It often seems that beginning advertising is not the first step on a slipperly slope. Not having a plan to avoid advertising is the first slipperly step.

This is due to having so many examples that not having advertising is the first step to having advertising, and that having advertising will be optimized for profit, and frustrate users.

They even used to say ads were a bad idea [0].

[0] https://indieresearch.net/2014/03/30/advertising-and-mixed-m...

(In)famously, Google's motto used to be "Don't be evil"

Scary to think about, if moving away from "Don't be evil" is the precedent for an "AGI company"

Came here to mention this.

> Ads are always separate and clearly labeled.

Indeed. Let's look at Google's launch of Adwords in October 2000:

> Google’s quick-loading AdWords text ads appear to the right of the Google search results and are highlighted as sponsored links, clearly separate from the search results.

https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2000/10/google-launches-sel...

Things evolved from there, and that's likely here, as well, I think.

Google is googley. Very different than any other company ever. You can trust us. With Search results. Your private emails. Your private documents. Remember our motto, do no evil. We will never change.

To be fair the open with a big lie about how useful agents and AI in general are, which helps to set the tone for what comes next. Part of me wonders if it’s intentional, a way to weed out the non-marks before getting to the punchline that they’re rolling out the most predictable attempt at monetizing ever.

I mean, Google Ads are still clearly separated and are labeled as such (there's even a "hide sponsored results" button. Not sure why people even click on the ads when the actual result is right below but that's not usually me.