It's both. It's still a search engine and it still provides good results. Personally I find their results to be better than the other engines for most things, but I still use other search engines as well.

But Google is a business and so yes, you have to add that into your thinking about them. For example they do not want to see their search results manipulate and so take an active stance against spam. Sometimes I think they go too far in their reaction. They've shown a willingness to throw the baby out with the bathwater so to speak. They'll let a few innocent sites suffer it means less spam. I'd rather let a few spam sites in to protect the innocent.

I think you can still trust it as a search engine, but you should also see Google for what it really is, a business. And as a business they're going to make decisions in their own self interest as would any of us. Most of the time their self interest won't harm yours, but sometimes the two will be opposed.