Google is hitting the headlines with its activities in China. They say they wont be shackled and are complaining about someone (The Chinese government) hacking into email accounts. But why now? Google bent over backwards and took a lot of flack when they launched in China, back in 2006, with a censored version of their search engine. But they felt it was worth it for a slice of the $1 Billion market. So why are they kicking up a fuss now? Could it be anything to do with the fact that they are struggling there? They only have about 30% of the market and are shadowed by a Chinese service: Baidu, which has over 60%. So what is the big idea here? I think that it could be a face saving way to withdraw from a market where they are not winning and don't feel they can win. It gives a solid and ethical reason to close down a failing operation and if anything improve their image for making very corporate decisions. Can the mighty Google afford to be seen as a second rate solution in any market? It might be that it is worth more to them to be seen as the best and not in that market for ethical reasons.
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