Google, Microsoft and the Internet

Today I ran into a couple interesting articles. One in particular spoke about Google's invisibility cloak. Forbes highlights the fact that web researcher net applications recently discovered that between 11 and 30% of traffic streaming out of Google is stripped of its usual identification. In other words the company is unable to make out on which operating system the originating application runs. The article continues by assuming that Google is developing their own operating system to avoid having to rely on Microsoft. Whether this is true or not remains to be seen and only the future will tell. Google was not available for comment, is and that's what they usually say when the information is correct but they are not intending to admit.

This gets me to a question that I have been hounded by for quite awhile. Many people bash Microsoft as the company that wants to concur the world, and name Google as the savior but I increasingly have the impression that Google is doing exactly the same as Microsoft a number of years ago. Secretly they are trying to get hold of every Internet related information that we convey from our computers. It is the secrecy that actually makes it even worse than what Microsoft has been doing. At least Microsoft was predictable.

At this point in time a big battle is starting. On the one side Google has been coming from the Internet and is now trying to take over our desktops and mobiles, while on the other Microsoft has started from our desktops and mobiles and is now, through the launch of there windows live environment, trying to attract us to their own Internet space.

I have to admit that the windows live environment appears to be an interesting one, not in its individual functions, but in the way the functions are integrated. They seem to have done a good job not just of integrating the functions that are running on the Internet, but also the Internet with the desktop. It's worth trying it out.

My belief is that there is place for two competitors in this space, and I really don't know who is going to win. However, what I do not agree with is that the one of them is presented as the devil while the other is the savior. I believe both companies have their own economical strategies and a common objectives to make money. Both are trying to maximize the amount of money they make and consider us as a vehicle to do so.

Unfortunately, as both environments are completely incompatible, to collaborate with others one will have to make a choice. As each of us will end up with its own preference, to avoid turf wars we will all end up requiring identifiers in both emvironments and we will have to learn to use both. But that's the prize of competition I suppose.