Google Comes Under Anti-Trust Investigation: How Big Of A Deal Is It?

According to MarketWatch's video above, Google could be in big trouble as it comes under increasing anti-trust pressure from both the U.S. and, as well, the European Union. Some allege, such as the book, Marketing of Evil, that Google is indeed evil and that according at least to Jobs and others, its motto of, "Don't be Evil," is nothing more than a lot of crap.

Also, according to yet another article, "Google's headaches are just beginning. At least three state attorney generals have started antitrust investigations into Google. Details of the investigations by the states of California, Ohio and New York were still in the early stages."

Well, quite honestly, I don't have the faintest idea of whether Google is, or isn't guilty of being "evil", or whether or not it's guilty of any anti-trust violations what-so-ever, but I definitely have to agree that it's beginning to look not quite so rosy for the Mountain View search giant. Google, as big as it is, is certainly not bigger than either the U.S. or European Union which both possess the power to hit it with huge fines, lay criminal chargers, or to even break it up.

Has Google now grown so rich, and so damn powerful that it feels that it can do pretty much what ever it bloody-well pleases? Some say the answer to that is a resounding yes, and they sight Google's now abandoned plan to publish every manuscript ever written and make them accessible to anyone online for free, and that's with, or without any of the copyright owners permissions. Then there's the notion of how they, and despite Apple's patents to the contrary, created, or should I say recreated, the iPhone's basic features and U.I. for its Android OS.

So, getting back to the question: just how big of a deal is the government's anti-trust investigation against Google, and what could any possible ramifications be?

The answer, in conclusion, is that it's a very big deal indeed, and one that could effect the company to its very core, much like what happened after the government conducted a similar anti-trust investigation into Microsoft. Microsoft emerged intact, but it was never quite the same again. Could this be Google's fate as well?

And that's my 2 cents 4 this Tuesday, June 28, 2011

UPDATE: The folks over at Engadget are reporting that Google's legal woes are mounting fast as France's 1PlusV search engine is preparing a whopping 295 million Euro lawsuit against Google over its alleged anti-competitive practices.