The point is that ALTHOUGH Google's recent acquisitions might be problematic from a privacy perspective, painting them as something more sinister is a cheap rhetorical device which, at best, provides an easy straw-man for genuine concerns about Google's behavior wrt privacy. (edit: added this in a desperate attempt to explain what I've been trying to say since my first comment)

Also, my position has been consistent. I'm editing so much because I feel the need to write very, VERY clearly for you, because you seem to misinterpret everything that's not extremely carefully stated. {edit: and upon additional review after posting, I realize that there's some tiny thing that you could misinterpret. So I go back an edit; mostly slight rewording}

E.g. the "apparent contradiction" you pointed out isn't at all -- it's a conspiracy theory that the article's author doesn't believe, which makes it a a rhetorical device. Please feel free to point out any others.

{edit: grammar. Also, yeah, triple posts! Is this better?}

{edit: also, I always stop editing after the first comment, but usually not before. The point of indicating edits to prevent diverging discussion and lack of context; as long as there's no reply, I don't see the annoying edit comments as necessary. Sorry if I offended you...}