Google: Always Increasing Market Share

     Google is becoming an incredibly powerful player with the vast number of online services that people use in their everyday lives. As I am writing this article, I am using Blogger, Google Chrome, Google Search, and my Android phone. All of which are products of Google. Besides the popular Google products like Youtube, Gmail, Hangouts, and Maps, Google is now developing a broadband fiber optic internet service, and they mentioned in a conference that they want to develop themselves as a wireless cell phone carrier. Essentially, if this were to happen, someone could have their Android powered cell phone that uses Gmail, Youtube, Google Chrome, Hangouts, Google+, Drive, Maps, and many more Google apps. Then they could potentially be using Google's cell phone service or WiFi with their fiber optic network. This raises the question: Is Google becoming to powerful in our everyday lives? Is it getting to the point of addiction? In my opinion, Google is becoming a little bit too powerful: however, I don't currently see this as a bad thing. From my experience of exploring multiple platforms and services, Google by far offers the best on the market. Sometimes its the simple things like in Chrome where the URL bar is also the Google Search bar making it simple and easy to navigate. Sometimes its the detailed customization like add-ons and themes that enhance the experience for the user. Google makes it simple and easy to use their services while also offering the customization and complexity many advanced users want to access. As far as Google becoming an addiction, I see it more as a means for getting the information we seek on a day to day basis. So I see it as an addiction to obtaining information and less of an addiction to Google. People want to achieve their online goals in a fast and simple manner, and Google is the one offering the best solution. Privacy and independence can also be an issue when Google is the one-stop-shop for all services. I definitely believe privacy can be a big concern. If something happened to Google, they would have all the information the consumer has been giving them from search queries to when you are going to yoga class next week. If the consumer used a bunch of different, at least the amount of information given would be dispersed widely across the internet with less risk involved. It is the same concept as investing all your money in one stock versus putting it in a mutual fund. People ultimately have a choice on where to go for their services. It is not any harder to type in bing.com vs google.com to make a search. I believe that, until a company comes along and offers up a worthy challenge, Google will continue to dominate the realm of the internet.