clipped from: www.readwriteweb.com 
We lead off with a somewhat predictable choice for Best Bigco of 2006. In the poll we ran to ask which Internet bigco most impressed you, 53% of respondents voted for Google. Despite this, for a while we were tempted to pick Amazon (which was second in our poll with 14% of the vote), due to its outstanding innovation. But when it came down to it, Google's influence and impact throughout 2006 has been second to none - so Google once again gets the Read/WriteWeb Bigco of the Year honor (it was also the first recipient, in 2004).
In terms of what Google released in 2006, there was a lot of it! Some were products of real promise: e.g. Google Base, Google Docs & Spreadsheets, a much improved Google Reader. But also there were some relative clunkers: e.g. Google Video didn't live up to the hype, 'Google Apps for your Domain' was clumsily named and marketed, their Personalized Homepage lacked oomph (although there are no lack of gadgets for it). In terms of new products, Google's 2006 effort will be remembered most for their canny acquisitions: not only the big one, YouTube, but also their Web Office purchases Writely and JotSpot.