Opinion
Michael Larson
We have been saying for years that Google’s famous mantra of “Do No Evil” went out the door long ago when it started answering to shareholders. That is the job of a corporation, to make money for its stockholders so there is not necessarily anything wrong with that, but the PR mantra of “Do No Evil” no longer applies.
It isn’t just the fact that they read your email to target advertising to you, but they are now starting to cop to some of the “evil” things they have been doing.
For a period of several years, Google allowed Canadian pharmacies to advertise their wares in the United States, despite laws prohibiting advertisements from non-U.S. pill-pushers. Google claimed it had no idea this was happening, and once it discovered the illegal ads, it put an end to the practice. However, in papers filed with the DOJ, the ad giant admits that it knew it was breaking the law all along, but pocketed the money just the same.
So they have been lying about this all along. Add to that the wi-fi spying practices, the persistent cookies for toolbar users even AFTER they opt out, collusion with typo squatters, supposed inability to stop copyright infringement on YouTube, and more.
Google started out doing no evil, but as of late, with it recent change in attitude toward Google labs, abandoning development of features for other platforms than it’s own, etc.. it has become as evil as Microsoft ever was. The world is just now starting to notice.
