In my mind, the only way the Internet is going to progress in any meaningful way is if Google do it - not only do they have the infrastructure for something amazing, and not only do they have some of the best programmers in the world working for them, but they do more or less everything for free.

I'd be happy to pay a few pounds a month to use a Google service, because I know I'm getting quality, and I can't find the same standard anywhere else.

As for them getting too big, well, let's face it, if Google sneezes then the whole world knows about it. For the moment, I believe they could do with reigning themselves in a little, and focusing on some of their more promising products and projects, but when the world economy has recovered enough for them to do so, Google should get into as high a gear as possible and run with everything.