Google's Cultural Phenomenon

Over the years, Google has become an increasingly prevalent entity in our lives and even permitted culture.  I use it almost daily for a search engine, I have a Gmail account, I spend hours on Youtube, and I have even used it as a translator on occasion in language classes. Because of its prevalence, I had a bit of a hard time even pinning down how often I use google or its other applications, and I know that I am only one in a million of its frequent users.  This considered, what kind of a hold does Google have on the Internet and on our society?  

To answer this, lets just look at the use of the word "Google".  You never hear someone say "Let me yahoo that for you" or "Let me bing that for you".  You would get many weird looks if you did.  It is an effortlessly common phrase that you "google something".  When grammatically, it should be, "let me look that up on Google.  Google has jumped in meaning of this sentence.  Instead of referring to itself as the noun that it is, Google has become a common verb and no one will be questioned for doing so.

Further more, Google is not only the most used search engine on the Internet, it is expected to be the most used search engine on the Internet.  I said earlier that you may get strange reaction to using other search engines.  I can think of one example where another engine was used, and it did have a funny reaction with people.  In The Amazing Spider-Man in 2012, there are a few scenes where the main character, Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield), is seen using Bing.  I remember taking quick notice of that when I saw the movie and thinking it was weird.  A quick search (on Google) and you will find I was not the only one.  Looking up "spiderman uses bing" yielded many results of people not only thinking that using Bing was weird, but that it was down right unbelievable!

This proves that people are not only willing but only allowing Google to have this kind of prevalence and the thing is that it is expected of Google to do so.  And anyone be damned if they go elsewhere.