Google gets is ICP license renewed and people have thoughts

Marketing Pilgrim

So the fake homepage ploy worked! Last night Google.cn was able to obtain a new ICP license, allowing it to stay operating in China. But was this a good thing? A round up of the opinions below.

• Giving Google its license was a show of political savvy, according to Paul Denlinger of The China Vortex, but the company is still in big trouble here in China. Despite being safe for now, it's worked itself into an incredibly vulnerable position in the country.
• In fact, they kind of blew it, according to Henry Blodget. Now it's not just censoring websites, it's effectively done as a search engine. All you can do on there is product and music searches.
• "It's really like they're back to Square Two... (not as bad as it could have been, but not as good as Google’s position at the end of last year, when it had about a third of the search market and was in second place behind Baidu)" says analyst Mark Mahaney of Citi.
• At least one outlet thinks this was a safe play for the government as well. Apparently, Beijing also would suffer some damage from a complete Google withdrawal because it would sorely hurt its attempts to attract hi-tech R&D.
• And despite all the worries about Google's crippled product, Barrons is suggesting that you pull out of investments in Baidu because the BIG G is back! They "think Google is the real buy, while Baidu is overbid."