Perhaps the web today can be best described as feudal. In short, we can see Google as the prominent nobility, holding the "land" and thus the power, employing the rest of us or simply giving us a place to live and surf.

When one source holds all or the majority of the power, it can be good or bad. If the source is good, like in Google’s case, the end result is good, but Google could never entirely live up to it’s motto, "Don’t be evil."

There is human error to take into account, and, eventually, Google will have to change owners. There is no democracy in a business. What the owners choose to do is what happens whether or not they listen to others for advice; thus, Google’s immense power can be steered either way. Is it good that such a company holds so much power over our information, email, privacy, bank accounts, etc?

The Economist, in its latest issues, argues that "Google needs a change of heart … Pretending that just because your founders are nice young men and you occasionally do things for free, society has no right to question your motives no longer seems sensible."

While such speculation is a bit paranoid, distribution of power has always been the way to keep things fair, to keep monopolies from forming, to keep dictatorships from happening. The publication continues:

"Conflicts of interest will become inevitable — especially with privacy. Google in effect has a dial, which, as it sells ever more Internet services, it can move in two directions. Set to one side, Google could voluntarily destroy any user data that it collects very quickly. That would assure privacy, but it would limit Google’s profits from selling information about what you are doing to advertisers, and make those services less useful to some users. If the dial is set to the other side and Google hangs on to the information, the services will be more useful, but some dreadful intrusions into privacy could occur."

Google tends to hold true to its "don’t be evil" motto, creating a business model that offers many great services for free at the cost of our vulnerability. What Google doesn’t hold true to is our tradition of democracy and more importantly checks and balances. Although the company takes our vulnerability to help us, not to hurt us how long will that last?

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Entry was posted on Tuesday, September 4th, 2007 at 5:39 am under Google, Opinion.

Read more entries by Danny Mendez.
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