Working at Google vs Working at Meetup (Updated)

"At Google, most revenue comes from advertising, so Google must satisfy advertisers to stay in business"

I don't think that is quite correct--they don't have to satisfy advertisers. They just have to be less unsatisfactory than the alternatives.

I've not heard many advertisers who are actually satisfied with Google. I've heard a lot of complaining about how the price for advertising keeps creeping up but the effectiveness of the advertising does not (with some speculation that the way advertising traffic is allocated at Google is designed to make it always look like bidding higher will be worth it, so as to get customers into a never ending cycle of bidding up).

Many internet businesses need advertising, though, and Google has such a big share of that market, and so the businesses pretty much have no choice about using them.

Interesting view of the two, the tea party part made me kind of cringe though.