Google goes click

Once again furniture is flying out the windows at the C-level suites in Redmond. This can mean only one thing: Google has just snaked DoubleClick out from under the talons of Microsoft, just like it did to Yahoo last year with YouTube. Further proof, if any were needed, that Google isn’t a technology company that makes money from ads, it’s an advertising company that uses technology to lure eyeballs.

This may be where the wheels come off G’s famous “Don’t be evil” train (assuming that Google’s agreement to serve censored search results to China hasn’t already permanently derailed it). There are two problems with a monopoly like the one GoogleClick threatens to become. One, as pointed out so ably by InfoWorld El Jefe Steve Fox, would be GC’s ability to dictate pricing to publishers. The other would be its ability to converge vast quantities of data about individual users — search histories, email, web trails, ad clicks, blogs, maps requested, videos viewed, the whole ball of wax — into one tidy package bound only by a corporate privacy policy that could change at any time.

(“In the event Google decides to become evil, the company will provide notice via this privacy policy. Please check back every 24 hours.”)

In some ways, GoogleClick is still better than an ad network controlled by Microsoft, if only because Google seems to understand what consumers want in a way MS never will. (“Would you like to click through this advertisement now? Are you sure? Please wait while we verify that your software is compatible with our ad server.”) But that situation won’t last long. Look for a jilted Microsoft on the rebound, aggressively prowling the ad network bars looking to hook up. Perhaps with its Seattle neighbors aQuantive (Avenue A/Razorfish)?

Is GoogleClick/DoubleGoo a good thing or bad? Drop me a note or post your pithy thoughts below.