The president of Mexico on Thursday expressed hope that Google “reconsiders” its decision to change its online maps to reflect U.S. President Donald Trump’s claim that he has the authority to change the name of the Gulf of Mexico.

Shortly after taking office, Trump issued an executive order announcing he was changing the name of the body of water to the Gulf of America.

For U.S. users of Google Maps, the gulf was listed as the Gulf of America as of Thursday. Google, whose CEO attended Trump’s inauguration along with other tech moguls, said last month it has “a long-standing practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources.”

But Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum warned Thursday that her government “will file a civil suit” against Google if it does not revert back to labeling the international body of water the Gulf of Mexico.

  • ERROR: Earth.exe has crashed@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    1 day ago

    Where will the lawsuit be filed in?

    Mexican courts? Good luck getting an American company to comply.

    US Courts, well… surely no judge would be biased right? glances at the composition of the US Supreme court

    International Courts? Lol like they have any power at all.

    Reminds me of The Expanse:

    “Earth Court? Mars Court? What Inner court gives Belters justice?”

    • driving_crooner@lemmy.eco.br
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      1 day ago

      Mexican courts? Good luck getting an American company to comply.

      Why not? Brazilian courts ordered Twitter to ban some people, Twitter refused, court treated to jail Brazilian Twitter legal representatives, Twitter closed their Brazilian office to shield itself from Brazilian courts, Brazilian courts ordered ISPs to block Twitter because they had no legal representatives on the country, after a couple of weeks without Brazilian access Twitter bow down, rehired their legal representatives and complied with Brazilian court orders.

      Don’t see why Mexican courts couldn’t do the same with Google Maps.

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        1 day ago

        By “comply”, I mean like getting them to revert the map rename. Kicking them out and blocking them isn’t really getting them to “comply”

        By contrast, if the US government wanted Google to do something, they could storm their headquarters and get the government tech people to go in the servers and change it (Edit: after obtaining a court order to do so, obviously).

        • Dragonstaff@leminal.space
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          23 hours ago

          if the US government wanted Google to do something, they could storm their headquarters and get the government tech people to go in the servers and change it.

          Bwahahahahahahainhalehahahahahahaa

          Thanks, I needed that. Whatever movies you’re watching are terrible.

          Forcing your way into Google to have “government techs” change something is NCIS level ridiculous. Conceivably they might get a court order to “force” Google to change. Funnily enough, the US and Mexico have the exact same levers to make a company do what they want. The US has more power to push those levers though.

          • phlegmy@sh.itjust.works
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            21 hours ago

            We’ll see who’s laughing after the government breaks through all of Google’s firewalls and hacks their mainframe!
            They’re gonna need a lot of cyber-tape if they want any chance of stopping all the data from spilling through their firewalls.
            And who knows how google would handle a cyber-nuke.

        • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
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          1 day ago

          Mexico is a big country, Google has shareholders who demand line goes up, people use maps to advertise (“map pack” “local SEO” and brand tie-ins)…

    • Nollij@sopuli.xyz
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      1 day ago

      In order to do business in Mexico, they must agree to Mexican laws.

      In order to do business in Canada, they must follow Canadian laws.

      In order to do business in the US, they must follow US laws kiss the ring.

      This isn’t the first time big tech has had to tackle something like this. Usually it’s with disputed territory. In that case, each region gets to see what it demands to see, while presenting something different to the rest of the world.

    • chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      The suit should be by an American cartography company over the proper US Board on Geographic Names’s official process not being followed for the name change.

      I’m actually submitting a name change to the board through the official process. But since the USGS added a bit to the process saying that resetablishing historical names isn’t a reason for a name change, I’m going to recommend it be changed to “The Gulf,” since it meets all criteria for a name change - most importantly that it be a name in common usage by locals. Lots of people refer to it as “The Gulf,” while “Gulf of America” isn’t in common usage.

      The most we can do outside of lawsuits is at least try to take the “America” part away.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        22 hours ago

        I’m going to recommend it be changed to “The Gulf,” since it meets all criteria for a name change - most importantly that it be a name in common usage by locals.

        So now when I refer to “The Gulf States”, I’m typically referring to Alabama and Florida and Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

      • MuadDoc@lemmy.world
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        22 hours ago

        the proper US Board on Geographic Names’s official process not being followed for the name change.

        This is the theme of this administration. Doing whatever they want with no regard for process. This gulf of “America” nonsense truly feels like the actions of a believed king or emperor. A frivolous decree that doesn’t change anything, doesn’t materially affect anything, just an opportunity to exercise their believed power.