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Originally Posted by Garrett
The Many Eras of Yahoo! First of all, Yahoo was one of the earliest and best ways to find information and content on the web. Greg even went as far as to break Yahoo's history down into different eras:
Era One - Human editors provide Yahoo with a real personality. Eventually this becomes too expensive.
Era Two - Enter: Inktomi, Stage Left
Era Three - Hello, Google!
Era Four - Inktomi again.
Greg's point is that the relevance and power of the Yahoo search has changed throughout the different eras, but the Yahoo audience is loyal due to familiarity
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Loyal but not expanding? I also think the note in "Era One" is important for anyone looking for ways to improve cataloguing the web.
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Greg's take on AskJeeves was very interesting. He said, "AskJeeves reminds me of the Canadians. Canadians are very aware that they're not Americans while Americans aren't aware at all of the Canadians." ... What do you think he meant by this?
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LOL... I think he must have visited Canada at some point!
More seriously, I think he's correct but I'd make two obervations:
1. Who was aware of Google just before they burst on the scene? If you are developing a new product or service, or trying to remarket an old one, current awareness isn't necessarily an impediment as long as you can offer something unique - and the propogation of new ideas on the internet can occur very rapidly.
2. I agree with the characterization of Google as utilitarioan - it's like no-frills grocery shopping with quality. One of the problems with Ask Jeeves and Mamma.com is they have these cutesy logos that make it hard to take them seriously. You don't have to be staid and stodgy but you do have to look proefessional and cute cartoons aren't the branding I'd want if I owned either of those companies.