Prohibit google?

The latest evidence of the steady progress that the word google is making into language is the fact that it has now been included in the Merriam-Webster, as a verb, with a lower case <g>. A student has pointed out to me that the Google company itself is not particularly happy with this development. The company is afraid that google may simply become another word for ‘search’ and lose its connection with the company (with the consequent loss of protection of the word as a trademark). But this is what is happening. And nobody, not even Google, can control language change. As a consequence, the leading dictionaries have started including the verb. The OED has included Google as a verb but, unlike Merriam-Webster, maintained the capitalisation. Australia’s Macquarie Dictionary has it both as a transitive and intransitive verb and as a noun (as in “I am going to have a google”).  Google are not the first company to worry. In the past, when xerox or hoover underwent the same development, the companies which thought the word belonged to them reacted like Google today.