I went to Google.com today to search something - does anyone still use the landing page? Everyone seems to have Google Toolbar, or use the standard search bars in IE7/FF3, but every so often I find myself at the home page. And today, being that it is the diving competition for the 2008 Olympics I noticed that Google had one of their modified logos in honor of the event.

The logo is your standard Google logo with the second 'o' and the 'l' replaced. The 'o' is a pig doing a backwards flip in a tuck position. I'm not totally up on my diving terms, so if this has a special term to it, let me know.

Anyhow, there's a point of confusion for me about this pig. Mainly - why a pig?

At first I figured, maybe it's the Chinese year of the Pig. Thankfully, right from the Google search page I typed in "Chinese 2008 year of the" and found it was the year of the rat. (Coincidentally, if you're a 1984 baby like myself, you'll know that 1984 is the year of the Rat too.) So then I thought - maybe this pig is one of the Olympic mascots. Still on the Google search engine, I found out that the mascots are 5 Japanese-anime looking cuddly animals, each the color of one of the rings. The 5 animals are: The Fish, The Panda, the Tibetan Antelope, the Swallow, and the not-quite-an-animal Olympic Flame... No pig though.

A little tiny egg of a theory started to form in my little brain, but before I let that little egg grow and hatch, I decided to give it one more shot. "2008 Olympics China Pig" I searched. The most reliable result I saw was an following article from the Wall Street Journal with the headline: China Bloggers Stew About Olympic Pigs

The article was written on the 2nd of October, 2007 - so not quite as relevant, but with curiosity I read the article to find that the Olympic commitee had decided back in 2007 to raise pigs in remote and secure locations, providing them only with organic grains, and ensuring they got regular exercise. These pigs would be the ones that would later be fed to the Olympians. This angered some Chinese - "I would rather be a pig for the Olympics than a human in a coal mine!" wrote a blogger.

While the Wall Street Journal requires a membership to read the full article, you can the entire article here: China Bloggers Stew About Olympic Pigs.

So while this was an interesting read, I couldn't quite imagine Google would make a statement about it - months after the article had been published. And so my theory-egg grew a little more - albeit, I will say my theory is meant as more humor than honest opinion - and is only there because I cannot find any other logical explanation for it - despite my attempts at searching for one.

We all have heard off the controversy surrounding the 2008 Olympics and Tibet. It's been the reason for why numerous public figures, as well as actors and musicians, have condemned the Olympics, and do not want any part in it. Others have chosen to be a little more quiet about the issue, and have not voiced a strong opinion.

There has also been much news recently about China censoring sites, and agreements with Google on censoring certain sites as well. From Google's Official Blog:

"Obviously, the situation in China is far different than it is in those other countries; while China has made great strides in the past decades, it remains in many ways closed. We aren't happy about what we had to do this week, and we hope that over time everyone in the world will come to enjoy full access to information. But how is that full access most likely to be achieved?" - Google in China

There's also pretty good analysis of what is being blocked, filtered or altered in China, on Google's search engine - Check out: http://blogoscoped.com/censored/

Google is restricted in many ways in China, and I'm sure this frustrates the company a lot - particularly when they not able to reach a sixth of the world's population. And I'm only left wondering why it would feature a pig in its logo, particularly when calling someone a pig is never a compliment. Moreover, the word Pig sometimes is preceeded with the word Commie.

So is Google making a not-so-subtle subtle attack on the Chinese Government? There would be far less doubt in my mind if they had replaced the red 'o' in Google with the pig, after all Red is the color usually associated with Communism. Instead the yellow 'o' is replaced with the pig.

Maybe it's a slip-up. Maybe it's a subtle attack on the Chinese Government. Maybe they just decided to use a pig. Maybe I'm reading too much into things.

I just find it odd they wouldn't have used one of the official Mascots like they did in their logo for the opening ceremonies. Particularly when one of the mascots is a fish.

Fish do like water don't they? Let me go Google that while you share your thoughts...