Has the Big G Finally Gone Evil?

[wmrobwl]

Most major companies refer to a detailed code of corporate conduct when considering such policy decisions. General Electric devotes 15 pages on its Web site to an integrity policy. Nortel's site has 34 pages of guidelines. Google's code of conduct can be boiled down to a mere three words: Don't be evil.

According to this article: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/11.01/google_pr.html (which by the way is unrelated to the jagger update, but gives you some insight into what they mean about their "Don't be evil motto). "Evil," says Google CEO Eric Schmidt, "is what Sergey says is evil."

So now we know what they mean by it. Is it possible that one man who was turned into a billionaire overnight could have changed his perception of evil? When I say "overnight", I'm not talking about the 6 years of hard work he had to put in to found the company (which is still pretty quick to become a billionaire in my eyes), but I am referring to the IPO. Pre-IPO, he was worth much, much less on paper.

Also, remember the ultra intelligent programmers who were turned into millionaires overnight. Could it be that everyone from the top down has changed their attitudes and perspectives based on this new found wealth.

To me, the answer is clear in my mind. Headlines like "Google Cranks Up 3Q Earnings 96%" only reaffirm my beliefs.

Now, don't get me wrong. I do believe that a business should be in business to make money. That's what business is all about.

My question is, are they still standing by the "Don't be evil" motto?

Microsoft never made any such claims. Many of their practices are viewed by critics as "evil". I personally find some of their business tactics to be very clever. They never claim not to be evil.

If Google wants to play with the big boys and without any rules, then they need to stop trying to portray this goody goody image.

Unless, of course, their strategy is to stick by their don't be evil guns to really fool the public into giving them trust they would never give to another company.

Then, this would be truly clever. Maybe critics should wonder if Google is more evil than Microsoft.

[Feydakin]

The modern reality is that publicly held companies are requied to attack every opportunity for profit, regardless of it's 'social' impact or risk being sued by it's shareholders.. The ability to say 'We will do no evil' is lost once you go public..

It puts engineers and programers in the position of developing new technology 'just because they can' and then having finance guys go, 'wow, look how we can use this to maximize profit!'.. Does anybody remember dynamic pricing at Amazon??

Steve