just Americans seeing it for the first time. Google probably has an admin page that let's them set it up without ever needing an engineer anymore. If you're within this polygon you see this line, else you see the line over there. The alternative is they get sued/shut down in that country/ etc. While I have no love for Google, this is simply them picking their battles.
I remember Google doing it with the Gulf of Mexico, so they shouldn’t be too surprised it wasn’t that long ago.
name a battle they picked to fight for the benefit of the common man in the last :
If they're picking battles, they must have done something worthwhile, right?
No, that's not what I said, I said they're picking their battles, and I didn't offer any reason or justification for why. You can do that if you choose, but I'm not going to go off and do errands to prove a point I wasn't making.
OK, and I'm saying they are not picking anything, and just rolling over. There is no fucking battle that they are fighting, so they aren't picking any battles.
Of course they pick battles for their interest all the time, do you think they have never sued anyone? https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/technology/safety-security/serpapi-lawsuit/
Look, I hate Google as much as the next guy, but do you know what the phrase "picking your battles" actually means?
Yeah, reserving your resources for moments that actually matter instead of wasting them for every petty issue.
But I don't think they are reserving anything for any moment, worthwhile or not. So they aren't "picking their battles" they are "doing jack shit"
They're actively siding with fascists, that's not "doing jack shit." Doing jack shit changes nothing, they choose to change things for the worse all the time.
To directly answer the question: within the last 3 or 6 months (I'm not sure precisely), they banned multiple youtubers that were placing ads to work for Russian Alabuga and it's drone production. It's an example of using their weight, in this case even something good.
On the other hand, I mostly actually agree with you. While I do think that they are picking their battles, I also think which battles they go into is usually not in your or mine interests. Instead, the battles are frequently in the interests of the richest google investors (think 10M+) and the US government, as of late. The Alabuga case above is a good and noteworthy exception.
American here, currently traveling through the (boring) state of Nebraska.
I just checked Google Maps from my Android tablet app. It shows Lake America for me:
I'm from the US but moved to Sweden a year ago. It's changed for me when I look at it. So maybe it's not specifically geolocjed but has to do with where my account was set up, or some localization setting somewhere?
IIRC they did this with the Gulf of Mexico too
I see Gulf of America in parentheses. You know, like a participation trophy.
Possibly, but that doesn't look like a maps compass rose I've ever seen.
Could be for Android or something.
Here’s what I see on iOS in Australia
2 hours later and they’ve fully renamed it.
Well that was a fucking lie.
It's still Ontario in Germany (Android).
It is Android.
Still says Lake Ontario for me, on Android, in Google Maps. I'm in Europe
It's true. This person is wrong.
Its well known that Google Maps shows different names/borders depending on where the user accesses it from
Wrong.
Fuck Google.
Nah. In the US when you look, it does say lake America.
The gulf of Mexico also says gulf of America.
Did you seriously think Google couldn't give you different map names based on your location? Really, Bud?