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Following Tech's Money Trail In Washington
snydeq writes "Having outlayed $111 million to gain political influence in 2009, the tech industry is clearly learning how to play the lobbying game, writes InfoWorld's Bill Snyder. And while longtime lobbying stalwart General Motors nearly outspent the tech industry on its own, the rise of lobbying among tech giants, especially those under antitrust scrutiny, is staggering. Google, which has been drawing interest from the feds over its online advertising business, has increased its efforts twelve-fold in the past four years. And while Google frames its sudden increased interest in Washington as a matter of growth inspiring greater civic responsibility, the company may find itself sucked further into Washington, now that it is party to an international spat involving both the US and Chinese governments. Among those that top the list of tech lobbyists, Oracle, Intel, and Microsoft all have come under scrutiny in the past year, with Intel accused of monopolistic practices and Oracle requiring sign off on its merger with Sun."
From the Google link above:
Lobbying on behalf of its position doesn't make Google evil. It just means it's a big corporation. But for a company with a messianic belief in its purpose, that's a hard truth to accept.
Whenever I see a person or an organization with a messiah complex or whatever, a belief in what their doing is the right way, I become quite concerned. I really hope that Google questions themselves at all times and considers criticism about what they do.Then again
"He bristled over criticisms of a settlement with publishers and authors: "In reality, nothing in this agreement precludes any other company or organization from pursuing their own similar effort. The agreement limits consumer choice in out-of-print books about as much as it limits consumer choice in unicorns."
Bristles? Not even a "I thought about that and this is why I don't think it's a concern..."
No, he makes a condescending comment. Oh great Brin sala bin, your Word is the Word of God!
So, Google, doing no evil, Hmmmmm?!? I'd like to point out that all of your revenues are from advertising - many of your advertisers are scammers, btw - and that the reason why you can command as much money as you do for your advertisement is by tracking users and their movements. Spying. And as more competitors come into the market, you're going to have to spy more in order to keep up your revenue streams.
You will be evil - you're on your way. Your only hope is to take yourselves private. Yes almighty Brin, you will lose billions of paper wealth doing it, but you will have a less a chance of being evil.
But that won't happen, I can tell you how to get out of your contract and you won't do it because you're a greedy human like them all and I'll keep your soul.
--Satan.
Are you a NIGGER that they can hold Bloc in order to not so bad. To the FreeBSD sHowed share. *BSD is All major marketing said. 'Screaming something cool