Does it make sense for Google to launch Dragonfly

Google withdrew from China in 2010 due to China's insistence on censorship. Recently Google intend to launch Dragonfly in China. Dragonfly is a version of Google that complies to China's censorship. A big backlash has been forming since The Intercept first reported it.

Lets just forget about the opposition to Dragonfly and look at why Google wanted to do it.

Firstly, Google will loose money on such a huge market. China has a population of 1.4 billion according to 2010 census, the largest in the world. 12.44% of the world population speaks Chinese according to Wikipedia. It is the largest spoken language. How could Google ignore such a big market by not being in China?

Secondly, search engines in China is building up rapidly. Baidu (百度), Sogou (搜狗), Easou (宜搜) all are competing for the same turf. They are available internationally. This means that they are eating into the pie while Google sits tight.

Thirdly, Google is a commercial company. It does not make sense to fight against China. It can't afford to. All it wanted is to make money. Yes, its logo is "Do no Evil". But by doing it, it hampers the finance.

Fourthly, Microsoft forms a partnership with Baidu to provide English language search result. Although at times it is also blocked but at least it is in it. Not all of Yahoo sites are being blocked in China blacklist. It is a threat to Google.

Fifthly, China simply wants to censor sensitive news. There are huge search topics that are still allowed. It is a great loss for such a limited topic.

Lastly, it is not just Google search engine. A number of Google products are blacklisted too due to their search capability.

I am not pro Chinese censorship. The above is just a neutral analysis of why Google wants back in China.