When Google first came out they were the fresh new upstart to battle big bad Microsoft who was defending the “monopoly” in court. Google extolled – “Don’t be evil”.
I’m calling it. Those days are gone. Google controls internet search and video and therefore is controlling where we end up and what we are shown. They do a lot of great things for free, sure. Increasingly, they have found so many ways to put ads everywhere and charge us businesses for the traffic, rather than primarily reward good content. They do that too, but it’s become their secondary priority.
Their first priority is to get you to click on something they make money off of – and they seed these links everywhere on your screen. At first it was the top three links and they were shaded. Now it’s the top, side, and bottom. In video they make you watch their commercials before they will show you the video you want to see. And in Search they change their algorithms to punish “cheaters” (sounds good) and then make exceptions for junk listing sites to come up on their searches because the company splits their revenue with Google. Meaning they have found a way to make money off “Organic” results, and you don’t realize it.
It’s their service and they can do whatever they want – and we still use it. Fine. But “Don’t be evil” has turned into “See no evil”.
Your Right on the money again Larry.
Life is good.