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Google is none-too-thrilled about a SearchIgnite study suggesting that search advertising prices would increase by 22%. Now they’re fighting back by saying the study was misleading. Here are their main points:

• Ad prices are not set by Yahoo! or Google, but by advertisers themselves
• Yahoo! won’t be able to see the current auction prices for Google ads, just as Google won’t be able to see Yahoo’s prices
• The report mistakenly assumes that Yahoo! will serve Google ads for as many of its search queries as possible. This contradicts Yahoo’s own statements that their plan is to serve Google ads on search results pages where they have few relevant ads to serve.
• The report includes a misplaced focus on cost per click (CPCs) rather than the more important measure for advertisers — return on investment of their advertising dollar.
• the study fails to take into account that fact that Yahoo! shows significantly more ads per page than Google

I’m sure the analysts will be split on whether they agree with Google or not.

But one thing Google is getting wrong is the timing. This week’s fast collapse of companies in the financial market and the mortgage problems that have plagued the U.S. for a year now are only reminders of the great risks associated with companies becoming TOO BIG.

Of course, forging an ad deal with Yahoo is not the same as taking on irresponsible loans, but consumers, Wall Street, and the feds are undoubtedly wary of big promises made by big corporations. And Google has become just that in a short 10 year time frame.

Even without the current mess, antitrust concerns abound. And while Google may have permeated our culture, for some the side effects of such power have been extremely costly.

In a week after a devastating hurricane and financials falling left and right, Google is not exactly demonstrating sensitivity to the current consumer and regulatory climate by supporting their desire to expand their overwhelming majority market share even further.

Search marketers can enrage diehard members of social communities who want to keep marketers at bay. The result? Death threats, cyberterrorism, obscene language, cyberharassment, and calls for suicide.
Social media marketers see StumbleUpon and social networking sites like Facebook as theirs to mine for traffic, links, and sales. A just-released Sapient study shows marketers [...]

The mobile web is not just the playground for big Internet firms like Yahoo and Google. The federal government has access to its resources available to mobile browsers too.
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The numerous agencies of the federal government possess thousands of documents and pieces of information that can’t be found by Google’s crawlers.As the leading search engine, those who use Google in an attempt to find what they need probably won’t find it if it’s stuffed behind an online search form at an agency’s site.
Today, the [...]

A subpoena for information regarding Amazon.com customers and used book purchases as part of a criminal investigation into Robert D’Angelo has been withdrawn after withering criticism from the presiding judge.

Federal Judge Stephen Crocker in western Wisconsin rebuked US Attorneys for seeking records from Amazon in connection with D’Angelo’s tax evasion and mail fraud case. News [...]

A federal judge said no to part to the Democrat green-lighted new version of the Patriot Act yesterday. The Feds will have to get permission from the court before they can order ISPs to turn over customer records without telling the customer.
I invoked him yesterday, and I’m invoking him again today, Nelson Muntz joins [...]

At first glance it looks like three Presidential candidates swore to uphold a law already passed, but since that wouldn’t make any sense at all, we’ll assume they meant they’ll hold the Executive branch to the same standards the Legislative has already adopted. Given the bobbing and weaving of the current administration, that really would [...]

We have an intrinsic and well-supported mistrust of the major broadband providers in the telecom and cable industries. It has been suggested search engines need just as much scrutiny.The assumptions of fairness assigned to search engines and their algorithmic work have come about because we believe computers act as the ultimate neutral arbiter of rules. [...]

In the virtual world of Second Life, one can engage in just about every imaginable sort of commerce. Industries spanning from standard retail to prostitution offer the average Second Lifer a veritable cornucopia of possibilities, but it’s the virtual casinos that exist in the online world that are drawing the attention and ire of government [...]

Negative publicity continues to befall YouTube, first stemming from the billion dollar copyright infringement suit filed by Viacom, and now from reports that the popular video sharing service is being used as a vehicle to communicate death threats from vengeful criminals.
There are several creative directions you could pursue when taking advantage of YouTube’s video e-mail [...]