The Empire that is Google

Your home screen. Your go-to news source when out and about. Your quick-fix fact finder. 

It is every where and it is undoubtedly one of the most recognizable names in the world. Google is one of the highest grossing companies that the world has seen and continues to grow by the nanosecond. 

Assisting this growth are the new programs and initiatives Google has come up with, cementing its place in our daily internet-ing routines.

Iv’e always had an bit of a grudge against these kind of multi-billion dollar corporations. Knowing full well that I frequently utilize them and that they help me in my day to day dealings, I just think that there is something not quite right about ginormous enterprises that have the potential to control and produce all the world’s information, infiltrating each and every aspect of our lives. 

But it’s a love/hate relationship.

Google News for example, being so brilliantly simple and informative is fast becoming many browsers’ go-to hot spot for whats happening in the world. Able to be tailored to your own personal taste, so that you see only stories which would be of interest to you, could there be an easier way to secure a snapshot of all the major news and affairs of the day? 

My only gripe with GoogleNews as a simplistic and on all counts reliable and accurate source is the notion of power to the powerful. The big name publications will always take priority over the smaller name publications when a user types in their news search. 

Founder and Chief scientist, Krishna Bharat commented on the revolutionary algorithm that Google uses to display unbiased search results, in the context of political reports.
"The algorithms do not understand which sources are right-leaning or left-leaning," Bharat said. "They're apolitical, which is good."

However, Google’s algorithm doesn’t assess the content, it assesses the ‘popularity’ or ‘most clicked’ factor in deeming something worthy of the top space of the search results. This means that the displayed news stories will be mostly those from the powerful, big names in media, excluding the minority and less known sources. 

On a whole, the innovation by Google is a smart one. What better way to get more people clicking on those six colored letters more that they already did. I can move past the fact that Google has encroached into all kinds of online and news territory. Google News really is a good news sight, compiling reputable news stories from a wide (ish) range of different sources. 


Able to select from local, nation or international news, a user really has a one stop shop for all the breaking news stories.