Google 
Blogs
In an article entitled How
Weblogs Influence A Billion Google Searches A Week John Hiler describes
the revolutionary effect that blog content exerts on google searches. This
article is well worth reading and digesting because it does explain the influence
that weblog content can have on google; an influence still felt today . Bloggers
have not been above manipulating this influence using a technique called "Google
Bombing" described in another article by John Hiler, Google
Time Bomb.
Google has it's own weblog, called unsurprisingly, Google Weblog which is full of the latest google news including "Froogle Redesign", Targeted Ads (apparently "the online edition of The New York Post ran an article last month about a murder in which the victim's body parts were packed in a suitcase, and Google served up an ad for a luggage dealer."), and Does Google Hate Itself? among others.
Not everyone appreciates the virtual monopoly that Google possesses in the web search engine market. Andrew Orlowski writing for UK online journal The Register (motto: Biting the hand that feeds IT) in March of 2003 (note the UK dates are day/month/year) claimed that Google had indulged in some Orwellian machinations. In his article "Anti-war slogan coined, repurposed and Googlewashed... in 42 days" Orlowski discusses how a small group of A-list bloggers can quickly redefine terms in the eyes of Google, in the course of which he coins the term "googlewash". Moreover, the scandal does not stop there. A week later in Google washes whiter he claims that
"Google has made its own statement on the 'Googlewash': by making The Register story that coined the phrase disappear from its search results."
Hysteria or genuine concern? You decide. "Googlewash" currently (as of Sept 2003) returns the above Register articles but one has to question the reported collusion with the People's Republic of China to block access to Google for mainland users.