WebProNews » Googlization

Google Library Foe Penning Googlization Book

WebProNews Staff — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 12:17:46 +0000

Siva Vaidhyanathan sees reasons to worry about Google and its goal of organizing the world’s information.

Google Library Foe Penning Googlization Book

Is anyone asking Google the hard questions? Vaidhyanathan, a University of Virginia professor and blogger, doesn’t seem to think so.

The question and answer exchange between him and a reporter at The Daily Progress summarizes all the things people fear about Google, but haven’t fully questioned.

He recounted one of the big concerns, transparency, that has been raised frequently about Google. Our readers generally hear about this in the context of determining click fraud, but Vaidhyanathan sees transparency as a much broader area of interest:

The real question is not one of danger, but one of transparency. You can imagine some nightmare scenarios in which Google allows the government to have too much information about us and people are falsely profiled.

Or you can imagine that Google starts censoring access to information. I don

Has Google Created A Monster?

WebProNews Staff — Thu, 03 May 2007 17:12:06 +0000

The Google vs. MSN Rock Em Sock Em fight provides an interesting juxtaposition. In an outcome that seems surreal, like when Tyson took a bite out of Holyfield, Google has taken so much out of Microsoft in the online arena that folks are starting to wonder if it’s a fair fight.

Has Google Created A Monster?

And then something more interesting happens (or, more accurately, is happening). Everybody’s favorite mountain to blast, Microsoft, has been blasted so low that they’re an unexpected underdog.

Or, to mix my metaphors further in honor of the upcoming Kentucky Derby, Microsoft is (it’s so strange to say I doubt it each time) the dark horse.

Now I’ve never been one to hype the power and potential of Google – oh wait, yeah, I have, lots of times. But it’s especially eerie to watch those prognostications come alive, especially as we all championed it all along. Everyone has sensed it for some time, that Google could and probably will, permeate all aspects of our lives.

Google Search, Google Ads, Google TV, Google Movies, Google Newspapers, Google park benches, Google satellites, Google ISP. Expect to see that brand on the side of a lot more property to come.

After acquiring DoubleClick, which already has Microsoft and AT&T ironically crying antitrust, there is talk Google is trying to cut News Corp. out of a deal for Dow Jones. And that makes Google followers pause to reassess.

They learned their lesson after not buying MySpace when they had the chance. All this wasn’t too long after Schmidt shrewdly buddied up with Apple – the lowest, hardest punch the company could have thrown at the Beast of Redmond.

Has all that Google hysteria, the IPO, the cheering on, the multi-nationalization, the creeping into every facet of media, the first real challenge Microsoft has faced in a while, combined to create a monster we’re all not certain we can control? Were the French right? Sacre bleu!

I’m not the only one that thinks Microsoft is becoming more endearing to the public than before. Microsoft is a giant we’ve already gotten comfortable dealing with.

Times Online Writer Jonathan Weber calls Microsoft "the great underdog," and expounds on why we need Microsoft in the age of Google.

Google has changed the way of the web in less than ten years. Without a strong Microsoft, its dominance will only increase.

Not that Microsoft doesn’t deserve it. They’ve been the shrewdest competitors the world has seen till now. But Google’s rise to challenge, though we all hoped for it, is getting a bit frightening. Who knew the lighthearted Lego Googtopia would become the fortress that it is?

Weber concludes:

And strange as this would have sounded ten years ago, the industry needs Microsoft to be a viable player in the Web 2.0 world, lest we all be bit players in the universe according to Google.

My only real conclusion:

It’s a strange, strange world when you can think of a company like Microsoft as the underdog.

Googlization Revisited: Is It Time To Evolve Or Die?

WebProNews Staff — Tue, 04 Oct 2005 20:46:33 +0000

In the past few months, Google has made some astonishing moves (and is poised to make another one today when they announce their new partnership with Sun Microsystems), the reactions to which have been as exciting as unnerving-a polarizing force whose benefits may indeed destroy traditional businesses, or at least business models.

It has become clear that Google is not just going after US business, but global business, and threatens traditional print media, advertising, the telecommunication sector, and software companies.

In their philanthropic, open-source-society every man, woman, and child has the Internet to raise them up, to educate, to communicate, to speak outthe granola-eaters, the patchouli-smelling Birkenstockers are elevated to executive levelsand that’s a good thing, really, even if it is very, very California.

And though this egalitarian world reflects the supposed hegemony of a modern free societyit’s chiseled on that big freakin’ statue in New York, anywaythe free economy types are sitting around, nervously fingering their brandy glasses, ulcers churning, while thinking what this may mean for so many traditional businesses.

Preston Galla, blogger for networkingpipeline.com and former newspaper chain editor-in-chief, explores the impact Google will be having on local newspapers whose bread and butter is local advertising. A free WiFi network, with its ability to deliver targeted advertising “literally on a block-by-block basis,” could spell disaster for small dailies and weeklies that depend on local money.

Pair that with Netimperitive that points out a recent study by the Internet Advertising Bureau that online advertising is “creaming” traditional media as paid search overtakes outdoor and radio advertising in the UK.

“The internet is an exceptional medium in that it now acts as a source of entertainment, information and communication for the majority of the UK population. Advertisers are realising this, and allocating their budgets accordingly,” said Pricewaterhouse Coopers’ Paul Pilkington.

And then you read David Kirkpatrick’s musings on next generation conglomerates, a fictional super-company he calls GEMAYA, consisting of Google, eBay, MSN, Amazon, Yahoo!, and AOL.

“There’s a new sort of Internet colossus on the rise, and it is poised to wreak havoc on what might be called the world’s legacy business infrastructure-meaning many of the world’s important businesses big and small. If you’re a banker in Greece, a telecom executive in Thailand, or a retailer in Reno, watch your back,” writes Kirkpatrick.

Not everyone, though, is convinced of this definitely plausible slippery slope. ZDNet’s Dana Blankenhorn thinks it’s only a matter of time before governments step in to prevent an economic (or moral) upheaval. Could Google really set off an open source communication revolution?

“Rose petals could fall from the sky, SBC could go bankrupt, and Osama Bin Laden could walk up to Abu Ghraib prison of his own free will, hands in the air. Ain’t gonna happen,” says Blankenhorn.

He reasons that the future will yield a slew of privacy advocate concerns, major com companies suing Google out the wazoo as municipalities “sponsor” a private enterprise, and eventually state legislatures stepping in with an interest in protecting business (and maybe with an interest in protecting kids from seeing Paris Hilton naked).

It will be interesting to watch unfold. Will Google create their free open source communication society driving major corporations into an evolve-or-die ultimatum? Will governments step in and stop it altogether? Will it be a mixture of the two? Only time will tell.