Is Google (and other SE’s) hindering natural technological growth?
I think websites would have looked somewhat different today if Search Engines and specifically SEO never existed. Keep in mind that the majority of websites today are built with SEO in mind and Search Engines pretty much dictates what we as web developers can and can’t do – do the wrong thing or use the wrong technology and your website will just not rank well, period!
I’m using 2 technologies to illustrate my point, Flash and Javascript/Ajax. We’ve been able to create really rich, interactive, mind-blowing websites for the last decade using these technologies, but the acceptance has been very slow due to the fact that these types of websites are not indexed very well on search engines, hence “we” prefer to use lesser technologies merely for the sake of getting websites to rank.
How far would Flash and Javascript have evolved over the last decade if there was no dictation from Search Engines, and what would the Web have looked like today?
You hit the spot here, but then the other side of the coin is what good is a website without traffic. If the technology does not prove to enhance marketing and SE visibility then its no good to anyone.