The increased monitoring and profiling of Internet users by companies such as Google and its DoubleClick online advertising subsidiary is widely seen as one of the biggest threats to online privacy.
At long last, Google owns DoubleClick. In doing so, the company has done something else that many people would have never believed possible. Become an SEO. That’s right–Google’s in the SEO business now, selling services through DoubleClick’s Performics to people who want to rank well on–um–Google. Conflict of interest? You bet. And worse from an image perspective, the purchase puts Google in the paid inclusion business, something it dissed as evil back in 2004, when it went public. Don’t get me wrong, I have absolutely no problem with Performics as a company and have good friends that work there. But Google shouldn’t own it.
Google finalized its $3.1 billion purchase of ad-delivery giant DoubleClick Tuesday after European Union regulators ruled that the purchase does not violate anti-monopoly rules in Europe. … DoubleClick is an ad serving and management company that Web publishers use to display and target visual and rich-media advertising. The technology uses a DoubleClick cookie that reports back every time a user visits a site using the system. … Google can merge that database with its deep knowledge of users’ search histories, along with its growing database of URLs visited by Google users who don’t realize that Google opts-in users to its “Web History” program, which continually tracks their every step on the Internet.
So what does the purchase mean for citizens on the Web?
Have you been wondering what had been going through the heads of Microsoft executives as they prepared to make the bid for Yahoo? In December, I got my hands on three confidential documents that Microsoft used in its lobbying against the Google-DoubleClick deal, and I posted them on Bits. (See that post here.) Re-reading those documents now shows that Microsoft was clear with the Federal Trade Commission that an approval of Google-DoubleClick might lead it to take drastic action–like it is doing now with its bid for Yahoo.
One reason historians study the past: Events are cyclical. What happened before happens again. The Federal Trade Commission should have more closely studied past mistakes before approving Google’s acquisition of DoubleClick. Google is becoming the new Microsoft, only much worse. When historians look back on the early 2000s, the DoubleClick merger will likely stand out as the turning point for Google. History isn’t yet written. The European Union can still spoil the deal.
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