In a move that will potentially position me as Gadzooki’s official Google warden (after Mac basher, Microsoft fanboy, and what-have-you), today we will delve into the wonderful world of technology politics making it more obvious that Google is not an industry sweetheart out to just spread the love. I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again: Google is laying out (and probably already has!) the foundations of its world domination schemes.
Earlier this week they already took center stage for whining to the authorities about how Microsoft, with Windows Vista, is making it difficult and unfair to third parties who think they can do a better job at local/desktop search. Google’s contention is that like the browser and mail client and media player applications, local search is central to the end-user experience and that Microsoft should play the field as such and provide means for alternate solutions. Surprisingly, Microsoft announced that Vista’s first service pack will indeed provide this means, via a socket in the already-existent Default Programs dialog, which itself was an outcome of a previous ruling against Microsoft’s perceived monopoly. Google then recognized this “step” in resolving the issue, and looks forward to a fairer move (read: put competitors in equal footing with native Vista search) to ultimately end this tussle.
Here’s an über-burger analogy: should Burger King put a McDonalds’ Big Mac poster next to one with a Whopper right in their own stores because McDonalds makes better burgers? I didn’t think so.
Another big story of the week: a post entitled “Life at Google” over at the freshly-minted No2Google blog details the culture and goings-on of life Google. While it says “The Microsoftie Perspective” right up front, there appears no official Microsoft financing whatsoever (frankly, something like this from the Redmond camp will put them at a bad rep, plus I’d figure they’d change the theme to something other than the WordPress default). It makes for a very interesting read, if not to only have a better insight at who’s been brewing all these very compelling services.
Does the future bode well for Google? With the amount of dependency we as the internet community have grown, it certainly does not look like Google is going away anytime soon. The closest thing I see to “fall down”, or “demise” if that’s even a valid argument against Google, is the very essence of what Web 2.0 is – the No2Google blog is already a crack in the ice – in the end, democracy in the Web prevails, and those who power and drive this new age on the Web will not let them get away with more than what they should; be it Google, or Microsoft, or any other evil empire.