“Eric Schmidt’s comments at the Abu Dhabi ‘media summit’ certainly sound especially cocky even considering the Google CEO’s past haughty pronouncements,” Tate reports. “Schmidt, Fortune reports, implied Google is more trustworthy than any government on the planet after he was was asked asked about the company’s worrisome stash of private data on its users, Schmidt: ‘All this information that you have about us… Does that scare everyone in this room?’ The questioner asked… ‘Would you prefer someone else?’ Schmidt shot back… ‘Is there a government that you would prefer to be in charge of this?'”
Tate reports, “Schmidt also said Google has been known to curb its own creepy impulses: ‘There are many, many things that Google could do, that we chose not to do… One day we had a conversation where we figured we could just try to predict the stock market. And then we decided it was illegal. So we stopped doing that.'”
Tate writes, “Fortune wonders if Schmidt’s comments are a sign of ‘a dangerous culture of self-righteousness.’ They are.”
“But the CEO’s remarks are just the latest in a series of prominent self-righteous statements from Googlers,” Tate reports. “There have been plenty of similar cases just in the past couple of months alone. It’s worth cataloging them, given Google’s deep relationship with its millions of users, and given that the Mountain View internet company doesn’t seem to be getting any more humble.”
Six delusions of Google’s arrogant leaders:
1: It’s not about the money
2: Google’s wealth means Google “gets it”
3: Google must sacrifice user privacy to grow
4: Users are hungry for Google synergy
5: Google is a worker’s utopia
6: The outraged users are confused
Full article here.
