Where openness is most important
"In the areas where openness is most important - its ad system and its data-retention policies that feed its ad system - Google is preternaturally proprietary."
With all due respect, Google's ad system is NOT where openness is most important. Where openness is MOST important is Google Health -- how they "protect" that information, who has access to it, what measures are in place to verify the authenticity of people who are allowed to access it, who can change it, how it can be changed, etc. That's much more important that anything ad-related. Personally, I'd love to know how Google can get away with storing people's medical records without complying with federal regulations governing the storage of those records (HIPAA for US citizens).
Having said that, I do agree with the rest of the article. Google's general lack of openness is even more concerning when they start linking all of their different projects (linking your Gmail, Docs, searches, etc). It's an advertisers dream come true.