This kind of 90's era Microsoft-style predatory tactics from Google is hurting innovation in the Valley more than patents. Small companies with innovative products are at the mercy of Google.
No wonder Apple, MS, Oracle, etc. are suing Google for patent infringement. Can you blame them?
Yelp, Groupon, Facebook, Twitter, Skyhook, Flipboard.
See any pattern?
Does it make sense now?
While I wouldn't deny their right to do so, I also wouldn't deny that it often casts them as a bully.
nothing wrong with throwing their weight around, provided the peopel that matter (who, in my eyes, are the consumers) are treated right. I don't care if a few businesses suffer because of commoditization of their product.
there's a term in business for that. I believe the word is "anti-competitive".
They have a huge chunk of the search market but you can still use very good search engines like bing, yahoo, ask, aol or the awesome duckduckgo.
Google is continually tweaking and improving the design, speed, results and features of their search engine in an effort to stay ahead of the competition.
The reasons that people don't use the other engines are not because of google being "anti-competitive" but rather due to them offering a superior service.
Yelp is a copycat (CitySearch etc.).
Groupon probably isn't the first deal site.
If we didn't have VisiCalc and 1-2-3 and Excel, we wouldn't have Apple's Keynote.
That's how this industry works: large enough markets attract multiple companies. Increased competition causes all players to step up their game and lower their prices. This benefits consumer i.e. you and me.
This is exactly how things are supposed to work.