Yeah, his points are just not that will demonstrated or backed up with actual evidence.
Free products and his Docs example: evidently he's never heard of
Zoho. More capable than Google Docs, a much more comprehensive feature set, and hey it's also free. In fact lots of other competitors do similar stuff *for free*. One could argue they only do free because Google does, but I think it's hard to make the case that Google is forcing free on the market when so much of the web is driven by it, from Twitter and Facebook to Zoho to Remember The Milk, on and on.
Regarding the "big spender" issue: I worked at a company that spent between $1000 and $2000 a month on Google Ads and we had several free one-on-one consults with them where they analyzed our campaigns. There are also tons of other resources. Do they provide a dedicated account rep, etc, etc? No. Does he have any idea how much SEM consultants cost? Evidently not. Minimum $1000/mo, bare minimum, for someone with low experience, and that's *before* you spend money on the Google Ads they're advising you on. Meanwhile the free info Google provides (in tutorials, FAQs, etc.) actually compares fairly well to the paid services in many respects. The main value of a paid consultant is they're specific to your campaign(s), and in some cases (if you pay enough) they'll do the work for you.
Hiring practices: I will grant that support from Google for *other* products can be very bad though, and frustratingly so. Adwords may be one of those, as in the case he describes, and I *do* think Google could improve there. My experience of problems that needed support that wasn't there is mainly with Google Apps for Domains (free/educational/non-profit version). But hey, it's free, you get what you pay for.
I'm not sure how much evidence he has to base his assertion that a low GPA = instant disqualification, that may be so and that would be stupid, but I have no way of knowing. What I can say is that to go from that and conclude that the people they hire are "all thinkers and no feelers" is doing exactly what he's complaining about *them* doing. In his own words: " For years, I too used my intellect to separate myself from others, without considering them as whole people." Still doing it apparently, just the other way now?
He also complains about Google being a "one trick pony" in terms of revenue, but he completely misses on the reality of his assertion. Yes, Google *is* a one trick pony, just like radio, newspapers, and cable TV, all of which have been around decades, if not centuries, supported primarily - if not exclusively - by *advertising*. Google's current most successful product is Search, yes. But they provide *advertising* and that's where they make their money. Yes advertising on their search engine accounts for some of that, perhaps a lot. But they also get lots of money from displaying ads on *other* people's sites, something that has little or nothing to do with search in itself ('relevance', yes, but they don't have to be king of search to provide that). So even if someone does come along and kill their search business, they're still a powerhouse of advertising brokering. They've bought several companies that did *only* that and which sold their services to other companies with public-facing content and services to monetize. If a new search engine eats Google's lunch on search quality and relevance, they're going to need ads or something else to support them. Who says they won't go to Google as an ad partner? It's an obvious choice, and there aren't many others with the reach and level of service they can provide.
What's funniest about it is this quote at the end of that bit: "And a vulnerable Google puts us all at risk." Huh? At risk of what exactly? At risk of having better services when another company comes in with a superior product? I think what he means is his marketing consulting business is at risk because it's built-up around Google-specific practices and information. Tough lucky buddy, learn the new system or go out of business, but that's no reason to resent Google if they go belly up.
Data collection: Zaine covers this one pretty well. Google does now offer lots of settings for controlling data collection. Not only that but, despite Schmidt's quote being creepy, he's *right* to a large degree (IMO). People entering search terms for stuff like "how to kill someone without leaving evidence" or "how to cheat without getting caught" are retarded. First off, why would you share such information/questions with a large, anonymous corporation of any kind, regardless of their data collection practices? Second, what about someone actually looking at your computer and finding out? The truth is most people just have no idea how this stuff works and probably don't want to, they'd prefer to be ignorant. The people who know better are the same people who know how to effectively "opt out". Google provides some options, but you can go even further if you want, using Tor or other anonymizing systems, or just using something like Chrome's own "Incognito", as Zaine also points out.
Charitable adwords issue: Funny enough this is the one that bothers me the most and I was not previously aware of it. It seems to me this may be a "bug" in the system. I'm sure if they're explicitly aware of it (which they must be, but one hand may not be talking to the other) that they're enjoying the results, as he states, but I don't think it's fair for others to have to bid against those charitable grants. Instead I think they should just give them a percentage display rate, without affecting the cost of other people's ads. This seems truly shady to me. Surprising that this is the one thing he doesn't actually hate them for!
- Oshyan
