Yeah I think in many cases its all a matter of perspective. You can look at any Google product, analyze it long enough and then understand how it will lead to a stronger advertising business model for them. On the other hand you can look at it and say that is potentially exciting technology for reasons that have nothing to do with advertising.
Probably most of the engineers at Google don't think of themselves as working in advertising and probably shouldn't but Id say almost indisputedly their paycheck is mostly coming from advertising and people clicking on mindless ads.
I think the main problem is how do you solve and build business around interesting problems that don't have the ability to be monetized through click advertising which most of the internet seems to be funded by.
Probably most of the engineers at Google don't think of themselves as working in advertising and probably shouldn't but Id say almost indisputedly their paycheck is mostly coming from advertising and people clicking on mindless ads.
I think the main problem is how do you solve and build business around interesting problems that don't have the ability to be monetized through click advertising which most of the internet seems to be funded by.