I live in a rural area and have fairly limited options for broadband Internet and ISPs as well. Shortly after settling in with the local ISP they migrated their e-mail over to Google mail; they said had a "partnering" relationship with Google. Now every user of the ISP has their mail on Google rather then kept locally by the company contracted to provide ISP service. Now, if there are problems with e-mail, my ISP says I'll have to take it up with Google. Since Google views Gmail as a free service, there is nothing resembling customer service associated with it.
So my e-mail and no doubt that of many others is now in what appears to be the spreading tentacles of Google. I bet it's a tactic that Bill Gates wishes he had thought of first (maybe he did with MSN?)! For now Google with its "Don't be evil" motto seems benign (but so did Microsoft); besides, benevolent despotism is still despotism. Obviously the primary villain is my greedy ISP which is trying to offload the service so they can pocket the savings (maybe my ISP is going to surprise me with a rebate check at Xmas---yeah, sure). However, without Google enticing ISPs to "partner" with them, this wouldn't be happening.