Is Google Out Of Touch With The Web Ecosystem?
In a recent interview, Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai, insisted that Google cares about the web ecosystem. When asked how Google supports the web ecosystem he struggled to articulate an answer. After a long series of uhms and false starts he started talking about how Google’s own YouTube platform enables multinational media corporations to monetize their intellectual properties on YouTube.
“He avoids mentioning websites, speaking in the abstract about the “ecosystem” and then when he runs out of things to say changes course and begins speaking about how Google compensates copyright holders who sign up for YouTube’s Content ID program.
He answered:
‘Look I… uh… It’s a… very important question… uhm… look I… I… think… I think more than any other company… look you know… we for a long time through… you know… be it in search making sure… while it’s often debated, we spend a lot of time thinking about the traffic we send to the ecosystem.
Even through the moment through the transition over the past couple of years. It’s an important priority for us.’”
This Is Why Google CEO’s Explanation Falls Short
1. YouTube is not the web ecosystem, it’s Google’s own platform.
2. Multinational mega corporations are not web creators.
Pichai’s answer sent the unintended message that Google is completely out of touch with web creators and if the author of the article about Google Gemini’s Deep Research tool is correct, this is further proof that Google continues to focus on providing information to users at the expense of creators.
See also: Google CEO’s 2025 AI Strategy Deemphasizes Search Box
Is Gemini Deep Research Harvesting Data Without Giving Back?
There’s an old television episode of The Twilight Zone called To Serve Man that relates the story of a benevolent race of aliens who bring advanced technologies that allow humans to live in peace, with food security and prosperity for everyone. As evidence of their good intentions they give the world a book written in an alien language that’s titled To Serve Man. The episode ends when government cryptographers translate the book and discover that it’s a cookbook and that the aliens true intentions are to farm humans as a food source.
Google’s mission statement promising “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful” also seems like proof of their good intentions. However, the mission statement doesn’t explicitly say that Google will refer users to the sources of information. It only promises to organize and provide the information itself in a way that’s accessible and useful. While referring users to the creators of the information could be a part of making information accessible and useful, it’s not explicitly stated; it’s not even implied in the mission statement.
Is Google Gemini Deep Research further proof that Google is harvesting websites as an information source?
If you’re a creator, does it make you feel farmed?
Featured Image by Shutterstock/Nomad_Soul