I am the Walrus - GOOG GOOG GOOG JOOB
The ostensibly unstoppable GOOG continues to dominate Wall Street today:
Google shares crossed $700 Wednesday on news of the search giant’s mobile-services plans, while Dell climbed after restating four years of results. The Nasdaq Composite Index rose as investors awaited the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate decision.
Google edged up $8.60, or 1.2%, to $703.26 on the Nasdaq Stock Market after The Wall Street Journal reported that it is in advanced talks with Verizon Wireless and Sprint Nextel for a possible line of Google-powered cellphones. The milestone is a fresh intraday high for the company, after it passed $600 for the first time only three weeks ago.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119383752903177649.html?mod=MKTW
What is fueling the hype?
Google Inc. is developing a new search service for cellphones that will help consumers find and buy ringtones, games and other mobile content as the Internet company pushes more deeply into wireless, people familiar with the matter say.
Google already offers cellphone users a version of its popular engine for searching the Web. Now the company wants to go beyond just looking up Web pages, effectively becoming a gateway for finding and paying for mobile media content.
With the new system, users would search for a piece of content — say, a U2 ringtone — and get back a list …
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB118461672269867869.html
Ok - so Google is building the infrastructure to accommodate revenue streams for the recording industry and media networks. That being said, let’s think about whose best interests are being served by keeping Google’s stock untouchable by the common investor. AT&T comes to mind. So does Sony, CBS, NBC - and let’s not forget about our good friends in the government -
The intelligence community appears to be interested in data mining Google’s vast store of information on each user who uses Google’s services. Google collects data on each user’s search queries, which web sites users visited after making a query, and through its Google Analytics service, can also track users on cooperating web sites. It’s not clear what level of access to or how much of this information has been made available to intelligence agencies.
http://www.homelandstupidity.us/2006/02/22/google-in-bed-with-us-intelligence/
So how on earth does all of this matter to me, the simple and lowly SEO strategist? What does AT&T and Homeland Security care about me working on getting “los angeles web design” into the top 20 organic Google results? What does Google care about it?
Nothing in this life is free - organic search results included. The money’s gotten so big that it has corrupted the process. More to follow…