John Robb's Weblog: Google's Strategic Mistake: "I don't think that Google clearly thought through its decision to move to Web page modification. If they succeed in nullifying the opposition to this, they will open the floodgates to Microsoft to rerelease its version of the concept.
Through modification of the browser, Microsoft could put this on 1,000 times the desktops Google could with its toolbar. Opposition to the concept is the only thing that is stopping Microsoft from doing it today.
It gets worse. The basis of this modification are search-based services. If Microsoft is able to put a basket of search-based services into every Web page most people view with a browser ('search in situ' vs. the site based model), Google could be in real trouble. It could quickly turn Google into Netscape, and I am sure Bill Gates knows this.
This is a bet the company decision."
Via Dave Winer, who summarizes the post as "John Robb calls Google's move into content modification a strategic mistake, a bet-the-company mistake."
A few issues with this:
1. Some fact-checking is in order, on Microsoft's intentions and architecture for smart tag technology in IE circa 2001; there's a bit of folklore at work here.
2. So... the biggest threat with Google's potential "bet-the-company mistake" is that it will "open the floodgates" for Microsoft to do even bigger evil? Not quite objective analysis...
No if you think about it, its quite logical: the reaason Msft pulled Smart Tags is because of the outcry against the technology. Technically they could re-implement it tomorrow, patch it into the next Windows update and millions of users would be getting hijacked into MSN search results based on contextual page analysis. This could EASILY be used to siphon traffic away from Google - its pretty easy to envision how Microsoft would wield smart tags as a potential Google-killer.
ReplyDeleteYou're right that Microsoft pulled smart tag technology (from IE; it went ahead in Office XP) because of the outcry; the point I'm trying to make is that the outcry was wrong -- the critical reviews of smart tag technology in IE didn't account for the client-based smart tag architecture, and also didn't bother to take Microsoft's goals seriously; they immediately assumed Microsoft would abuse users at every opportunity.
ReplyDeleteI continue to find it weird that so many people assume Microsoft would do all evil, if unfettered, while many people seem shocked when Google acts like a voracious capitalist.
BTW for the conspiracy theory file, I had to use Firefox to enter this comment because Google's Blogger service has uneven support for the latest version of IE...