At What Point Must A Line Be Drawn?

[Caged Anger]

I was amusing myself reading the Geekipedia on wired.com
(btw, great utility to brush up on geek jargon)
(http://www.wired.com/wired/issue/geekipedia)

when i hit Google's entry and began to wonder....at what point does one company really have too much control? Sure there are other giant companies noone ever thinks about like Viacom and GE, but the internet has begun to play such a critical role in our day to day existance. Should Google be allowed to continue its growth and acquisition of various internet startups or should someone finally say "Google, give it a rest!"

[Death Engineer]

Personally, I think it's starting to turn downhill. There have been some interesting studies on both googles search engine and their tools (google desktop, toolbar, etc) and they have found some not so pretty things relating to privacy. I used to be their biggest fan and I think they have some of the smartest technology folks in the world working for them. Picasa is absolutely fantastic.

On the other hand, they're all for open source, so they can't be all bad, can they? That's my 2 cents.

[Caged Anger]

i too liked them until i learned the p[rivacy implications. Now i block their cookies and no longer use my account for anything other than books earch

[Die Hard]

I've never read those earch books. Did you find them on Google?

[EXEcution]

Looking through the terms I found an interestting one.

"Goodwin's Law:

In 1990, Electronic Frontier Foundation staff counsel Mike Godwin noted a feature of online discussion groups: As a thread gathered steam, members would start hurling insults and inevitably someone would be compared to Adolf Hitler. Thus Godwin's law: The longer an online conversation continues, the greater the probability of a reference to Nazis. At that point, the discussion is effectively over. The upside: The law can be invoked as an exit strategy. Just compare an adversary to Hitler and you're free to sign off."

[BobtheCkroach]

As long as you're running a Microsoft OS, I'd say Google isn't the biggest of your worries.

I'm much more concerned that MS is watching information than Google.

Google knows what I search - MS can keylog everything I type. I don't search my Credit Card number, etc.

[Nitro]

http://www.scroogle.org/cgi-bin/scraper.htm

[Suicidal]

There was no vote for "neither"...
It's not really bad (yeah and the link nitro set up kinda explains that)
but the growth really isnt good either (its kinda, "neutral").
Google's helped me many times before.

Did you know they could save a ton of money if they changed their background to black instead of keeping it white?
I just saved 15% or more on my car insurance! (http://google-black.blogspot.com/)

[Caged Anger]

i left out the neither option because its too easy to ride the fence, make a point and defend it