As a content creator, and also a developer I can't get very far without using Google services like search, Gmail, maps, etc...
Have we given Google too much power?
In this article, let's talk about why Google may be too powerful and what we need to do to prevent such monopolies from taking over the web.
Monopolies are bad
In most industries, a monopoly is always a bad thing. These large companies not only kill small businesses, but also get complacent over time, and their product offering slowly degrades in quality.
And then, we are here, in 2024, when this article is ranking on the first page of Google:
Litterally one of the main subheadings: "After a full year of not thinking about printers, the best printer is still whatever random Brother laser printer that’s on sale." 😂
As you will read, this article is, well, basically a tongue-in-cheek swipe at Google to prove that big businesses and domains with high domain authority can do just about anything, even put out bad content and still rank on the first page of Google.
Still the best from the bad bunch
To be fair, compared to Microsoft which seems to have a quality problem (Windows 11, Bing, Teams!!!), Google still does fairly well.
Gmail is one of the best mail clients, Search is still better than Bing and others, Chrome is fairly good, and so forth.
Coming back to my previous point, The Verge is a top-ranking site generally and they do have a domain authority of 92. So in terms of trust, it makes sense why Google will rank them on the first page.
Still, didn't they release the "useful content update" to combat poor quality content?
Algorithm changes from Google have been more frequent in recent times, especially changes such as the "useful content update".
How then is this Verge article still ranking so well? When it's not useful for the searcher's intent.
Shouldn't useful content be applied across the board as the first ranking factor? then domain authority?
Google has some of the best engineers around, so surely they can build a re-ranking and weighting system that is more balanced.
Google abuses its dominance
Apart from the example above, Google has been engaging in some anti-competitive behavior. Whether it's the whole 3rd party cookie debacle (not a bad feature but plays to their benefit), Google shopping products ranking higher than e-commerce sites, Google prioritizing more first page adverts and so forth.
Google no longer is focused on building the best products for users, they seem to be more focused on maximizing revenue.
Retrenchments
This is not unique to Google, but why on earth have there been so many layoffs? You would think a company that has been profitable and still is very profitable would not take such a drastic action.
Sure, COVID did cause a surge in tech employment, but still, this is no excuse for blanket retrenchments.
I am not advocating for keeping staff just for the sake of maintaining jobs, but still, I am pretty sure a fair amount of those thousands of jobs that were cut, were workers that had good performance ratings and were just a victim of the team being disbanded.
How to stop Google's dominance
Stop using Google products just because they are from Google, look at local competitors that have a decent offering and support them wherever possible.
Stop writing content for SEO purposes, half of the problem with Google search is all the bad content that is being created daily just for SEO optimizations and to optimize advertising revenue.
Prioritize quality over quantity, this includes using AI/ML to generate content, which is unethical and bad for the web. You can use AI/ML to aid in the content creation process, but the final piece of content you put out, should be your thoughts and ideas, your words, and not AI.
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