I wish you would read what I'm writing instead of what you want me to (not) be writing. >The article never stated that Page was building a private army. You di

I wish you would read what I'm writing instead of what you want me to (not) be writing. >The article never stated that Page was building a private army. You did. Oh come on. It's the entire damn point of the article. Without this running narrative, the article's just a list of Google's most successful products and its recent acquisitions. Despite your claim, the article isn't simply a list. And the editorializing is the only reason this article is on the front page of HN. Period. I realize it's just a rhetorical device, but the article reads still like a conspiracy theory. The only thing this article does is, at best, lump critics of Google's privacy behavior in with conspiracy nuts. And there's no reason to appeal to fantastical "what-if's" when there are real, demonstrable problems. > Why can't it be both-and vs. either-or? It can be (see below), and I think the notion that I somehow implied Google's new expansions cannot be problematic is mostly a fabrication of your indigence. It's just that I think the narrative of the article is completely ridiculous and trivializes actual avenues for abuse. What is Google doing to do with military technology? It has 3 options: 1. Use it to create technology which augments its other ventures. 2. Sell to US Govt or our allies. 3. Create a private army or sell to our enemies. 2 and 3 don't worry me for the same reason I don't worry about Boeing taking over the world; military tech is closely monitored and regulated. I don't have to know Page's motives to know that he knows that if he were try try 3, he'd probably end up in prison or dead. I don't have to be omniscient to assume he probably wouldn't take that kind of risk. And hell, I don't even need to know anything about him to know that if he did, the US military would be able to easily unilaterally shut him down. Scenario 1 worries me (despite what you've read into my previous comments), but it's really just an additional element of the privacy problem. And the author was too busy telling a cute story to focus on non-insane potential avenues of abuse. TL;DR: Rhetoric matters, and the rhetoric of this article is unhelpful at best, and possibly harmful.