Paul McFedries, proprietor of the website www.wordspy.com which defines new words coming into the language, listed the verb, "to google." Rose Hagan, trademark counsel for "Google," asked McFedries to delete the word and implied that McFedries was violating the "Google" trademark.
He was able to satisfy the counsel by adding a note to his definition that "Google' and its forms were © by "Google."
(Remember the old days, when Kodak was happy to have "Kodak" used for all cameras, etc.?)

Word Spy is interesting and amusing to anyone who likes words: Word Spy
To go directly to the definition of "to google": google

Words recently defined in Word Spy include hand-me-up, studentification, militainment and unilateral (an independent journalist).

The article was carried in the Calgary Herald, Apr. 28, 2003, e-Business section, under the title "King of the Web? ...or cybermeanie, by Christopher Shulgan, Canwest News Service. I could not find the article on the Calgary Herald website.