Are we headed for a Googopoly?

I was inspired by all the buzz about self-driving cars for this post. When I stopped to think about all the ways I interact with Google during my day, it was truly eye opening. Here’s what an average day in my Google life looks like: Log in to Gmail to check/send emails Update/view my shared Google Calendar Chat with co-workers or friends via Hangouts Update spreadsheets and documents using Google Docs Pull/review reports from Google Analytics Watch the latest viral video on YouTube Browse the web via Chrome and the Google search engine Search for a restaurant nearby for dinner, check out reviews, book a reservation, and get directions via Places/Maps and get a street view so I know what the restaurant looks like Update my blog and read updates from others I follow via Blogger Listen to music on Play Share photos through Picasa Stream TV shows online using Chromecast Your list may be longer if it includes an Android device, Books, Wallet, Translate, Nest… and soon the WiFi to operate it all! Google literally knows where you are and what you are doing all the time. Today, with increasing concerns about fraud and identity theft, it’s a bit scary to know that one company owns that much data and information about us. Don’t get me wrong, as advertisers, Google is our best friend. But seriously, is Google becoming too powerful? I recommend taking a few minutes to read this article by Wade Roush. The article is about Google acquiring Nest and his conspiracy theories about a monopolized market of not just one product, but knowledge, wealth, ambition, and data. The author adds that Google’s buying power is allowing them to simply buy out the competition. By competition, I don’t mean in search/online. Instead, most recent acquisitions have been in networking, productivity, logistics, energy, healthcare, and even robotics (self-driving cars and delivery robots). Basically Google buys whatever it becomes interested in! Quick facts about Google: Founded in January 1996 as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin when they were PhD students at Stanford University Started as a search engine with a simple technology: PageRank. It determined a website’s relevance by the number of pages, and the importance of those pages, that linked back to the original site Name came from a misspelling of “Googol,” which was meant to insinuate that the search engine provided large quantities of information Incorporated in 1998 and based in a friend’s garage in California In 2000 the company started selling ad space through search keywords In 2006 the word “google” was added to dictionaries as a verb Owned 67% of the US market share in online search (Bing: 18%, Yahoo: 11%) as of November 2013 Cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities were $58.72 billion as of December 2013 The worldwide usage share of the Google Chrome desktop browser was 46.6% as of January 2014