I realize articles describing and deriding Google for its hegemony are a dime a dozen. And, frankly, when the articles are older, they seem to give Google more credit than possibly due; other contenders have emerged.
I usually don't think twice when I read articles similar to this one asking if Google is too powerful.
Why don't I worry much? Well, besides the fact that I am apathetic to most things described in such articles, it is because my power has gone out it in my home more than once in the past two months. I realize
that despite how much we praise or groan about technology's presence, its biggest weakness lies in its total dependence on electricity. And electricity, if you think about it, or ask anyone who has knowledge of how our grid system works, is extremely vulnerable to failure and in some respects is ancient technology when compared to what our bits and bytes are capable of doing now.
My home was built in 1919. It's one of those old craftsman style homes--but which shows little craft, heh. I am told that my home was built sort of like how Frankenstein's monster was: out of the dead, left over parts of other homes. It hasn't gone through any major renovations. I still need to use Edison fuses:
Ahh, yes. Old technology. |
Miller's "Death of A Salesman"--wow where's this kind of drama been for the last decades in theatre? Read through some more Chekhov--most every amateur writer after him has been imitating his style. Reread some poems-- "Wordsworth's The World Is Too Much With Us" is perhaps the best Romantic poem ever written.
So, when the power went out, what could have I done if I had my entire library on an e-book? Hope that the battery would last its advertised 7-8 hour lifespan and cram as much reading in the allotted time? I couldn't google any poems. I had to reach for my library.
I stumbled across this news saying how Google is investing in the world's largest solar power tower plant and I thought: finally, they have taken the first steps toward total domination.
Once no one can pull the plug on them, they can claim to have no real weaknesses. If I, an unassuming, inconsequential nobody can figure this out, what makes us think that the technocratic chiefs don't realize this?
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