Google too powerful? D.C lobbying office grows from one to 30 staffers in two and a half years
Just the other day I was writing about goggles for reading naughty e-books—only, it ended up googles until Nathan Youngman and others kindly alerted me.
Oh, the mindshare! Yet another sign that we’re becoming One Nation Under Google? Or maybe one World under the “Do No Evil” duo? From libraries to book publishers to the EU, some claim Google enjoys too much power. I myself am concerned about the library area especially, given such issues as the searchability of Google-controlled books. Another fear isn’t so much about Google itself but what the government could do with so much data centralized.
Check out Ken Auletta’s New Yorker piece (via LISNews), complete with word that Google’s D.C. office has grown from one to 30 staffers in two and a half years. So, gang, what do you think about Google’s power? Actually I know of an area where Google should flex its muscles more—e-book standards. Google would do well to back the IDPF’s e-book standard before Microsoft gets a chance to pre-empt .epub, just so the G people support the standard rather take it over.
Disclosure: I own a tiny, tiny slice of Google for retirement purposes.
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