Predator is because of the prey

I first stumbled upon this poem by Isaac Watts.

Then I found this article in CIO magazine (hat tip - Vinnie Mirchandani). Tom Waligum goes the whole hog to define a few characteristics of Evil Companies.

Well, I for one, am a firm believer in survival of the fittest. I also believe that there’s no company that just wants to be Noble. Where competition lets you get one up on them, you will. It’s not the question of someone wanting-to-be Evil or Noble. You are either one or the other. I don’t think Wal-Mart, Microsoft and now Google started out wanting to be Evil. Google in fact, said "Don't be Evil". They trooped in to find mediocrity reigning and scotched them all. It wasn’t invasion, it was just plain outthinking or in some cases, outbidding. No God ever created Microsoft with a muscle, just that others had muscular dystrophy (because they were smug, incompetent and lacked vision) and were waiting to be buried.

.

Now it's the turn of Google at the title. What did it do? It’s stock price touched $700/- when that of others headed south? Or is it because it got a bit creative, used some technology that allowed it to make a ton of money and get “creepy” in the process? If not for Google, would not an enterprising someone have done it? Sure, as you would guess, so long as it stayed within the realm of possibilities. Soon there will be someone that blocks Google’s creepy ways and then it’ll be Google’s turn to shed its skin on that – the new “Evil”.

I would just say this to others that are Noble-by-default ; why don’t you just admit “Hell, I couldn’t get it right” !

.