https://www.theverge.com/2018/5/9/17334632/google-io-2018-personal-assistant

Every company in Silicon Valley will tell you, with operatic grandeur, that it aims to change the world and make it a better place. But set aside the pretenders trying to sell you $400 juicers, Google happens to be a company that can actually alter the way we, as a global society, interact with and understand one another. Google has control over the world’s dominant search engine, web browser, video and email platforms, mapping service, and mobile operating system. The decisions made by this company have far-reaching effects, and Google I/O 2018 presented a vision of the future that makes Google even more personal, influential, and essential in our daily lives.

One of Google’s promotional videos during the event concluded with the tagline “just make Google do it.” As with the very name of the Google Assistant it was advertising, this promo positions Google’s services as your servants, the Alfred to your Batman, as it were. But I feel like this deliberately benign portrayal masks a huge number of proactive decisions that Google makes every day on our behalf, and it’s useful to revisit those in light of the latest announcements from the company.