Just about everything becomes the subject of a lawsuit these days, and the “cache” used by Google was the subject of a lawsuit heard before the United States Court of Appeals in Nevada, styled Parker v. Google Inc., 071007 FED3, 06-3074. The Court’s opinion notes that the case is not precedential.
If you conduct a search on Google, you will find references to “cached” pages that show what a page looked like in the past. Whether used by a search engine or on your personal computer, a cache is used to speed up data transfer and may be either temporary or permanent. To speed up your Internet viewing, the web pages (or Internet cache) are stored in the Temporary Internet Files folder on your hard disk. When you view a page that you have recently looked at, chances are you will be viewing the Internet cache and not a live copy of the web site. Of course, if you regularly maintain your computer and clear the Temporary Internet Files, you will be looking at fresh content.
The main thing to remember in understanding a cache is that if you are viewing a web page from the “cache,” it means that you are not viewing the live page. The main goal of the cache is to reduce round trips to the server.
The March 2007 federal court ruling in Nevada involved a twist to the general description of a cache because it involved content in USENET postings. As described in the Court opinion, Google’s Internet search engine allows users to search for websites, products and images. Google’s search technology operates by “crawling” the Internet so that the content can be organized in a searchable index. In the course of “crawling” the Internet, Google makes a copy of each website and stores it in a “cache.” When a user conducts a search, Google provides a list of results and often includes an excerpt from the matched site. Of course, if you are familiar with conducting searches on Google, you know that there is a “cache” version of each site that shows in the search results.
The twist in the federal lawsuit involves Google’s providing its users with the ability to access, search and post messages to the USENET. The USENET is a global system of online bulletin boards. In 2000, Google purchased an archive of USENET postings dating back to 1981. Google’s USENET archive contains more than 845 million messages. A user can search the USENET archive using several different criteria, including, but not limited to the author, date, keywords, phrases and/or subject material.
The plaintiff in the case, Gordon Roy Parker, represented himself in 2004 in filing a complaint against Google, alleging in his first amended complaint that he is an Internet publisher who publishes works on the Internet under the name Snodgrass Publishing Group. Parker stated that he owns a copyright for his work entitled “29 Reasons Not to be a Nice Guy.” The plaintiff alleged that a third-party copied “Reason #6″ and posted it to the USENET without his permission. Furthermore, Parker alleged that Google provided users with links to websites that portrayed him negatively when users utilized Google’s Internet search engine.
The complaint and its amendments were ultimately dismissed, with the Court finding that Parker’s allegations against Google did not state a claim of direct copyright infringement. The complaints concerning the Plaintiff’s allegation that he was portrayed unfavorably were also dismissed.
Since the ruling did not set a precedent, it is possible that other lawsuits will emerge concerning search engine uses of dated material in a cache.
From a web designer’s point of view, you can include a “no cache” command in your metatags — although some argue that this is not effective. If you are looking at a web page and want to make sure that you are viewing the live version, simply refresh your browser.

