GOOGLE EARTH

Can anything stop Google? Ask Jeeves that question, and you might be directed to Google itself, which is probably the correct answer. The ostensible search firm has its finger in more pies than Kirstie Alley these days, but it remains to be seen just how much the company can truly digest. In addition to its quiet construction of a vast optical network and its launching of wireless broadband, its tentacles are touching everything from books to real estate to cars. Even Wal-Mart now sees Google as a potential threat, if the latter is able to point customers to better bargains from competing retailers. When you're competing against Microsoft, Yahoo, Verizon, Wal-Mart, Craigslist, Random House and the New York Times (among others), you're probably stretching yourself too thin. Google has been lauded for its self-insinuation into the dictionary as a common verb. But what does it mean? Roughly speaking, “Googling” someone once meant looking up a long-lost high school pal. Before long, it may mean not only looking up those former classmates but also speaking directly with them and saying, “Hey, I went to high school with you. Look up and wave! I'm watching you from space!” The ambitions of Google's founders are known to extend beyond money-making to world-changing. History is full of such Napoleons, whose appetites far outpace their armies. Before they start taking their map brand, “Google Earth,” too literally, the firm's founders may want to Google the names Icarus and Daedalus.