1 post tagged “innovation”
My, these are strange times for the high flying giant. Perhaps the altitude has gotten to it's head?
Over the course of several articles this week, it's become resoundingly clearer that Google is, well, maturing into a classical enterprise. Lack of innovation in certain spaces has lead Google to parry with defensive, protectionary measure's aimed at stalling the expansion of rivals. In particular, Google is a laggard in the social networking space, which comes to no surprise to startups and followers in the realm.
It's all about the Graph baby, and Google don't got it, yet
Google knows they missed out on social networking while hunting for the Office 2.0 prize. Arguably, this is a more ambitious goal and has a much clearer, and quantifiable revenue base and model. Just copy and paste MSFT's Office revenue from their annual report. However, in order to play catch up, Google has recently created a Social Graph API. Bravo, you say? Nope. This is simply an attempt to slowdown the progress of other social networks by commodotizing their functions. How useful is the shell, if everyone can hold one up to speak? Google knows this tactic is aimed at leveling the playing field at the expense of established social networks. A commenter at TechCrunch nailed this on the head:
Google doesn't want you to have the next killer application, yet
Next up on the stonewalling of innovation path is Google's take on social search.
VB: Does influencing existing Google results with third-party social networks make sense?
MM: It would be a surprise if one day users opened up their browsers, began using Google, and friendships they had formed on MySpace began to rerank their results or in some way influence the page. It would be non-intuitive to them. As a result, we don’t think it would be a great product decision or a great user experience.
Yikes. There's so many flawed points in that argument, I don't know where to begin. Google has simultaneously admitted that social search is the future, yet, have also shrugged off making use of external social networks in the name of UXM. Hmmm... I believe if we translated this paragraph from corporate-babble into underlying intentions, it would read:
Absolutely, leveraging an existing graph to enhance your results would be the most cost effective and seamless transition to social search, and sure, we know how to overcome the user experience issues of porting online identities... hell, we can import your Outlook and Hotmail contacts into GMail, no problem. As far as user experiences go, adding the ratings, recommendations and tagging of other users to search results? Why, I think someone has already proven this concept to be acceptable to the masses... what are they called again, oh, that's right... Amazon!
No, the real issue is that for Google to profit from the value-add of the social network, we need to OWN the graph. We need to OWN the data. Otherwise, there's no consumer lock in, and we're at the mercy of the graph owners. Our users could ditch us for the next provider, and our shareholders wouldn't like the sound of that. We're simply haven't got the graph yet, so until then, why don't you consider building it for us with our Graph API?
And I'm sorry Marissa, don't put words in the consumers mouth. I'm certain if I ran a poll today, the vast majority of web users would absolutely clamor for exactly what you mentioned. We know it, you know it. Google just isn't there yet to deliver. Imagine deli.cio.us enhanced tag clouds, reviews and digg style ratings of search results. All of these mechanisms can enrich the quality of the results, but Google doesn't yet have a handle on social networking. I frankly don't think the existing brain trust has the experience or skill set in house to tackle this just yet, which could help explain their lag.
Propaganda is the tool of tyrants
Instead of doing what Google did best, innovating, Google is using it's might to slowdown progress at a pace it can the cost of the industry. Can you believe the gall that Google has to claim that Microsoft should be reviewed for antitrust complications in its takeover bid? I'm not going to harp on this piece of low hanging fruit, everyone already has.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:27 pm
This API will stay up. Remember: Google wants openness from YOU not from them.
Remember they used to have a free search API you could use (but wouldn’t even let you use on your own site) because that would cost Google money. OTOH, when they lost with Orkut, now they’re pushing SN openness so they can get all the SN data from MySpace, Facebook, etc.
Pretty simple: when it involves Google helping the net, they’re against open APIs. When it involves everyone else helping Google, they’re all for open APIs.