Businessweek runs an article about the power of Google and asks is Google is too powerful?
I was thinking about this a while ago. How many takeovers can you do on the web until authority and control mechanisms see your network of companies (websites) as a cartel?
If Google should ever think about taking over a very large network of sites (for example Yahoo, I don’t know if they could) the better do it fast. What if you own 90% of the search market? Or what if you are controlling the market and price for advertisements?
I think this also counts for other websites, for example Yahoo. With content-syndication and partner-deals the majority of the web users ends up on websites of a few major players. Microsoft was already forced to separate software (Windows) into parts by the EU trade commission.
When will trade commissions step into the web?
What do you think, should trade commissions get involved with the web? Or are the web (and its users) better of in a marketplace without regulation?
This morning I visited the Google Geo Day 2007 in Amsterdam. A morning with presentations about Google Maps and Earth. KML is the RSS of a spatial web. The Google Maps and Earth API support KML and GeoRSS since last week, making it even more easy to make all kinds of mashups.
At this moment there are over 30.000 Google Maps mashups, 1/3 of the populated land mass is covered by Google and 50% of the houses photographed is in high res.
The workshops are online. Maps here and Earth here via Nederkaart.
I can’t wait until Google Earth will be viewable in a browser.
INSERT_MAP
This post is in the hypernarrative rss feed geotagged to Amsterdam (I picked the wrong street and part of Amsterdam. Anyway you get the idea.)
Erik Kessels (KesselsKramer) talks about found Photography on the We Are All Photographers Now! / Tous Photographes! weblog
[audio:http://www.boring.ch/waapn/incoming/podcasts/erik_kessels.mp3]
I like with how much passion he talks about typefaces. Watch the interview (Quicktime video).
Crouwel is also in the Helvetica documentary
A Flickr set of photos by KonradS from the construction of CCTV, the OMA project (The Office for Metropolitan Architecture – Rem Koolhaas).
This is how it will be when finished.
