That's a fair assessment of Google. My views are coloured because of a few really good startups I saw crushed when Google released products for free (specifical

That's a fair assessment of Google. My views are coloured because of a few really good startups I saw crushed when Google released products for free (specifically Calendar, and Reader IIRC). I have a long-running joke with friends when we come up with ideas, that we'd better not do it as "Google's going there soon". Thankfully it seems to have slowed down its expansion a bit in the last few years. Also the power they wield with search and adwords, to make businesses thrive or die - especially if they play the rules (cf RapGenius). Though I don't expect it would be any better if Bing was the dominant search engine. tl;dr: I don't like semi-monopolies. Small, competing and thriving businesses are the best.