Classmate Stephen Illagan raises a valid point that never previously concerned me. Google essentially has a monopoly over the entire cyber world.
Googolopoly
Google owns the real-estate of the entire Internet, with all sources “renting” space on Google’s empire. Google’s search engine has become God over all things cyber-space, a dictatorship with absolute power (afterall, it does have satellite images of every inch on Earth – Google Maps). What we see is what Google wants us to see! Enormous acquisitions have Google directing traffic back to its own products! Imagine: Google has the power to bury ANY SITE deep in its search results. With this God-like status, any competitor it has is virtually worthless. The money made from advertising and Internet search is used to expand its empire even further (eg. Youtube, Motorola, DoubleClick, etc…). Google has created an alternative to every leader in the technological world: Facebook vs. Google+, Internet explorer vs Google Chrome, Hotmail vs. Gmail, Microsoft Word vs. Google Docs, Android vs iPhone, Library Databases vs. Google Scholar, the list goes on.
Google’s expansion is literally otherworldy. The Internet belongs to Google.
Google 2084
(I wish I had seen this before I finished writing)