What would you think if you were contacted at work, instructed to meet someone at a hotel, and then escorted to a private room along with a handful of other members of the press?  Sounds a little shady, doesn't it?  Who would you guess was in that hotel room?  A government official about to blow the whistle on a cover-up?  An international spy with the scoop on a combative countries next move?  Maybe even Elvis… announcing that he was about to re-enter the building and start a comeback tour?

Or it could just be Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page along with YouTube co-founder Chad Hurley.

While not quite as exciting as government whistle-blowers or The King of Rock come back from the dead, Brin, Page, and Hurley did create a "quasi-clandestine" atmosphere when they invited, among others, Hannah Clark of Forbes.com to a small meeting in a hotel room to talk about China, newspapers, and YouTube.

China

First on the agenda was a response to the criticism still be hurled toward Google over it's deal with the Chinese government to filter results to people inside the communist country.  When it comes to China, Clark says Brin and Page were divided.  Brin, having lived in the Soviet Union and experienced oppression first-hand, said he was initially against the filtering of results to people in China.  He said the deal created a "net negative" for the company.  But when he spoke to the Chinese people, they changed his mind.

Brin and Page both agreed that any information - even information being filtered by the government - was better than nothing.  And when one journalist in the room questioned the ability of a company the size of Google to remain "warm and fuzzy", the company co-founders responded with comparisons to their business and Microsoft.  They played up the idea of being fair with revenues and open with partners.

Newspapers

Clark said this was the only time that the two Google leaders disagreed.  While Page said that it would be a long time before digital news replaced the paper variety, Brin, with a look of surprise, responded "you do?" and asked just how long Page thought it would take.  Page then went on to talk up the benefits of paper.  Keep in mind, Google is working on a newspaper advertising system.

I think this represents a little more than a simple disagreement.  I think Google is working to take out their newspaper partners.  Maybe that's why Brin was so surprised by Page's comments.  If you and a friend were working on a way to destroy all of the world's green paint, and you later heard that friend talk about how much he loved green paint, it might be a bit confusing.  This kind of rhetoric got Microsoft into some trouble some years back.

Apparently Page is smart enough to keep those kind of comments to himself.  Brin obviously isn't.

YouTube

Clark was able to get the last question of the group in.  She asked about YouTube and if the company had any plans on how or when the $1.65 billion video website would make money.  Brin fielded the question to Chad Hurley who simply responded:  "We're already making money."

Not-so subtle side-step there, Hurley.