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Digital Gutenberg Study Completed

Infonortics Ltd. received the manuscript for Google: The Digital Gutenberg yesterday, April 10, 2009. The monograph is the third in my series of Google analyses. The topics addressed in this new study include:

• Google’s content automation methods
• A discussions of dataspace functions, the report or dossier system, and content-that-follows system
• A description of Google’s increasing impact on education, scholarly publishing, and commercial online

The information in the study comes from open sources such as Google’s presentations, technical reports, and US government filings to the SEC and USPTO. I have revised and updated some of the information I wrote for BearStearns, Trust Company of the West, and IDC for this study as well as included completely new material that, as far as I know, has not been described in detail elsewhere. I am often asked, “Does Google cooperate with you and provide information.” The answer is, “No.” The Google ignores me, making sure my “authoritative” score is near the bottom of the barrel. I have remarked on many occasions that Google would like to see this goose’s cooked. Google professionals off the record express their surprise at what their employer is doing. Google is not into opening its technical kimono for researchers of my ilk. Compartmentalization is useful I suppose.

Why Google and Publishing

I narrowed the focus to publishing for three reasons:

First, Google finds itself in the news because some newspapers have become critical of Google’s pointing to content produced by third parties. What I have tried to do is explain that Google’s technology processes information and provides access. One of my findings is that Google has shown considerable restraint in the use of its inventions. If my research data are correct, Google could be more active as a content generator than it has chosen to be. Google, for this reason, has “potential energy”; that is, without much additional investment, the company could produce more content objects.

Second, Google’s technical infrastructure plus its software adds up to create a “digital Gutenberg”; that is, an individual could create a Knol (fact based essay on a subject), create a business listing in another Google service, and create a Web log on the Knol’s topic. The “author” or user uses Google as a giant information factory. Inputs go in and traffic “finds” the information. There are different ways to monetize this manufacturing and distribution system. Google has created its own version of Ford’s River Rouge integrated facility.

Third, Google is following what users click on. As a result, it is important to track the demographic behaviors of Google customers, advertisers, licensees, and users. The users, not Google management, help determine where Google goes and what Google does. Competitors who attempt to predict Google’s next action are likely to be off base unless those analyses are anchored in demographic and usage data. Another finding is that Google is relying on demographics to carry its “River Rouge” and “digital Gutenberg” capabilities into different markets.

Google did not open its kimono to me. The open source intelligence methods yielded that data in this study. You can see one of my tools here.

Differences in Digital Gutenberg

In my first two studies, I explained in detail Google’s systems and methods. I include a couple of Google equations in this new study. I make brief references to patent documents and technical papers, but my editor and I have worked to make this study more accessible to the general business reader. I lack the capacity to write a “Sergey and Larry eat pizza” monograph. Frankly, technology, not pizza, interests me. I suppose I am as mechanistic and data centric as some Googlers.

Also, I don’t take sides. Google is neither good nor evil. The companies affected by Google’s waves of innovation are just average companies. Google, however, thrives in sophisticated technology and data. In my encounters with Googlers, most would prefer to talk about a function instead of the color of a sofa. The companies criticizing Google lack Google’s techno-centrism. I point out that Google’s actions and public statements make perfect sense to someone who is Googley. Those same statements when heard by those who operated mostly from subjective information come across as arrogant or, in some cases, pretty wacky.

The conclusion to the study is a discussion of one of Google’s most important initiatives in its 10-year history: the Google App Engine. That surprised some of the people whom I asked to read early drafts of the manuscript. The App Engine is the culmination of many thousands of hours of engineering, and it will make its presence felt across the many business sectors into which Google finds itself thrust.

You can see an early version of the study’s table of contents here. (And, yes, I know the Chinese “invented movable wood block printing”. I used “Gutenberg” as a literary convenience.)

Who Should Read This Monograph?

My mom never read any of my monographs. She looked at my first study, written decades ago, and said, “Dull.” Today, I am still writing dull stuff, but the need to understand what is happening and will happen in electronic information is escalating.

At a minimum, I think the contents of the Digital Gutenberg would be of interest to companies who are engaged in traditional media; that is, publishing, video and motion picture production, and broadcasting. Others who may find the monograph a useful reference may include:

• Analysts, consultants, and pundits who track Google
• Competitors and soon-to-be Google’s competitors
• Lawyers who are on the prowl for Google-related information
• Entrepreneurs who want to find out how to “surf on Google”
• Government regulators eager to find out whether the existing net of regulations has hooked on Google
• People who want to work at Google because some of Google’s most exciting innovations are not well known.

Don’t look for this study at Barnes & Noble. Infonortics is in the digital book business. Also, I don’t sell my monographs or give away copies. I turn that work over to my publishers. I am known to blow away the machine on which I created a study in order to make room for the next project. I am a blank slate type of thinker, not an archivist type of thinker.

I have four different publishers at this time. The one who gave me the best deal for this third Google study is Infonortics, Ltd. The company is run by my long-time friend and colleague Harry Collier. Mr. Collier, former director of EUSIDIC, has worked in the information industry for many years. He has experience with Robert Maxwell, Butterworth’s, and dozens of high profile information companies. The Boston Search Engine meeting is one of the premier events in search and content processing. His criticism and suggestions were invaluable to me. The final version of the monograph was reviewed by Marc Arenstein who lives in Israel and by Ulla de Stricker who lives in Canada. Both sent me back to the drawing board when their observations called attention to points that required my attention.

Where Digital Gutenberg Fits

I am now officially tired of Google.

The three monographs provide more than 500 pages of information about one of the most influential information companies in my lifetime. I reread my first Google study, The Google Legacy, written in 2004 and published in 2005. Most of that information is germane today. The technical explanations of Google’s cost advantage are timely four years later. I also revisited my second Google study, Google Version 2.0. The technology described in that work is now evident in Google’s public services. What struck me is that most of the pundits, competitors, and analysts tracking Google fail to connect Google’s dominance in information access to specific technical competencies. As a result, the commentary about Google expresses constant surprise with Google’s most basic actions. The technology makes it easier to see and understand what Google is and will be doing.

18 Months: Three Monographs

I have written three major studies in less than 18 months. The reason is that I know that I am getting older, and I wanted to capture some of the information that I have used in my for-fee work before I officially retire. The three studies are Beyond Search (Gilbane Group, 2008), Successful Enterprise Search Management (Galatea Ltd.), and Google: The Digital Gutenberg (Infonortics, 2009) can be read as a set. Beyond Search looks at what has changed in search and content processing technology because basic keyword search just doesn’t work for most professionals today. The SESM book, co-authored with my friend and colleague Martin White of Intranet Focus, captures the business methods that are the foundation for a successful search system deployment. And the third, Digital Gutenberg, explains the changes that will now be arriving even faster and more furiously than even before.

I have lost count of the number of monographs I have written. But I do recall the first, Managing the New Information Products, written with Linda Rosen, then at Digital Equipment Corp. and later a Microsoftie. I no longer have a copy, but I do recall that it set forth the business issues associated with electronic information made available to employees. Now two decades later I am still writing about the impact of electronic information.

In a sense, I haven’t progressed much. On the other hand, my readers have not adapted either. Electronic information still baffles, encourages entrepreneurs, and stimulates carpetbaggers. That’s one of the paradoxes of electronic information. The more you have, the less you know. The less you know, the more you depend on systems to tell you enough to get by. That in a nutshell is how Google wins over its users. The system does quite a bit of thinking for those users. More than two thirds of those who use the Internet to find information seem quite happy to let others think for them. Not me. I still do research the old fashioned way. I print out patents and technical papers and read them. I am, however, not the future. I am an old, addled goose thinking about real time search.

Stephen Arnold, April 10, 2009

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