Why do people think Google is a great software company?

Even more importantly, why does Google think so? Paul Thurrot's detailed review of the new Google Pack shows that it is just a random collection of applications that anyone could download individually from the Web. (Via Dan Farber) Even worse, many of them are older than the versions currently available online. What I can't figure out is why anyone would be surprised by this. Other than search and their ad system, has Google ever done anything amazing with software? Yes, it is very cool the way you can drag Google Maps around on the screen, but we all know now that this is a simple bit of Ajax programming that anyone could implement. I've tried most of Google's eternally beta offerings and have yet to be impressed. In some cases, most prominently GoogleBase, I'm actually furious at the lost opportunity. Are they great at making software because of their current stock price and resulting market cap? In that case, there are plenty of now moribund Internet companies that were once equally brilliant. I still use Google for search, but that is largely out of habit, since I know from tracking my own blog's findability that Google is way behind many other search engines. I've already written about Google's bad case of the God Complex, and the Google Pack is just another example. Do they really think anyone is going to be impressed by this offering, or do they think that we are all so stupid in relation to their obvious genius that we wouldn't notice how lame it is? I've seen this so many times with software companies. How can you tell a company that is doing better than anyone ever imagined that they are f***ing up? You can't. You just wait until it catches up with them, as it always does. Is it fair for me to keep bashing Google like this? As long as the computer industry and the press continue to describe Google as the leading software company in the world, it is not only fair, it is my job.