And you're forgetting that most (successful) companies like to have more than one revenue stream. Advertising is one stream; direct sales of content could be another. There may be good reasons for a company to ignore direct sales of content (e.g., because the user base is getting more and more pissed off at the very thought), but altruism sure ain't one of them.

This annoys me: The legal balance that needs to be struck, he says, is that "a bad Google ranking can be the kiss of death for an online business. . . ."

First of all, any online business worth its salt shouldn't be relying on page rankings by Google, but should be buying ads from Google. Second, and much more importantly, Google doesn't owe these online businesses anything. Just because you hang a digital shingle out doesnt entitle you to success. If you enter a crowded niche or design a crappy site or otherwise piss off Google's bots, you deserve to fail.

Just like you would fail if you opened up the hundredth newspaper stand on your block with nothing to distinguish yourself, or never swept your store out, or forgot to advertise.

There's a huge sense of entitlement in this country, and its largely undeserved. It's far too easy to blame Google than to blame your own lousy business model.