Barn Burns, Horse Gone: Google and Regulation
July 16, 2010
Wow, the Danny Sullivan, the Google Public Policy Blog, the Silicon Valley Watcher, and the New York Times (you may face a dead link and have to pay). That’s a link fest. What’s the topic of this click-a-rrific moment?
Regulating Google.
The addled goose is a bit jaded with the “look at Google now” crowd. In 2002, when a client asked me to flip through Google’s technical papers and patent applications (note, not patents) and report on any interesting developments, I unearthed some interesting factoids. I have documented these in detail in my three Google monographs published by Infonortics, a new chunk in the Beyond Search study published by Gilbane, and in Success Enterprise Search Management. The span of these monographs is from 2004 to 2009. When people stop paying me to do stuff for them, I hope to push my most recent study Google Beyond Text out the door.
Let’s take a trip down memory lane:
- By 2002, Google was beavering away on making money using the one revenue model that was working at the time: slapping ads into search results. Seems easy, but Google had to get technology from Applied Semantics and other places plus re-engineering what struck Yahoo as a system that was similar to Yahoo’s. I will leave it to you to check out the pre IPO settlement with Yahoo to make this “issue” go away. The point is that the “evil” motto, although cute, seemed to be particularly elastic.
- By 2004, Google had fired up or turned loose researchers to work on projects spanning seven different business sectors. I won’t repeat those in this bullet point, but I bet you will resonate with telephony. You know, the Google Android, the wireless stuff, and spectrum gambit.
- By 2006, the present day Google was discernable, including the company’s push into rich media. I know that folks are fixated on YouTube.com, but the technical reports and patent applications suggest that YouTube.com is a single instance, not the comprehensive rich media system Google’s engineers have commented upon and disclosed in open source writings.
What’s this mean?
Well, with the realization that Google dominates Web search, has put pressure on a number of business sectors not related to search and retrieval, and is throwing its weight around, folks are now waking up to Google.
Okay, good morning, Rip Van Winkle.
Source: http://scrapetv.com/News/News%20Pages/Politics/Images/rip-van-winkle.jpg
The problem is that Google has been operating in the same manner for about a decade.
Ever hear the story about the barn burning down and the horses fleeing? In order to take meaningful action related to Google, several things have to happen?
First, competitors have to actually compete. Right now Apple (limping with a bullet in its iPhone holding hand), Facebook, and maybe Twitter have a shot. But if these outfits stumble, the Google will keep on truckin’, as we say in Harrod’s Creek.
Second, governments must do more than “study” Google. In the US, pressure centric politics ensures that the Google’s lawyers will neuter even the testosterone charged folks at an outfit like Viacom. But in other countries, the opportunity to take action may have different rhythms.
Third, Google itself has to avoid what I have variously called the Icarus problem, the Math Club behavior, or – my personal favorite – the Googzille effect. Yep, Google’s fatal flaw may be its management methods. The culture of a start up is tough to make work when you have 19,000 high IQ folks running around believing everything mom told them about how wonderful each was.
Fourth, the economic climate may be a problem. Forget global warming. Think about a chill in a double dip recession. With one source of cash – advertising – Google’s monoculture could face some problems in a climate change.
Bottomline. Read this passage from “Google Responds to Calls for Search Neutrality”:
Google is under more and more pressure from more and more groups concerned with its size. Google dominates the search market, in some countries by huge margins, and, subsequently, the online advertising market. It also has countless web products, Maps, Gmail, Docs. More and more, a call for ‘search neutrality’ is being made calling for regulation, government oversight or opening up search algorithm. It’s one thing for unheard of companies and people seeking attention to do it, it’s another when a respected news organization does it.
The only problem is that the comments were dated July 16, 2010, just a decade too late.
Stephen E Arnold, July 16, 2010
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Comments
One Response to “Barn Burns, Horse Gone: Google and Regulation”
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Great post, Stephen. I am impressed with the amount of research you brought to the table with this subject. We have a community for IM professionals (www.openmethodology.org) that discusses related topics and we have bookmarked this post for our users. Looking forward to reading more of your work and sharing with our community.