The Integrative Stream

Sun and Google

A quick comment on Sun and Google’s announcement that they’ll be cooperating to distribute OpenOffice, Java and Google Toolbar:

I don’t entirely get it. But not because it’s a small thing compared to what various folks were hoping for (although it is), but because it’s so unbalanced. Sun seems to get a lot more out of this than Google does. Bundling Google Toolbar with the Java runtime environment seems almost silly, and a little anti-consumer. After all, one reason I don’t have QuickTime on this computer is that I don’t like Apple’s insistence that I install iTunes at the same time. Still, a “Get Java” link on the Google home page would be a big deal for Sun.

The bottom line: I don’t think there’s actually very much going on here. Google, certainly, doesn’t seem to have gotten anything they didn’t have before.