Speaking at the annual shareholder meeting on Thursday, Eric E. Schmidt, the chief executive, of Google stated that their business was organized around three ideas, “Search, ads and apps.”
The first two — search and ads — are well known to shareholders, and they account for virtually all of the company’s success. The third — apps — puts under one umbrella Google’s growing business of offering software. All three resided on the Web, rather than on users’ PCs, and were available wherever there is an Internet connection.
The programs include photo storage, social networking, online calendars, e-mail, instant messaging, word processing and spreadsheets. Most are free, and many compete with paid offerings from others. But Google has started charging businesses for some of them. “That is a business that looks like it is going to grow very nicely for us,” Mr. Schmidt said.
So where are books and bookselling?
