Matt Cutts Cuts Loose

The latest whipping boy on the internet is Google this week with the release of the Privacy International Report calling Google’s operations the most egregious in regards to consumer privacy.

Matt Cutts, one of the more fun Google Bloggers to read takes the whole thing on, and while he admits he is biased because he works there, takes on the report point by point, and wants to know how AOL got a better grade than Google. We don’t know either, but it makes for entertaining reading.

The thing about Google is that they have become the new poster boy for everything evil, as focus turns away from Microsoft, which replaced IBM, Google finds itself in new territory as the leader in an industry that has potential for both good and bad.

There is no way that the news will sell if we talk about the interns and Google days of code, or good works. Ask Microsoft, they know this already.

What does sell is saying that Google is now evil incarnate and the anti-Christ and if we are not careful Google will soon own us all.

News for pundits, they already do, we use many of their services and are happy, we really do not think about what they are doing on their side of the internet transaction, dangit, show me the pictures of Paris Hilton crying in the car.

Really, this is nothing different from other companies that get targeted because people want them to do something, and the company is dragging its feet to do what someone else wants them to do. So we will get a privacy group to beat on the company while we push our separate agendas. That is the new territory that Google finds themselves in, and while it is sad, it is also very human.

In about 20 years, someone else will replace Google as the internet evil poster boy, but this is an unaccustomed position for Google to be in. Just wait until the anti-trust lawsuits fire up, this is a predictable pattern, one seen before. Just make sure you have lobbyists in DC now, don’t wait until the last minute.

You can read Matt’s very interesting article here.