Will Google Survive?

[Brittany]

Back in the ‘90s, when the Internet was a new and virtually (pun-intended) unexplored frontier, four names dominated the world of search: Yahoo, Intomi, Excite, and AltaVista.

That was then. This is now.

So far, the reigning search engine champion of the new millennium is Google, which accounts for over 75 percent of all searches today and at times seems almost invincible… Almost.

The March 2004 issue of Technology Review questions whether Google, which the American Dialect Society dubbed the most useful word of 2002, will be able to survive despite a horizon that is being slowly clouded by hype surrounding the possibility of an impending IPO.

Nothing lasts forever, and there’s no question that Google’s days at the top are numbered, but the Technology Review is trying to estimate what will bring the downfall of the great Google...

The issue hits newsstands February 24th. In the meantime, what do you think?

[primelibra]

i think this is the time when all internet users should think that we need on more search engine which should be operated by public.

like dmoz.org directory. but we need search engine also.

[sonnie]

Originally Posted by Brittany

Nothing lasts forever, and there’s no question that Google’s days at the top are numbered, but the Technology Review is trying to estimate what will bring the downfall of the great Google...

I could only imagine that the downfall of Google will be at the hands of users (searchers) frustrated by not being able to find what they want. Many today are still new (3-5 years) to the internet, and don't know anything but "Google". I could imagine that if one of the "old guys", that is the original search engines we all used and depended on, actually would make a television commercial "Come back to Inktomi or AltaVista (my favorite for a long time) for all your search engine needs", things might change. Wishful thinking.

[minstrel]

Google has made mostly very good decisions since their inception, avoiding some of the mistakes made by people like Yahoo in the past. So, unless they totally lose their minds, I don't think they will be superseded as a result of something they do, but rather by someone who comes up with a better idea - the same way they themselves burst on the scene with a new idea when everyone else was still pushing variations on the same old tired ideas.

I have no idea what that startling new idea will be but I'm confident that there will be one sooner or later...

[citypublife]

Brittany Wrote

Nothing lasts forever, and there’s no question that Google’s days at the top are numbered, but the Technology Review is trying to estimate what will bring the downfall of the great Google...

My opinion is that their own business model will bring about their downfall if their not careful. Here’s why…

The simplest of business model would be in the shape of a triangle Whereby, each side is represented by 3 units, - product and/or service – people - advertising and/or promotion - with the length of each side representing the weight of importance the company places on that unit. E.g. with the company placing equal importance on each of the 3 units the triangle would be equilateral. (all sides of equal length). Placing more importance on say advertising and/or promotion than the other 2 would give you an isosceles triangle (1 side of different length and 2 sides equal). Placing different importance to each unit would produce a scalene triangle. (all sides different length).

Based on my own personal experience and observations of Google, I believe their model has changed from equilateral to scalene, with the longest length side being advertising and/or promotion. Second longest people and the shortest side representing product/service. My evidence:-

• Product and/or Service – not withstanding Minstrels defence of Google being an “ongoing process.” Many people on this board have been incensed, not only by being dropped from the top pages but by the new and irrelevant results they have been replaced with. Minstrel, and others will say that Google are testing their algorithm, which is probably the case, but it seems that Google are missing a crucial stage in the process, that which is Alpha testing. (Testing the results internally as opposed to Beta, testing externally). This causes website owners distress when their site is dropped and searchers frustration when they find irrelevant results.
  
  If you were paying for a product or service e.g. Adwords, Adsense, would you not expect a company’s customer service department to be courteous and quick to respond to any queries? Would you not expect to talk to a human being on the phone? Not so with Google. If you write to them and are lucky enough to get a response, it normally takes a week or three.
  
  People:- I respect the right of Google to keep its so called Algorithm secret, however, I do not respect them for their deception when it comes to Adwords and Adsense. I have never been given a straight answer to why hits on Adwords are not recorded for up to 4 hrs. Why I am paid in $ from Adsense and am required to pay in £ sterling for Adwords, although I’m sure this will change for their benefit when the $ recovers. Is it any wonder why some of us believe that so called Florida, Brandy and whatever are just a ploy for IPO.
  
  Advertising and Promotion:- This is of course the longest line of the scalene triangle, you very rarely see a website without something about Google and they have done a great job here.
  
  Conclusion: - Product and Service are getting worse and my trust in them has gone. Their respect for us, the people that helped build their database, is non-existent and the philosophy of “Success at the service of others and not at the expense of others,” is not in their dictionary anymore. They have forgot the basics of business and should look again at their business model.

Minstrel, I mention you, not to criticize, as I find you the most helpful person I know and read all of your posts, of which most I agree with. I happen to just not agree with you on your defense of Google.

www.citypublife.co.uk

[Mel]

Most companies experience growing pains.

Google is arguably the most scruntinized and talked about search engine in history, but their tenacity of purpose has been remarkable, and while IMO they messed up BIG TIME with Florida, they are doing a pretty good job of disaster managment.

I believe that Google will continue to be an important search engine, but perhaps not the dominant search engine as their search share is eaten away by competitors and improved technology.

Within 60 days we may see an overnight reduction of their search share by 35% (when Yahoo drops them) and within a year we may see another well funded search engine from MSN trying to take more market share.

I do not see the supposed IPO as a threat to their technology or to thier technical management style and capability. I believe their management will not sell off the majority share to third parties, who might conduct a fire sale and run or who might initiate significant changes in the way they run the company.

It is not well appreciated that Google have diversifed into other areas besides pure search and it may be that the IPO is more geared to diversification than to a shakeup in the search department.

Bottom line - next year at this time at least three signifiant search engines, with Google hanging in there and introducing more and more refinements to their search in a bid to maintain dominance.

IMO this is all to the good.

[janeth]

As Mel pointed out loosing 35% at one time has got to hurt.

I think there still be #1 at the end of this year but not by much.

[Dave Hawley]

I cannot see Google toppling until another SE out there truly deep crawls the web for free, just like Google. It *astounds* me that this has not yet been done. ATW might come close, but on my site it only eats 10% of my site pages. Google had 10,000 of my pages, many generated from from forum. For myself (and I guess everybody) to have the same amount of pages in another popular SE I would be looking at BIG $$$ ($30,000 per annum)!

[xmx]

Google is now entering the stock markets to take the money.

Let's hope this won't make them change their approach and see them become a new verisign (recently voted the internet villain of the year 2003).

Is always possible a newcomer becomes the favourite of the searchers, in fact this already happened in the past.

Maybe this is one of the most important characteristics of the net, you can never know what you will find next and what will become a super success, and... you want to have always new nice surprises!
Unfortunately there are also the bad ones, as too much spam and too much scam, also arriving via search engines and worldwide known online services.

XMX

[minstrel]

Originally Posted by xmx

Google is now entering the stock markets to take the money.

Actually, in recent interviews Google representatives have said, first, that "an IPO isn't a priority", and later that they're "not even thinking about an IPO". There have been rumors about this for months - perhaps it was true at one point and it has now been delayed indefinitely dure to market conditions, or perhaps it was always 95% speculation and 5% talk in the Google boardroom... who knows?

[simonm]

In deciding which Search Engine is going to take Googles mantle, we mustn't miss the point that it is not us that have the influence it is the end user of which there are millions. There might well be a serious competitor to Google spring up - which we all get to know and love - something with the perfect algorithm that delivers perfect results and re-crawls the web on a daily basis and has more and better facilities than Google.

Sadly, unless it has media presence it is irrelevant.

I get approached on a regular basis by portal sites and pseudo search engines that claim to be the next best thing, 1st thing I do is check to see if they have listed any of my pages, then check my stats to see if anybody has used that portal to find me - its invariably the big zero!

For example, search engine use for one of my sites: www.esglabs.co.uk, mostly b2b with eg 1st page position for such as "pharmaceutical analysis" on Google, AltaVista, MSN and Yahoo

This year so far google.com 37%; google.co.uk 19%; Yahoo.com 12%; MSN 9%; Ask 4%; Yahoo.co.uk 4%; Google CA 3% the rest are sub 1%.

Last year google.com 37%; google.co.uk 15%; Yahoo.com 14%; MSN 12%; Ask 4%; Yahoo.co.uk 4%; Google CA 3% the rest are sub 1%.

The only change is google getting bigger!

[Dave Hawley]

Google pretty much has most in its favour. It has a HUGE user base (and growing) it has a HUGE Database (also growing) and not one SE that can freely deep crawl the web like googlebot. It's SERP's are still the best around and it's easy to tell the paid listings from the non-paid.

Go google!

[mtbot]

Bill Gates talked about this briefly while on the Charlie Rose show last Friday. He really believes that MSN will be a strong Google competitor in the future, but did not give a timeline. He sayed that Microsoft's search engine will compete with Google in the same way that Internet Explorer competed with Netscape. (He seemed to temporarily forget the problem Microsoft had with Justice Department.)

He hinted that one advantage Microsoft has is that Windows can already search your local computer and intranet files for search terms. In the future, when you do a search, you will be able to search the Internet, your computer, and your network simutaneously.

[minstrel]

Originally Posted by mtbot

Bill Gates... hinted that one advantage Microsoft has is that Windows can already search your local computer and intranet files for search terms. In the future, when you do a search, you will be able to search the Internet, your computer, and your network simutaneously.

The future is now, sort of. In a limited way, that already happens - hit <F1> or click on help in Windows XP or several more recent Microsoft apps and you get a list of articles in the local help files as well as MS tech support or knowledge base articles on the net. It isn't hard to see how this could easily extend to access MSN search instead of just the MS Knowledge Base.

But you're right - if Microsoft tries to do this, you can be sure the howls of protest and litigation will be loud and long, unless they make it crystal clear that for searches beyond the help topic you have a choice of search engines.

[mtbot]

Originally Posted by minstrel

unless they make it crystal clear that for searches beyond the help topic you have a choice of search engines.

I wonder which search engine would be the default :)

I guess Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft are all hiring natural language processsing/artificial intelligence specialists by the dozen since the future of search, of course, is knowing what the user really wants and what the search results really mean, especially for question searches like "How many times does Google update backlinks internally per month?"

This reminds me of the joke in which President Johnson asks a mainframe computer "Is there a God?" The computer, after a few moments, replies: "Now there is."

[xmx]

I believed that entering the stock markets for google was almost done.

But we know these things can always change, I remember last year I read about a possible merger for google and microsoft too that never happened.

We will know more about it before than the google brain implants anyway...

[Dave Hawley]

Google has proven to be a very prudent long sighted business. They will float when it's of benefit to them and all their (to be) shareholders IMO

[citypublife]

BBC World Business News have just reported that Google will announce IPO next week.

http://www.citypublife.co.uk

[cbp]

http://www.webproworld.com/viewtopic.php?t=18293

CBP

[keywordguy]

Google will survive if they can get a handle on relevant results. For nearly all the customers I'm running reporting, there are still categories that show results with no relevance for simple phrases.

Additionally, Google still needs to clean up its database of search engine SPAM. It irks me to no end to find top listings that are loaded with latent search engine spamming techniques...not to mention poor or no relevancy to the searched phrase.

Whether we're talking about Google, Yahoo, or MSN the remainder of 2004 will be an interesting year for sure.