Google (GOOG) has been all over the news recently -- if it was the small acquisitions or the proposed net neutrality deal with Verizon (VZ). But perhaps more seriously are the different articles in the media about how the Web is changing and how that's going to affect the search engine giant.

The Web Is Dead. Long Live the Internet is the provocative title of a Wired article published Tuesday. Chris Anderson explains how we changed our habits from using the "wide-open Web to semiclosed platforms that use the Internet for transport but not the browser for display." Most importantly, he adds, "it's a world Google can't crawl."

Is it possible to run a business by giving away your stuff? It sounds counterintuitive. But hey, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) gives away much of its offerings, right? I'm actually using Google Docs to write this column, for example.

True, Google is perhaps an exception (it certainly helps to have a huge user base and brand name). But it is worth exploring the concept. In fact, there is an excellent book on the topic -- Free: The Future of a Radical Price-- which came out recently.

In Chris Anderson's new book Free: The Future of a Radical Price, he makes a compelling argument for why many products and services should be free (or, will inevitably become free). Of course, the driving force of this trend is Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), which has figured out how to generate billions from free offerings.

So, this is why it's puzzling that Google is thinking about building technologies to allow for the purchase of content. What's going on here? Well, it may be that Google realizes it needs to be more political in how it deals with much-needed constituencies, such as the newspaper industry.