Google news not 'universally accessible'
I asked "Why does Google pre-release breaking news via single, favored media publications?" last June. Robert Scoble asks "Is Google hiding from bloggers?"
During the Google Checkout pre-release frenzy I noted:
If today’s Wall Street Journal 'story' 'Google Gets Ready to Test GBuy, A New Online-Payment Option,' based on 'people briefed on the situation,' reads like a souped up version of Google’s own press release, perhaps that is Google’s intention.
Google’s apparent strategy to pre-release the news of its GBuy launch via a seeming 'exclusive' given to The Wall Street Journal, follows a strategy recently employed by Google for the announcement of its redesign of 'Google U.S. Government Search.'...
Additionally, all first-day tertiary coverage relies solely on the information presented via the singular 'exclusive' story in a publication Google deems to be 'Google-friendly.'
Today, even Reuters news service finds itself having to run the headline: 'Google's online pay service to test this week: WSJ' and its meager seven line coverage merely reiterates a few phrases via 'The Wall Street Journal reporting, citing people briefed on the situation.'
Scoble says of the Google Apps release:
Google went to the New York Times to leak tomorrow’s announcement of new business-focused services...
Damn, did we all piss off Google PR or something or are they trying to hide something?
And, does Google want to manipulate and control both news coverage, and writers?
Google's calculated strategy at currying favor with the chosen media few with the goal of writing its own press coverage mocks Google's vaunted mission to:
organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful
Google's shrewd "launch via favorable media" strategy shows Google:
1) organizes the world's information to its own, direct advantage,
2) limits accessibility to the world's information,
3) restrains information usefulness.