[worldtize]

Let me get this straight, the World is accusing Google of cheating because its search engine provides a Google based client amongst the first choices instead of the client that might be more familiar to that factor.........

Tell the Harvard professors to walk into 2,000 McDonalds and order a happy meal and take a survey and complete case study on how many clerks suggest Burger King before they suggest a number 3 value meal.

Now, if Google wanted to be firm, and maybe this does exist, not sure, but when the only privileged results in a search should come from companies who pay for it, and if they do pay for it, Google should have a special surcharge from companies wishing to appear above Google services in that specific search.

Google doesn't cheat, it does what most businesses try and accomplish, a way to run your customers back into your cycle. - GTV

[nickbp]

I don't disagree with the overall point, but the McDonalds analogy doesn't quite work.

By specifically going to McDonalds you are indeed showing them that you're shopping for a McDonalds Happy Meal, because that's all they've got to sell. But when you're searching for a given term on a site that indexes the entire internet, you're just looking for whatever's most relevant, regardless of where it's hosted.

If you'd wanted the search to only apply to YouTube, well, that's what direct youtube.com and the "site:" keyword are for.

[worldtize]

Yeah, the Mcdeez analogy doesn't really work, but you know what I mean anyway....