I think it's difficult for a company not to be "evil" once they grow to the size of Google. A company of that size has to please too many stakeholders. I think Craigslist is the perfect model of how a company can avoid being evil -- stay small.

On the subject of morality, I suggest Bernard Gert's "Common Morality: Deciding What to Do."

http://www.amazon.com/Common-Morality-Deciding-What-Do/dp/0195314212/

Paul, originally I heard "do no evil" as the motto, then after a bit it altered into the current "don't be evil". Was it ever the former or was that just Chinese whispers at the time? Personally, I prefer it.

No, it was never "do no evil" -- it just got misquoted a lot.

Could someone tell me why Google allowed advertising by essay writing companies for such a long time? What happened to "Don't be evil"?

Your evil might not be Larry and Serge's evil.

For a company that values merit, it seems strange that it would help students to cheat.

If you're into educational theory, you might like Alfie Kohn's book No Contest: The Case Against Competition. It's a really good look at the systemic effects of competition. It touches on cheating among other things.

It's funny, these days I find myself mostly reading counter-intuitive stuff. I figure if it's intuitive, I'm probably smart enough to have figured it out already. This book (and his other book, Punished by Rewards) is a really good example of something that just diffs with your current knowledge.

Well, could you give an example of an evil product that's being sold right now, that was known to be evil from the start?

_If you honestly believe that kids are well served by drinking a dozen spoonfuls of sugar every morning before school_

Nope. Nor pron. Nor warez.