Have you noticed of late Google being a bit.. well.. monopolistic?
Well I have. Don't get me wrong, I love the company and the work they do – but their business and public relations practices are beginning to smell a lot like Microsoft.
Take Adwords and Adsense for example. It is the sole reason that Google has the money it has – text based advertising. Recently, the text underneath the bulk of adsense ads (like the ones below) that used to say Ads by Google, now has a Google logo image, furthering their brand to all who use the internet and see their ads.
With Google's recent purchase of DoubleClick for billions of dollars, I can see their stake in on-line advertising boom further.
Then we come to YouTube. Love it or hate it, we have to live with it; And regardless of whether you think that it showing copyrighted video clips over the internet goes against intellectual property laws, Google is making a killing from the 'Tube. Rumours are rife to the meaning of the YouTube deal; Many people (including me) believe that Goggle acquired YouTube because they were losing so much money over them selling Adsense ad space, that a takeover in the end would in fact save them money.
It could also be said, now that Google own YouTube and Google Video (obviously), they have a giant 55% share in the on-line video market — easily having the monopoly.