Quote

Is Google getting too big for our good – and even its own? The American search engine is under simultaneous investigation by the US and European anti-trust authorities. Both are probing whether its acquisition of DoubleClick, whose technology puts adverts on the web, is against the public interest. It would make Google dominant in internet display advertising, on top of its existing profitable dominance of non-display ads. A separate investigation by the EU is examining its approach to privacy. Both issues are uncomfortable for a company that up until now has traded under the informal motto “Don’t be evil”.

As someone who is very heavily influenced by google in my working life, and becoming more so in my private life as well, I have recently been beginning to lose some trust in our friend Google. While we all know them for smoothly taking control of the online search market, Google have been branching out all over the place, rather like my unkept back garden. Google look after email, online advertising (you may have noticed a smattering of it here?) and if you want you can let them look after all your finances, documents, presentations, addresses, phone numbers, photos, diary… I just glanced at the full list of Google’s online services and I think it’s probably best I stop here. Are Google becoming more of a master than a friend?

As for my professional life the word Google sits along side conjunctions like and… It appears in every other sentance banded around the office. When they take their random dislikes to something on one of your websites and drop you down the rankings a bit it hurts. Being by far the most effective way of finding what you need on the web search engines supply a large proportion of revenue to the online industry.

Now I would guess that a lot of people wouldn’t trust a time testing mammoth corporation like Microsoft with that kind of personal information in a time where protecting your identity had become extremely important and security leaks make the front pages far too often. So why are we all so trusting of them, id Google really still a pair of students with a heroic goal of just wanting to help the world out?

Having said all this, I myself am still swirling in my affiar with Google. Their online services are by far the best. Every last corner has been developed with the user in mind. Web applictions such as Googlemail are so intuitive, for me the labelling and filtering system is far more logical and I can still find that email from last year with some product key in it in a matter of seconds! Also the Adsense site is so simple to use yet you can still maintain a high level of customisation. Rather than bombarding you with a page full of option fields and tick boxes that rarely has enough space for explanation, you are methodically guided through multiple step interfaces that propel you confidently to your goal.

Whatever happens from here, Google are going to play a large part in the future of our world, as those branches are already breaking free from the virtual world into our world. You however can find out about that on your own. Er… may I recommend this search engine for help.