Well, Google has achieved a great success and profits of course, but as any other company it has got its problems. The most important ones are listed below.
Internet censorship in China: On January 12 2010 Google announced that it will stop censoring search results in China. China is the largest internet market by users and Google is taking a huge risk doing this. Many analysts believe that China may easily ban an uncensored search engine. China prohibits content on websites which jeopardize political and social stability and therefore, Google is really risking the loss of market by unilaterally lifting the censorship. The US government is backing Google on this initiative. However, no other companies, except Yahoo, are backing Google, waiting for the giant to leave the market to take its place. The freedom of speech that Google values so much is understandable, however, it contradicts to their actions in India, where they removed offensive comments from the website even without the government asking them to. Some cynics say that Google's actions are just aimed to cutting small operations in China by also making a lot of PR on it. Although, according to Google, its reaction in China was reportedly accelerated by the hacker attack that hit Google and over 30 other companies and was allegedly initiated by the Chinese government. After a month of speculation Google finally stopped censoring Chinese search engine in March 2010 with hope that Chinese government will let them continue to operate. This is yet unclear.
Privacy: Following the launch of Google Buzz, Google's response to Facebook and Twitter, a lawsuit was filed in February 2010 in San Francisco claiming that Google is sharing personal data without consent. And this is not the first time Google's privacy practices have been criticised. In 2008 Google's data protection policies have been brought into question. Trying to make the data universally accessible Google at times overshares information without permission which raises privacy issues with the users and interested organisations. An article which I found very amusing on this topic was talking about Andrew McLaughlin, the White House's Deputy Chief Technology Officer and previous employee of Google whose frequent contacts with Google were revealed unintentionally after the launch of Google Buzz. Of course, these might have been just keeping up with friends or even correspondence while he was employed in Google (because Google Buzz reveals contacts that he e-mailed or chatted with most frequently in the past and not the recent ones), however this raised an increased interest and now the Consumer Watchdog is requesting the copies of e-mails exchanged between Andrew McLaughlin and his previous employer. At least this might make Google realise the price and importance of privacy.
Antitrust trouble: Google is so diverse and tries to enter so many online markets that it always runs into the antitrust regulators. First problem came out last year when Google wanted to sign a long-term partnership with Yahoo. The deal was cancelled by Google following the increased interest by the Department of Justice (DoJ). DoJ is now interested in Google's contracts for building a book search engine, partnering with publishers. There's also an allegation by the European Antitrust regulators about the Google's search practices, claiming that Google gives lower rankings to its competitors in the search results. The latest DoJ interference, which however ended up successfully for Google, was the proposed acquisition of the mobile advertising network AdMob. In short, being successfully present in every online market possible, Google is now facing trouble in every new endeavour.
Sunday 30 May 2010
Monday 24 May 2010
Will Microsoft last forever?
Well, nothing's gonna last forever, but do I expect to see Microsoft as a leader in the next couple of years, I definitely do.
To start off I listened to Steve Ballmer at Microsoft CEO Summit 2010 http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/events/ceosummit/liveevent.aspx. He sounded really optimistic about the future and mentioned five key areas of competitive advantage:
1. best talent
2. balanced investment
3. innovating in the right areas
4. product flow
5. future bet: cloud
Listening to Microsoft CEO is kind of biased but still to me as a happy PC user he sounded quite convincing. I must admit though that I'm quite a conservative person when it comes to technology. But setting conservativeness aside, I have to be objective. Microsoft is by far the leader in Desktop OS, browsers and it's all time winning solution, the Microsoft Office. Competitors are getting innovative but Microsoft can always follow and it will pay off in their case. Users will not change to competitors that easily. Moreover, by being the follower, Microsoft can capitalise on improving the weaknesses of the competitors.
I tried to analyse Google Docs just for example. Google Docs becomes increasingly popular but is it really better than Microsof Office Live? It seems that the main advantage of Google Docs is the real-time collaboration, whereas all the rest of the features are better with Microsoft. http://www.pcworld.com/article/168309/microsoft_office_vsgoogle_docs_a_web_apps_showdown.html
Microsoft products have bugs of course but well it does not preclude them from having the largest market share. I don't want to talk about Vista and it's failure. The idea was not executed correctly and I think Microsoft is huge enough to afford that.
It's a huge corporation and has got the right talent and enough finances to be able to research, innovate, follow and continue to be the leader. I don't think Microsoft is going to give up anytime soon...
To start off I listened to Steve Ballmer at Microsoft CEO Summit 2010 http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/events/ceosummit/liveevent.aspx. He sounded really optimistic about the future and mentioned five key areas of competitive advantage:
1. best talent
2. balanced investment
3. innovating in the right areas
4. product flow
5. future bet: cloud
Listening to Microsoft CEO is kind of biased but still to me as a happy PC user he sounded quite convincing. I must admit though that I'm quite a conservative person when it comes to technology. But setting conservativeness aside, I have to be objective. Microsoft is by far the leader in Desktop OS, browsers and it's all time winning solution, the Microsoft Office. Competitors are getting innovative but Microsoft can always follow and it will pay off in their case. Users will not change to competitors that easily. Moreover, by being the follower, Microsoft can capitalise on improving the weaknesses of the competitors.
I tried to analyse Google Docs just for example. Google Docs becomes increasingly popular but is it really better than Microsof Office Live? It seems that the main advantage of Google Docs is the real-time collaboration, whereas all the rest of the features are better with Microsoft. http://www.pcworld.com/article/168309/microsoft_office_vsgoogle_docs_a_web_apps_showdown.html
Microsoft products have bugs of course but well it does not preclude them from having the largest market share. I don't want to talk about Vista and it's failure. The idea was not executed correctly and I think Microsoft is huge enough to afford that.
It's a huge corporation and has got the right talent and enough finances to be able to research, innovate, follow and continue to be the leader. I don't think Microsoft is going to give up anytime soon...
Wednesday 19 May 2010
Foursquare - sell or not?
OK What is Foursquare all about…letting your friends know where you are, getting into a competition to earn statuses in several places, getting credits in places you visit most…these are all benefits perceived by the users. Launched 13 months ago, Foursquare now has almost 1 million users, according to CEO and co-founder Dennis Crowley. But what’s there for Foursquare. It all started as a mobile application, a game for iPhone, but now it’s growing so fast it’s quite logical that Foursquare started thinking about profits.
On Foursquare’s website, they invite businesses to engage with Foursquare in order to get closer to their customers, track their behaviour and reward loyal customers. It’s free for the moment but things will change at some point I think.
So where will the money be coming from? I see a few options:
First thing would be to start getting subscription fees from users. We’ve seen a few social networks, e.g. schoolmates (the Russian version of Facebook), who started selling subscriptions. The amount is very marginal, but considering the growing number of users it might be a good idea. The mentioned network started selling on top additional possibilities, like blocking comments, million of smileys, etc. In fact Facebook is thinking of starting subscriptions as well. But that’s not what I would go for. It’s risky in the sense that it can limit the growth of the customers.
The second option I thought about is advertising, but not in terms of putting ads, but in terms of cross selling. Like Amazon makes recommendations to users, Foursquare does the same by recommending nearby places to it’s users and it could also recommend places that the users might like. I believe that Foursquare can get paid by the companies to get their names out more often.
The third option I see is getting paid by the companies for selling user profiles and behavioural patterns, and that’s probably the one that I would go for. Foursquare already has partnerships with a few “Big Names” and makes some money out of it. The potential market for this type of business is very large including “Big Names” at one end of the spectrum and small owner-run businesses on the other.
Foursquare came up with the right idea at the right time and there’s a big potential in it. The rumors that Yahoo wants to buy it for around $125m can as well be true. With such a fast growing user base and huge potential market, it’s not surprising to me. However, I am somewhat conscious of the competition. The main competitor at the moment is Gowalla and it kind of does the same thing but is not as popular as Foursquare. The problem with this type of social networks is that once the one gets more popular, people are going to subscribe to the one to which their friends are subscribed to. Therefore I don’t see much threat in Gowalla. However, there is one important thing that has to be taken into account and that’s Facebook. Currently Facebook has a much larger user base and they decided to launch geolocation features shortly. If Facebook is successful in its launch, incorporates all the important elements from Foursquare and enters into a direct competition with Foursquare, for the above mentioned reasons, I don’t believe that Foursquare will be worth the money it’s worth now.
On Foursquare’s website, they invite businesses to engage with Foursquare in order to get closer to their customers, track their behaviour and reward loyal customers. It’s free for the moment but things will change at some point I think.
So where will the money be coming from? I see a few options:
First thing would be to start getting subscription fees from users. We’ve seen a few social networks, e.g. schoolmates (the Russian version of Facebook), who started selling subscriptions. The amount is very marginal, but considering the growing number of users it might be a good idea. The mentioned network started selling on top additional possibilities, like blocking comments, million of smileys, etc. In fact Facebook is thinking of starting subscriptions as well. But that’s not what I would go for. It’s risky in the sense that it can limit the growth of the customers.
The second option I thought about is advertising, but not in terms of putting ads, but in terms of cross selling. Like Amazon makes recommendations to users, Foursquare does the same by recommending nearby places to it’s users and it could also recommend places that the users might like. I believe that Foursquare can get paid by the companies to get their names out more often.
The third option I see is getting paid by the companies for selling user profiles and behavioural patterns, and that’s probably the one that I would go for. Foursquare already has partnerships with a few “Big Names” and makes some money out of it. The potential market for this type of business is very large including “Big Names” at one end of the spectrum and small owner-run businesses on the other.
Foursquare came up with the right idea at the right time and there’s a big potential in it. The rumors that Yahoo wants to buy it for around $125m can as well be true. With such a fast growing user base and huge potential market, it’s not surprising to me. However, I am somewhat conscious of the competition. The main competitor at the moment is Gowalla and it kind of does the same thing but is not as popular as Foursquare. The problem with this type of social networks is that once the one gets more popular, people are going to subscribe to the one to which their friends are subscribed to. Therefore I don’t see much threat in Gowalla. However, there is one important thing that has to be taken into account and that’s Facebook. Currently Facebook has a much larger user base and they decided to launch geolocation features shortly. If Facebook is successful in its launch, incorporates all the important elements from Foursquare and enters into a direct competition with Foursquare, for the above mentioned reasons, I don’t believe that Foursquare will be worth the money it’s worth now.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
