I'm sure Larry Page started Google with the aim of becoming a quick millionaire. I'm sure he never thought that one day Google would overtake or even prove to be serious competition for Microsoft.
So what has Google been upto? It started off by revolutionizing the internet search engine. In 2002 i had no idea what Google was. Had never heard of it. The most popular website that i knew of was Yahoo!. Then one day my brother told me to use Google for internet search, and i did. Since then nothing has been the same.
Google has revolutionized the cyber world with its entry. It changed the way search was done and it has changed website aesthetics. Its simple and minimalistic designs have caught the eye of millions of people across the globe and more and more sites are now going in for the simple and use-friendly approach.
What started of as a search engine has now become an empire. Apart from the search engine Google has now gotten into multiple domains across the cybersphere. With Gmail it entered the email provider field and has beaten all the other existing providers and changed that field. Initially it used to be surprising to find any email provider giving more than 2-4 mb of storage space but with gmail came the idea of unlimited storage space. What started with 1GB of space (in an era where 800mb was a lot), today is about 7GB of avaialble space to its individual users. Gmail also introduced the concept of labels and did away with the clumbersome folder system. It made email access lightning fast, easy to use and easy to organise.
From Gmail it spread to Google Talk its Instant Messenger, again revolutionising the messengers with is very simple and easy to use interface. And then came Google Documents, an online version of Microsoft Office. MS Office which is expensive to acquire is a superb piece of software used by practically all offices. People who can afford it end up buying this software and those who cant can download it the pirated version. But Google recognised the huge market it could capture if it gave the people an option to stop breaking the law. With Google documents it launched a service almost the same as MS Office, only it was free to use. And it is a hit (no surprises there). It is also one of Microsofts biggest competitors.
With Picasa, YouTube, Google Video, Shopping, Blogs, Calendar, Orkut, News etc. Google has practically entered all the various fields on the interenet possible. Revolutionising or changing the way things are done. Softwares like Android, Google Chrome, Google Earth, Google Gears etc. Google is now beginning to challenge most of the big names and coming out on top. It has so much access to interenet users' data that a service like Google Analytics can easily track anyone's browsing history without any problem. We are already dependant on Google, atleast i am. All my emails ranging from the past 5 years are already on Google server. My calendar is already on a Google Server. This blog is on a Google server. My IM is on a Google server, my pictures are slowly going online. As they improve Google Documents and MS Office lags behind i'll shift to Google and then all my documents, excel sheets, presentations etc will be on a google server. When and if Google Drive comes about a copy of our Hard Disks will go onto a Google Server. I'm afraid that one day i'm going to wake up and find that my computer has no hard disk, the screen and the keyboard just a form terminals while all my data is stored in Mountain View on a Google Server!
Slowly and slowly at a snail's pace Google is taking over our lives and getting access to all our important and sensitive data. 50 years down the line we will all wake up and find out that Google is the Government, Larry Page the Emperor and Sergey Brin his 1st in Command and we wont be able to stop them because they would have access to all her sensitive data and have the power to incriminate all of us.
And the worse part is if one day those Google imperialists ask us to pay up for everything (whether as usage cost or as taxes) then we are all dead! :D
-> SJ