The New York Times > Technology > So Google Is Almost Public. Now Comes the Hard Part.

The New York Times > Technology > So Google Is Almost Public. Now Comes the Hard Part. "If Google does finally succeed in raising billions of dollars through its initial stock offering, the next big challenge will be proving that its success is not an accident - that the company, operator of the world's dominant Web search engine, can survive from one technological generation to the next.
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Even while Google may try to offer technology-intensive services like a personal information storage system on the Internet, the heart of its long-term strategy centers on finding new ways to sell ads, said Eric Brewer, a University of California computer scientist who founded Inktomi, an early Internet search engine.
"Because Google arose after the Internet bubble, they were able to acquire a very strong technical team," Mr. Brewer said. "The irony is that they are really more of an advertising company than a search engine company today."

Includes a Flash-based pop-up slide show with John Markoff voice-over in which Markoff expresses more personal opinions about Google's likely trajectory -- interesting and innovative complement to the traditional article format. (I'd include a link, but it's a JavaScript pop-up window; see the "Multimedia audio slide show" link in the original article.)