Google knowingly did what they did. You cannot transfer your liability just because your work is based on someones else. Google is 100% responsible here.

The funny thing is that Google is actively working against privacy settings in browsers so that they would have every means to track users. They use shady tricks that amount to hacking to circumvent browser security. And yet people think Google does no evil? Hilarious.

Yeah, he was fired. That really is adequate response for snooping in peoples emails, chat logs and search queries. And don't forget that he wasn't fired by Google before the news spread like wildfire. No, he continued working there. Google came under so much fire that they had to finally fire the guy. And still that isn't enough for such abuse, in my opinion. But of course it's just normal stuff at Google.

All of these cases are extremely evil by nature. In several of these cases they have without shame weaseled their way out of trouble by by settling for fines (read: bribes). Hell, Google is the holder of largest fine ever sanctioned to any US company - $500 million for knowingly accepting and showing dangerous rogue pharma ads on their sites and search engine.

Google is just as evil as the companies you named. Even more so, actually. Sadly, you are victim of their marketing on these issues. Google is extremely good at marketing - after all, they are the worlds largest advertising house. They try to maintain a white image of themselves with everything because they need that with all the privacy violations.

Personally, I rather not use any of Google's products because they have time and time again shown that they cannot be trusted and they just try to violate your privacy. This is not even an issue of rogue Google admins like David Barksdale who like to snoop on teens private chat logs, emails and searches, it is a company wide policy and how their business works. I would never use Google Docs for business as that means housing my private company data on Google. Microsoft's Office is far better for that. At least I know that Microsoft gets their money when I buy their software and has no reason to snoop on my data after that. Likewise, I would never trust Google for my private personal communication. If you don't care about your privacy, you are free to use Google. I just must say that it may come hunt you later.

So how much do you pay to access Google? This is worse here. They are charging you to access API, but not charging to access in non-programming way. I think it clearly shows that Google thinks APIs should be chargeable.

Regarding Oracle and Java, they also have costs to keep the language evolving and working. It is not free. If you don't want to play by the rules, then don't use Java. I cannot see why Oracle shouldn't be allowed to charge for Java, especially when Google is doing so too.

The ironic thing here is that Google has themselves copyrighted many of their APIs and only give access to them if you pay them. For example, Google Search API.

Open source does not mean it's not copyrightable. In fact, GPL is by definition a restrictive copyright license too. Open source, by definition, just means that - you get the source. It doesn't give you any more rights.

And Miskaata is right. Google has been abusing tons of laws and people in their road to glory. They have finally coming under review and sanctions for it. Not just in the US, but around the world, including Europe, Australia, South Korea and tons of other countries.