I fear Google's control of the web
People are going to dismiss Dave Winer as a crank right up until the day they or one of the things on which they rely get &quot;googled,&quot; and then they will wish they&#x27;d listened sooner.<p>Google&#x27;s power over the web today, already, is not healthy. There are a lot of people within Google who care deeply about the free and open web, and a lot of people who don&#x27;t, or who define &quot;free&quot; or &quot;open&quot; in ways that involving trusting a for-profit corporation more than anybody wise ever should. Many people get upset when they see Google being attacked, because the part of Google they depend on is a part that really supports the free and open web, or because they themselves don&#x27;t value the freeness and openness as much as they should.<p>Google delivers a lot of value right now, and without people pushing back, hard, that value will enable them to get away with anything.<p>Anybody who has been around long enough ought to understand that power you grant to someone you trust inevitably ends up in the hands of someone you don&#x27;t. Political parties switch back and forth, CEOs and corporate priorities come and go. Sometimes it&#x27;s best to accept an option that is second-best today in order to avoid giving too much power to the organization providing the first-best for them to misuse tomorrow.