Wendy Davis over at Mediapost blogs about hearing Wired magazine editor Chris Anderson speak at an event today. She writes....

"Your brand is what Google says your brand is, not what you say your brand is," Anderson told staff at Universal McCann this morning in a discussion about his book, The Long Tail: Why the Future of Business Is Selling Less of More.

Ok, that's just silly to suggest that Google defines your brand. Your product/service defines your brand, bottom line. It's either a good product/service, or it's not.
The experience your customer has with it is your brand. Perception, well, that's another matter.
I define perception as a part of marketing, not brand. In other words, I believe you cannot fully make a judgment on a brand until you experience it first-hand. Everything up until that moment of experience is marketing/perception.
Yes, Google can help determine perception by dissemination of negative reviews and commentary about your brand. But you know what? If your product was as good as it could be, the risk for extreme exposure to negative reviews is limited, and you can hardly blame the messenger (Google) eh?

This development, he says, has given rise to "the tyranny of the customer," which can lead to some "really unfair" results, as one dissatisfied consumer can cancel out decades of accumulated goodwill.

So as you can guess, I don't buy the "tyranny of the customer" and the relation to Google as an "really unfair" results tool, do you? Make me believe!