> the President of the United States has no effect on the country
Thats not remotely analogous as the point is about the effects of the magical disappearance of google on humanity. Your analogy wouldnt be how the disappearance of a PotUS would not cripple the US, as that contradicts your view...which I have difficulty grasping.
My point is to not judge an entity's power by what would happen if they didn't exist, but what happens because they exist. Google doesn't act the way it does because there's a universal law dictating a Google-like entity must exist and must act that way. Google is made of people, and all of its actions can be traced to one or more of the people in Google.
The sudden disappearance of the POTUS is backstopped immediately by the existence of a Vice President.
The sudden disappearance of Gmail would be significantly more catastrophic to communication online (though it would certainly be sorted out in a short amount of time as people sneaker-netted new communication addresses out and re-established the broken lines of communication).
Thats not remotely analogous as the point is about the effects of the magical disappearance of google on humanity. Your analogy wouldnt be how the disappearance of a PotUS would not cripple the US, as that contradicts your view...which I have difficulty grasping.