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Opera Reaches 1 Million Downloads Thanks To Google
auckland writes "More than one million people have downloaded the Opera browser in the days since Opera announced it was dropping the ad banner and going completely free. All made possible because Opera signed a search referral deal with Google." From the article: "'The current most important deal now is with Google,' the spokesperson said to Mr. Malik. That deal, and similar ones with Amazon and eBay, give those companies prime placement in the Opera search box. Mozilla has a similar arrangement with Google, with its search box and its default right-click menu search option on highlighted text sending queries straight to Mountain View."
When Google first started out, the bragged how they won't let advertisors pay to be ranked higher in the search results, like Yahoo and other search engines did - that's what made their seaches such great quality. But it seems now that Google has changed their mind?
Free stuff without getting the referrals? http://referralaccelerated.com
Google can do no wrong. Even when the violate the #1 rule of search engine integrity and manipulate their results, they can do no wrong (according to the Slashdot crowd). But yes, Google is still a profit-making company like every other one on the planet. I really doubt that they'll let their "do no evil" philosophy get in the way of profit. I've never known ANY company to keep their original idealistic philosophies once they get to a certain size.