darkyl - 12:09 am on Mar 16, 2010 (gmt 0)

Or else what?

Farmboy,
yes, publishers, unless they're really big ones, don't have much negotiation power with Google. Also Google has more than 90% of the online advertising market in many countries.
That's often called a dominant position.
And when a dominant position comes with a particularly unbalanced contract it gets the attention of antitrust authorities (more in the EU than US I think).

I'm not saying Google is evil or is doing anything particularly evil, but many may see its domination in the market and lack of transparency as something that may harm the market itsself.