Worthwhile Reading

While it's a little late in the day for me to cogently comment on this post about Google's status and future, it's worth a full read. Cynical as I am, I actually disagree with the premise of the post. Suffice it to say that I believe Google adds value to whatever they touch. And if you add value to me, and to the things that are important to me, I give you a lot more leeway. That added leeway allows you to touch me in ways I don't allow most people/companies to touch me: targeted ads, for example.

Better maps, better SMS, better whatever-Google-is-doing-today, adds value in my opinion.

This same premise applies to TiVo and the banner ads that they are planning to push at me as I'm zapping through the commericals I don't want to see. And my response? Okay...sure...why not...I'll take 10 seconds of a targeted banner ad over 2 minutes of random commercials any day because, goddammit, I just want to the see the conclusion of this episode of Good Eats.

Contrast this with AOL, who not only provided a crappy connection when I used them 10 years ago, but couldn't even support the crappy connection with decent customer service. And in the midst of all that, *still* tried to sell new stuff to me every day. Google gives me a great "connection" to content and it ALWAYS works. Big difference.

Okay, so this isn't the most insightful commentary around, but I think Google's got a lot of legs and they are nowhere near jumping the shark just yet.