With regard to why it wasn't confined to Google etc, I'm under the impression that a lot of it is just fear of media coverage. If you have very progressive activists in the large media companies (or have the large media companies often cover/follow the activists), you'll automatically get corporations wanting to insure themselves against attacks.
I do believe that it sorts itself out in the long run, as more and more consumers will drop activist media products and they lose their relevance (who's afraid of having a hit piece about their multinational corporation published in a local school paper vs the New York Times).
I do believe that it sorts itself out in the long run, as more and more consumers will drop activist media products and they lose their relevance (who's afraid of having a hit piece about their multinational corporation published in a local school paper vs the New York Times).