Google Making Major Moves in the Content Space

Article first published as Google Making Major Moves in the Content Space on Technorati.

While partaking in a daily allowance of Internet broadcasting the other day there was news of some apparently notable maneuvers by Google.

The rumored acquisition of Kevin Rose of Digg and Revision 3 fame  by Google last week was confirmed Sunday with he and his staff at the recently idled Mi.lk (creator of the Oink app) being hired for an as of yet undisclosed project. 

Close on the heels of that development was news of the imminent launch of a new premium channel on You Tube called Geek & Sundry aggregating popular web content from  personalities like Felicia Day (The Guild)  Wil Wheaton (Star Trek, The Guild), Veronica Belmont & Tom Merritt (Sword & Laser, TWIT), 

Speculation abounds that these moves signal Google's intention to improve their stagnated social networking destination, Google + and become a dominant provider of popular Web produced content much like Rose's Revision3 but on a grander scale. 

Google's recent acquisitions and development of You Tube channels may pose a threat to smaller content providers if successful.   Some pundits such as Leo Laporte have gone as far as to suggest  Google may aspire to the role of a content gatekeeper not unlike traditional television networks.  The dual role of Google as both content provider and de-facto search engine of record does beg the question of whether the company can remain unbiased in both roles.