Google and the M Word
July 20, 2008
I try to avoid the “m word”–monopoly. Jason Lee Miller at WebProNews.com, another Kentucky outfit, does a very good job exploring this point. His “What Percent Makes a Monopoly?” is a must read. You can access the full text here. The essay contains a wealth of data about market share. The most important point in the essay concerns the duopoly that exists with Google and Microsoft as the two duopolists. Mr. Miller says, “we know from experience with telcos and cable that the government doesn’t really mind those so much.” I agree.
The one point that warrants a comment is the notion of a barrier to entry. Online services have barriers that are difficult to quantify until you have to write checks. Google and Microsoft are building infrastructures that can support cloud services. The part that’s tough to grasp is the continuing investment in innovation necessary to keep these giant data Hummers in top form.
Stephen Arnold, July 20, 2008
Google and Mass Transit
July 20, 2008
I wrote about Google’s routing patent document in my KMWorld column several months ago. The patent application is US20060149461, and you can get a copy here. Tim Doulin (The Columbus Dispatch) wrote “COTA Riders Get Help from Google in Planning Trips.” (COTA is an acronym for Central Ohio Transit Authority.)
The idea is that a person wanting to ride a bus can navigate to the COTA home page and use Google’s technology to as a trip planner. “More than 50 transit agencies around the world,” writes Mr. Doulin, “offer it.” You can read Mr. Doulin’s well written essay here.
For me this is an important news item. The “transportation” invention is a deeper function than showing bus routes and pick up times. US20060149461 allows a transit authority to shift from published routes to floating routes. Riders, according to the invention, can send a request to Google, receive a pick up time and location, and make use of individual buses that follow dynamic routes.
Once Google achieves critical mass with its “plain vanilla” route service, the company may be pulled into a cloud based routing service. The benefits of the Google invention include reduced wait times, flexible routing around traffic jams, and reduced fuel consumption.
Google and mass transportation. I recall mentioning this function in a briefing last year and I was greeted with head shaking and snorts of disbelief. Might it not be time to start watching Google and learning about the company’s “search without search” methods. Could Google become a cloud based services provider in public transportation?
Google is an application platform, not an ad agency, dear readers.
Stephen Arnold, July 20, 2008
Google Learns about Ben Franklin’s Maxims
July 19, 2008
This is an opinion piece.
My 7th-grade teacher, Miss Soapes, was a Ben Franklin groupie. Of course, Mr. Franklin departed early life in 1790, and I was in the 7th-grade in 1957. To Ms. Soapes, Mr. Franklin was at hand. Her favorite Ben-ism was:
There are no gains without pains.
Google certainly understands the meaning of Mr. Franklin’s insight. After a decade of effort, Google has arrived at the summit of the Web search and online advertising mountain.
The Google brand is one of the most recognized in the world even though most people who use Google every day don’t know that the company’s name is a corruption of googol, a number that is equal to the digit one followed by 100 zeros.
Google accounts for about 70 percent of the Web searches in North America and even more in Denmark and Germany where Google enjoys an 80 percent or more share of the Web search traffic. Only China (www.baidu.com) and Russia (www.yandex.com) resist the charms of the GOOG.
In a miserable economy, Google’s second quarter revenue missed Wall Street’s estimate by a few pennies. Within moments, Google was a loser. I was shocked by the negative turn, but my surprise was nothing to shareholders who watch the Google share price drop below $490 in after hours trading right after the results came out. Financial success in today’s high-technology sector is rare indeed. But Wall Street wizards have come to expect stellar performance from the Mountain View, California, company.
The company has been somewhat less successful with its non-search and non-ad initiatives. But the lack of success is a function of comparing Google’s ad revenues with revenues from its other units. For example, in FY2007, Google reported less than $200 million in revenues from its much-watched enterprise search and services unit.
However, when I worked through Google’s financials and their less-than-helpful revenue breakouts, I identified revenue from Google geospatial services, Google’s educational sales, and fees paid by developers. After fooling with assumptions and a quite bout of spreadsheet fever, I estimated that Google’s non-search earnings that could be viewed as enterprise-centric could have been as much as $400 million. Compared to Google’s FY2007 revenue of $16.6 billion, the $400 million is larger than Autonomy (about $300 million), Endeca (about $110 million) and Fast Search & Transfer (about $70 million but subject to change) in the same 12 month period. The acquisition of Postini is likely bump these revenues upward in FY2008.
Corporate Social Networks: Might Be Losers
July 19, 2008
On July 17, 2008, ReadWriteWeb.com let the cat out of the bag. Marshall Kirkpatrick’s essay “Corporate Social Networks Are a Waste of Money, Study Finds”. Please, read the full post plus the useful linked stories embedded in the essay.
The source of this insight is Edward Moran, a brain-for-hire at Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, one of the remaining Big Eight largely untarnished by service scandals in the last few years. As a veteran of Booz, Allen & Hamilton, I am reluctant to embrace these types of studies without reading and studying them first hand. I am, therefore, not agreeing or disagreeing with the news media’s summary of the story or Mr. Kirkpatrick’s analysis.
I wanted to capture the most important point for me; to wit:
They [corporate social networks] are stupid.
Brilliantly summarized, Mr. Kirkpatrick.
I continue to be skeptical of social networks as a user. As a person who has worked in law enforcement and intelligence for short periods of time over the years, I think social networks are extremely useful. I don’t want to participate. I want to peruse the information about the topics, who reads what, who comments, on what, and other tasty info nuggets.
My view of social networks is probably not what the cheerleaders for social networks and collaborative systems had in mind for their products. That’s okay with me. Keep ’em coming. Pump up that usage. Every little clickstream helps.
Stephen Arnold, July 19, 2008
Search All Information: The Categorical Affirmative Is Alive and Well
July 18, 2008
I think I took a logic class in 1964 from Dr. William Brown, a Ph.D. with an encyclopedic knowledge of Will Rogers, the American humorist. Dr. Brown could whip out one liners to make a point. I watched as my classmate when he said, “Will Rogers said, ‘A man only learns in two ways, one by reading, and the other by association with smarter people.'” My classmate avoided categorical affirmatives and negatives for the remainder of the semester. I’m not sure if my classmate understood the quotation or if the attention Dr. Brown directed at my classmate drove the lesson home.
This morning my news reader presented me with this headline: “We Offer a Single Place to Search All Information”. I clicked the link and read an interview conducted by Ruth Samson for DQ Channels, a publication with which I was not familiar. Her interview subject was Sanjay Manchanda, Director, Business Division, Microsoft India. You must read the interview here.
The subject of the interview is Microsoft, Fast Search & Transfer, and assorted closely-aligned issues. Here’s my list of what caught my attention:
- Demand for SharePoint Search comes from “companies that have huge amounts of data and need to search quickly and constantly.” My notes to myself: What’s huge? SharePoint native search dies at 50 million documents, sooner if the documents are multi-megabyte jobs with SmartTags and other goodies stuffed inside the wrapper.
- Unique selling proposition: “we have built our search capabilities so deeply that it is seamless. We offer a single place to search information of different types. Our recent acquisition of FAST, a provider of enterprise search solutions, also gives us an edge over other players in the segment.” My notes to myself: No way. Search is a crazy quilt. Fast Search is not one thing. Powerset is older technology given a new coat of paint. Baloney. Seamless! Not true. The stitches are evident, far apart, and made with a nail, not a needle.
- Microsoft has 3,600 partners. My notes to myself: Hmm. Are these SharePoint partners or total Microsoft partners? 50 to 60 partners in India. Why the spread?
- Cost of SharePoint is variable. Starts low, then increases as the number of users goes up. My notes to myself: Ah, exactly like the IBM and Oracle models. Business model may not work in the present economic environment. Search server in India costs R20,000 or $470. Now that’s a deal with Fast Search targeting $150,000 in early 2007.
- Search is “the next killer app”. My notes to myself: Nope, search is disappointing, a utility function, and not what users want. If this Microsoft expert Sanjay Manchanda is right, Microsoft is chasing the wrong ambulance.
The interview struck me as a marketing effort. Not only was the “all” spurious, the idea that Microsoft search is “seamless” is not congruent with my experience. What’s seamless is loading a third party search system such as Isys Search Software and getting something that doesn’t take a platoon of Microsoft engineers scrambling around for days.
The interview has some one-liners that would make Will Rogers smile. Dr. Brown would still be fussing over the “all”. I am hung up on “seamless”. Quite an interview.
Stephen Arnold, July 18, 2008
Search and Text Analytics in New Fall Wardrobe
July 18, 2008
Clarabridge, according to CRM Today, has announced a new program for its business partners. You can read about the deal here. The most interesting portion of the announcement is the positioning that Clarabridge is adopting. I think of these fresh, clever ways to package search and text analytics as the fall collections of fashion houses. Clarabridge is described as “a leading provided of customer experience management solutions”. The acronym is CEM. In order to deliver better CEM, Clarabridge employs search and other technologies. If you want to know more about Clarabridge, click here. The headline on the Web site describes the company as one which delivers “customer experience intelligence”. I assume that the CEM and CEI are closely related. Clarabridge’s founder did a stint at MicroStrategy, a company that has an interesting track record in business intelligence.
Stephen Arnold, July 18, 2008
Google: Stepping on the Enterprise Search Gas Pedal
July 18, 2008
Richard Martin’s “Pressed by Rivals, Google Accelerates Enterprise Search Efforts” is a revelation. The story appeared on July 17, 2008, and you can read the full text here. (You may see an annoying fly over ad and then be redirected. The wacky url worked for me.)
In my opinion, The most interesting point in the scoop was:
Unifying a single search interface across those varied systems, which often use different protocols and programming languages, has become something of a holy grail.
The religious metaphor is lost on me, but I think Mr. Martin’s point is that search is supposed to make it possible to access data, regardless of its location or format, from one interface.
I agree.
My view is that this is not a search problem and, therefore, the GOOG, Microsoft, and the companies mentioned in the article will not solve this problem with search technology.
The challenge is transformation of data in such a way that new operations are possible. Who wants to search? I want to know where a particular item comes from and how certain I can be that the item is accurate or good enough to use in a decision.
In my opinion, talking about enterprise search is a waste of time. Google is definitely going to deliver, but the solution will not be a search technology. The problem is better resolved in terms of data management. Google has some interesting technology in this practice area, and I discuss it in my new study Beyond Search, published by the Gilbane Group.
Stephen Arnold
Explicit User Input: The Future of Web Search
July 17, 2008
TechCrunch has an intriguing Web log post called “Is This the Future of Search?” After scanning the text, watching the video, you will want to read the comments to this post. I find it difficult to summarize multi-media Web log posts. My take is that Google is showing some users a Digg-like interface; that is, a user can provide input with a click about the value of a result, add a link, and with little effort on Google’s part, provide a full complement of user input functions. With the acquisition of JotSpot, Google can out Digg Digg with a user creating in the midst of a query or other Google action a “new” Web page. I provided raw material for an Outsell analysis last year, and few took notice of Google’s ability to morph into a publisher. Digg-like features are a fraction of Google’s content acquisition and creation capabilities. Traditional publishers, are you tracking Google as a digital William Randolph Hearst?
Among the more than 100 comments is one that I think centers of what is going on. Ben writes:
Ouch. I’m betting Kevin Rose is wishing he cashed up when he had one of those many opportunities.
I’d be a little worried if I were Mr Calacanis also.
Based on my research, my view of these Digg-like features are a bit like a double-edged sword equipped with those nifty barbs and hooks like this:
Source: http://www.myarmoury.com/talk/viewtopic.php?t=9497
Here’s how I interpret Google’s Digg-iness:
- Google wants to brandish a threatening weapon without actually striking anyone. This is digital saber rattling. Google shows strength, maybe intimidates or causes a competitor to think about selling or partnering with Google
- The GOOG is pushing the tip of the sword into the flesh of a opponent, forcing the opponent to get out of the way. If the opponent does not move the way the Google Jedi wants, a quick thrust and twist ends the opponent’s life. Death comes but it is painful.
- Googzilla is taking practice swings in order to use the cutting edge of its technology to hack its way through the social search opponents. Limbs and other digital body parts will be summarily removed as Googzilla stomps forward swinging the deadly blade.
I think the Digg-iness of Google is designed to position Google to buy one or more entities, force one or more entities to become partners in the manner of Nokia-Symbian’s sudden love affair with the GOOG, or outright war.
Stephen Arnold. July 17, 2008
Symbian: Simpatico toward Google
July 17, 2008
Symbian [http://www.symbian.com/] makes open source operating systems for mobile phones and has been building reference designs for telecommunications companies for years. Nokia, its major stakeholder, recently announced that it’s going to buy the rest of Symbian’s shares and turn it over in its entirety to the Symbian Foundation, a new group backed by several mobile phone companies that have pooled their knowledge and resources to create one big, happy, open-source, royalty-free, customizable Symbian platform.
Enter the Googlemeister. It’s about to launch a new product: Android [http://code.google.com/android/]. Android is (drum roll) “the first complete, open, and free mobile platform” and was developed by a group of more than 30 technology and mobile companies.
Symbian’s CEO said in a July 16 article here [http://news.yahoo.com/s/pcworld/20080716/tc_pcworld/148477] that the company has a good relationship with Google and cooperation between the two companies is possible. But he also defends Symbian and basically questions why Google is pitching Android as if Symbian didn’t exist.
Perhaps Symbian sees the hammer about to fall.
Google has grown far beyond just being an Internet portal and is a serious player in the telecommunications industry. You know the “walk softly and carry a big stick” credo? There isn’t a big enough stick for Symbian to carry to ward off Google. It might not be a bad idea to embrace the GOOG’s services and functions.
Jessica Bratcher, July 17, 2008
Blinkx Actions and Rumors
July 17, 2008
Blinkx is in the news again. As you may know, Blinkx is a video search service. Beta News reported on July 16, 2008, that the company is taking offensive and defensive action. You can read Jacqueline Emigh’s story “Rumored Google Target Blinkx Teams with Microsoft, Others” here.
Ms. Emigh cites another Web log. The paragraph of interest to me was:
“Speculation is rising around a potential acquisition of Blinkx, a video search engine, by either Google or News Corp. (and possibly Yahoo),” noted a blog posting in May by Heather Dougherty, director of research at the Hitwise market research firm.
Blinkx reports that it you can search over 26 million hours of video from Google Video, YouTube, MetaCafe, and others.
Among Blinkx’ new deals are tie ups with:
You can learn more about Blinkx here. The Register offers a different angle here.
I am not sure what to make of this story. In 2005, Blinkx was an independent company according to this posting in Search Engine Watch. I have heard that the company is linked to Autonomy, but I need to look into this alleged tie up more closely.
The phrase “sharpened its defense and offense” continues to puzzle me. Does Blinkx want to be purchased by Google or Yahoo? Does Blinkx want to remain independent? More information is needed.
Working Hypotheses
My working hypotheses are:
- This is a PR play, designed to increase visibility of Blinkx and focus attention on what are partnering deals, probably not big money makers yet.
- Blinkx is a hot property, and the company’s management is aggressively positioning the search engine for acquisition
- Video search is a money pit, and the company is pursuing tie ups in hopes of finding a formula to boost revenues and get the stock moving upwards.
The honking goose will fly over its available information and update this Blinkx coverage. My earlier essay about Blinkx is here.
Stephen Arnold, July 17, 2008
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