From the outside it seemed like Google 20-25 years ago cared more about making good things than they cared about making money. Which counter-intuitively is why

From the outside it seemed like Google 20-25 years ago cared more about making good things than they cared about making money. Which counter-intuitively is why they made so much money, people trusted google. Somewhere around the doubleclick merger or the IPO that changed. When google launched Gmail people were paying for invites on ebay. Changing your email address is the biggest pain in the ass in digital life and Google had people paying for the chance to do it before their friends. That would not happen if they launched something new right now. After a decade or two of trading goodwill for short term gains no one trusts google, and pretty much only use it because they think they have to.