Google is the new Microsoft

[Administrator]

Some time in the last 12 months Google became the new Microsoft, the company everyone want to hate and the trust busters want to investigate.

Its “jump the shark” moment seems to have been its deal with Yahoo.

Regulators on both sides of the pond are now calling Google a monopolist, pushed by powerful interests, so its growing dominance of wireless search will just be used as evidence against it.

Despite this, and despite recent falls in price, Google’s P/E ratio is double that of most tech leaders, at around 27. Still, if you’re looking for a serious monopolist (and over the last five years a better investment) you should be looking at Apple, not Google.

Despite this reality, Apple’s own antitrust problems pale next to Google’s. A Mac clone-maker is complaining, and European regulators are sniffing around its iTunes store, but no one wants to break its business arrangements.

I have notedÂ*the trendÂ*in comments here at ZDNet Open Source. There are a growing number of commenters wanting to dump on Google, sometimes even using the “e” word (for evil) in describing it.

This is not to say Google should stand above criticism. Its rejection of the AGPL makes its internal code as proprietary as Windows. It engages in close dealing just like any other profitable business.

But something has changed. The bloom is off the Google rose. Resistance to its ambitions is rising. It may be that most people do not yet see Google as “evil,” but I’m betting some in fact do.

What does this mean for open source?

Is Google evil?

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  Yes


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  No

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