Microsoft: Plan to Hobble the Google
May 28, 2008
A contented quack to Henry Blodget who wrote a thoughtful essay “Microsoft’s Secret Plan to Kill Google Explained”.
Not only is this a great headline, the analysis is first rate. You can read the Silicon Alley Insider post here. This Web log has a useful search engine, so you can track this article down if you don’t get to it today. (Another happy quack for Mr. Blodget.)
The arguments are dense and hard to summarize. I don’t want to rehash Mr. Blodget’s points. Instead, let me identify for you the sentence that jumped out and hit me between the eyes:
Good search results are necessary, but even if Microsoft’s results are widely agreed to be better than Google’s–which today’s certainly aren’t–this won’t help. Why not? Because most consumers won’t notice or care. Google works, and Google is synonymous with search. And of course “great results” are an advantage only if the great results are better than Google’s, and we’ll believe that when we see it.
Powerful and direct.
You may not agree, of course. Let me offer several observations sparked by Mr. Blodget’s humdinger of an essay.
First, Google can’t be caught. Microsoft must leapfrog Google. Google can fall on its own talons. Lawyers can ensnare it. But the GOOG is lumbering forward, not sitting on a park bench smelling the flowers. There are technologies and mathematical procedures that are newer than the ones Google uses. These have to be assembled and crafted into a system that leaves Google in second place. Incremental, tactical, and me-too moves won’t do it. IBM could not match Microsoft and Microsoft can’t match Google. Today, IBM has a consulting business model that blends hardware and software. It works, and Microsoft needs that type of business innovation first, then the technical expertise to deliver.
Second, user behavior in searching is changing quickly. At the Enterprise Search Summit I showed a screen dump from a “test” Google service disclosed in a little-known patent application. A Googler–fancy Dan Hollywood-type too–told me I made up the screen shot. Wrong.
Google’s whiz kids in engineering are pushing far beyond search results and keeping the secrets from sales types and most of its competitors. (IBM insists it knows what Google is doing, so IBM has decided it won’t be caught in a rewind of the Microsoft MS-DOS fiasco with the GOOG.) So, Google is moving forward more quickly than most people know or realize. Let me tell you. The output shows aliases of a person along with a hot link to the individual’s location and image. Pretty tasty stuff to a researcher or a person with an inquisitive mind.
Third, search is a problem. The news that the Fast Search & Transfer group has become a new project for Norwegian law enforcement professionals. If you read Norwegian, you can get the details here. Keep in mind that this news story may be addled, and an overworked police force might be too busy with other work to fiddle with engineers who can’t add. Fast Search’s Web indexing and search system is online and available here. If the Fast Search problem moves from the backburner of Norwegian gossip to the microwave of a legal action, more stormy seas may lie ahead. The quick action to swap Live.com search out and plug in the Fast Search technology could go nowhere. A delay allows the GOOD to widen its Grand Canyon scale lead over Yahoo and the lagging, third place Microsoft. You can pay advertisers, retailers, and users. Heck, pay me. But folks are voting with their clicks, and the results are in.
To wrap up, the Henry Blodget fellow has earned an invitation to the Beyond Search goose nerve center. We’ll even cook up a batch of burgoo and not require him to bring a couple of dead squirrels or whatever critters are in the Silicon Alley ecosystem.
Stephen Arnold, May 28, 2008
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