Google’s Many Changes

With the simple dictum “don’t be evil” as its motto, the Internet software giant Google — which ranked as the third-highest lobbying spender in the tech industry in 2010 — wages an aggressive image and relations campaign with an international public, and its strategy is evolving.

The Huffington Post’s Ryan Grim, Zach Carter and Paul Blumenthal give us an extensive update on the part Google plays alongside governments and other corporations in the “war for the Web,” from becoming a financier of the Republican Party to its many roles in the worldwide struggle over intellectual property. –ARK

The Huffington Post:

You can’t swing a dead cat video in Washington lately without hitting a lobbyist, consultant, attorney or adviser on retainer to Google or one of its tech rivals. Google, whose top executives have long been a bottomless cup of campaign coffee for Democrats, is finally entering its bipartisan phase, theatrically hiring Republican operatives and broadcasting the news through insider Washington publications, pumping air into a K Street tech bubble.

The shift in political strategy comes as Google faces a serious antitrust threat, punctuated by a high-profile hearing on the company held Wednesday afternoon in the Senate. But Google’s investment in the infrastructure of the conservative movement goes much deeper than what’s been reported this summer.

The company known for its progressive politics is now giving money to the Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Republican Governors Association, the GOP firm The David All Group, Crossroads Strategies, the Republican Attorneys General Association and the Republican State Leadership Committee, among others. On Thursday, Google and Fox News cosponsored a Republican presidential debate.

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