Yahoo: Searching for Luck
September 23, 2014
I read “An Insider’s Account of the Yahoo-Alibaba Deal.” I found it interesting. The one factor not mentioned was luck. The write up explains some of the deal context. My hunch is that Yahoo was in the right place at the right time with Jerry Yang, who hit it off with Alibaba’s founder. Why discount luck in a Harvard Business Review article? Easy. Few MBAs and their ilk want to admit that chance generated a positive payoff.
What about Yahoo in the post Alibaba IPO environment?
According to “Welcome to the Strange, Upside-Down World of Yahoo after the Alibaba IPO,”
According to another analysis, by Nicholas Carlson of Business Insider, the rest of Yahoo really is worth nothing at all, after subtracting its stake in Yahoo Japan (a separate company) and its cash reserves. What this means for Mayer is that she’s in the strange position of running a company whose core business the stock market values at less than zero. Yet she has a pile of cash and a site that is one of the most popular on the Internet, attracting over one billion visitors per month, and generating $4.62 billion in advertising revenue over the last year.
If accurate, Yahoo may need some more of that rarely mentioned key to business success—luck.
Stephen E Arnold, September 23, 2014
Yahoo Concentrates On Local Search
September 10, 2014
One search trend that is proving profitable is local search. Users want search results that correspond to their immediate areas, rather than generic, global results. To cash in this market, “Yahoo Acquires Startup Zofari To Bolster Local Search” says CNet. Zofari is a local search startup that recommends places to visit. Zofari pulls its data from Foursquare and user provider data about what they like, similar to Pandora and Netflix. Zofari even acknowledges these services inspired it.
“The purchase is just one of more than 40 that CEO Marissa Mayer has made since she took the reins at Yahoo more than two years ago, but it’s aligned specifically with the company’s desire to build out its mobile search offerings. The buy comes at a time when Yahoo’s display ad sales — an important financial metric, though becoming less en vogue as users move to mobile devices — fell 7 percent last quarter.”
Mayer has been testing new ways to save Yahoo. She has saved the company from drowning, but it is still flipping about to compete with Google. Yahoo’s problems go deeper than anyone suspected, but acquisitions like Zofari could possibly strengthen it.
Whitney Grace, September 10, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Yahoo Flickr Images: Does Search Work?
August 31, 2014
I think you know the answer if you are a regular reader of Beyond Search.
Nope.
Finding images is a tedious and time consuming business. I know what the marketing collateral and public relations noise suggests. One can search by photographer, color, yada, yada.
The reality is that finding an image requires looking at images. Some find this fun, particularly if the client is paying by the hour for graphic expertise. For me, image search underscores how primitive information retrieval tools are.
Feel free to disagree.
To test Yahoo Flickr search, navigate to “Welcome to the Internet Archive to the the Commons.” Check out the sample entry to the millions of public domain images.
Darned meaty.
To search the “Commons”, one has to navigate to the Commons page and scroll down to the search box highlighted in yellow in this screenshot:
Enter a query like this one “18th century elocution.”
Here’s what the system displayed:
I then tried this query “london omnibus 1870”.
Here’s what the system displayed:
No omnibuses.
Like many image retrieval systems, the user has to fiddle with queries until images are spotted by manual inspection.
The archive is useful. Finding images in Yahoo Flickr remains a problem for me. I thought Xooglers knew quite a bit about search. You know: Finding information when the user enters a key word or two.
Stephen E Arnold, August 31, 2014
The Perks and Pitfalls of a Yahoo/ AOL merger
August 1, 2014
An article on re/code titled Two Years and Still Stuck in a Revenue Rut, Will Yahoo’s Mayer Bite the AOL Bullet? attempts to separate fact from fiction when it comes to the possible merger. The sight of Mayer and AOL’s Armstrong chatting during the Allen & Co. conferences in Sun Valley proved too exciting for some reporters, who jumped to the conclusion that the two old friends were making a deal. While making it very clear that the merger is entirely hypothetical at this point, this article makes an argument for the perks of getting Yahoo and AOL together. The article states,
“AOL and Yahoo have very similar businesses and could easily combine them…Internally at both companies, this is not seen as a completely bad idea — both share numerous advertising overlaps, content overlaps, video overlaps and too many employees doing the same thing. In addition, Mayer could certainly use a decent exec she actually knows well like Armstrong at the top (presumably, him CEO, her chairman).”
However, the article also points out some hedging by Mayer who has made some comments about the possible merger being boring and “backward-looking.” On the other hand, if Mayer wants the Huffington Post, she may have to take AOL along with it. So the article is inconclusive. Will AOL and Yahoo finally get married? Can two Xooglers (former Googlers) make one scion named Revenue?
Chelsea Kerwin, August 01, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Yahoo Acquisitions: A Hunch about Why
May 8, 2014
I read “Yahoo Spent More Than Anyone on Acquisitions in 2013, but Why?” At dinner tonight several colleagues and I discussed Yahoo’s buying spree. The article surmises:
There has to be rhyme and reason for Yahoo to have picked up these companies, even if it was just to keep talent from the likes of Google or Facebook. In the continued push for Yahoo to be more mobile and contextual, we should look forward to a Yahoo stacked with both talent and money in 2014.
That’s a positive view. The thoughts of the ArnoldIT conversation drifted a different direction; for example:
- Yahoo is taking advantage of the “bet on a bunch of horses.” The notion is that one or more will be winners
- Yahoo is just doing stuff to demonstrate that it has direction, intent, and purpose. In short, the deals are Wall Street theatre, just way off Broadway
- The Silicon bubble is a habitat that encourages gorging.
Financial results may shine a light on the actions.
Stephen E Arnold, May 8, 2014
Yahoo and Search
February 24, 2014
Yahoo may not be able to wriggle out of the Microsoft Bing search deal. Microsoft may not be m making much progress in catching Google, and Yahoo may want to swizzle a different spin on Web search. Microsoft’s voice enabled technology seems to be disappointing Ford. The US auto maker may be embracing BlackBerry’s QNX system. Yep, BlackBerry, a stellar outfit in my experience. Microsoft has some issues to resolve particularly if it loses a major account to the shareholder-pleasing Waterloo, Ontario company.
I read “Yahoo Launches $10 Million Research Effort to Invent a Smarter Siri.” I find the notion that a large company can invent voice search that is “better” than another voice search system interesting. Google has a voice search system, and there are a number of companies eager to make their voice search technology available to Yahoo. But Yahoo apparently has confidence in Carnegie Mellon University, the outfit that delivered Lycos, Vivisimo, and Claritech to information seekers in the past.
According to the Technology Review article:
Ron Brachman, head of Yahoo Labs, says that he expects the InMind project to experiment with apps that are capable of rudimentary conversation—for example, asking a person follow-up questions and making suggestions based on new information. “This is missing from Siri,” he says, adding that although Apple’s personal assistant is impressive, it doesn’t attempt to understand the context in which it is being asked a question: it doesn’t understand what the user is doing or might need at the moment.
With Web search shifting to mobile like iron filings following a magnet, users find typing less facile on a mobile device. Will Yahoo crack the code in five years with the help of the CMU professors and students?
Five years is a long time. Like Facebook and Google, Yahoo may find it more expedient to start buying voice recognition companies and licensing available technology. WhatsApp, a company that Facebook bought in February, promptly said, it would not change. I learned today that Facebook will be adding voice calls to WhatsApp. How long did that “will not change” statement endure? WhatsApp did not have five days.
Yahoo may not have five years.
Stephen E Arnold, February 24, 2014
Yahoo Tops Google on Web Property Roster
February 13, 2014
Anyone convinced of Google’s inevitable Internet dominance should take a gander at the numbers TheNextWeb shares in “comScore: Yahoo Beats Google as Top Web Property in the U.S. for Six Months Straight.” This chart of the top 50 U.S.-based Web properties as of the end of 2013, put together by analytics firm comScore, does indeed show Yahoo ahead of Google (and everyone else) in terms of unique visitors. The very brief write-up notes:
“We went back to make sure, and indeed Yahoo has topped comScore’s list for the last six months straight, starting in July 2013 (before that, it was first way back in May 2011). It’s safe to say that Yahoo’s gold medal is now a trend – an impressive feat given that Yahoo’s numbers exclude Tumblr, which is ranked at #30.”
I want to point out one caveat: the chart only covers desktop access, specifically from “home, work and university locations.” I wonder how the numbers would be different if mobile were included.
Cynthia Murrell, February 13, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Yahoo Attempts to Regain the Search Crown
January 30, 2014
Yahoo has not been the top search engine for a long time and they have focused their energies on other promising projects. CEO Marissa Mayer kept search in the back of her mind when she purchased Aviate, creator of a contextual app search and organization for mobile phone users. Business Insider describes the acquisition in “Yahoo Just Acquired A New Search Product That Could Hurt Google.”
According to the article, contextual search is very important to technology companies and many already have projects concerning the new search trend in development.
What makes contextual or semantic search different? The article states:
“Basically, contextual search differs from the regular search you know on Google by trying to anticipate what you really mean or want based on cues in your past searches or in other stores of data the search tool has access to. It’s not just about matching keywords and ranking incoming links.”
Under Yahoo, Aviate’s product will organize phone apps on the home screen based on its best guess to what the user needs at the moment. Mayer is probably out to solve the app overload problem, where users download hundreds of apps and hardly use any of them. Aviate takes hide and seek out of finding apps. The search product will also locate items before users access other search applications.
Mayer has a good idea. Organize the tools that are supposed to make life easier. It also sounds like she is trying to set up the Yahoo equivalent of the Google’s Play Store and Apple’s App Store. What will she name it?
Whitney Grace, January 30, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Startup Aviate Acquired by Yahoo for Homescreen Improvements
January 27, 2014
The article titled Yahoo Announced That It Has Acquired “Intelligent Homescreen” Startup Aviate on TechCrunch delves into Marissa Mayer’s opening words at the Consumer Electronics Show, where the Yahoo CEO was a keynote speaker. Mayer promises that Yahoo’s intention is to make homescreens “smarter and more personalized.” Her comments are outline in a Yahoo blog post where Aviate’s work in auto-categorizing apps to bring the relevant ones to the surface. “By using signals to understand your context – WIFI, GPS, Accelerometer, Time, etc – Aviate automatically surfaces information at the moment it’s useful.” The article mentioned that the Aviate team will most likely join Yahoo.
The article also states:
“Note that Aviate is an Android product, and the blog post says Yahoo plans to make it “a central part of our Android-based experiences in 2014 (and beyond)” — not, it seems, on iOS. When it was independent, Aviate did tell us that it had iOS plans, but I’m guessing its capabilities would be significantly limited.”
The service could be the new clippy or the adaptive menu system that Microsoft uses. By that I mean it could be sometimes helpful, possibly annoying. The article did mention that Yahoo intends to make Aviate a “central” aspect of their plans for their work with Android in the future.
Chelsea Kerwin, January 27, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Microsoft Earns Yahoo More Money Than Realized
December 26, 2013
Yahoo is pulling itself out of the red and is back on track to becoming a popular search engine and Web service. According to the ZDNet article, “Yahoo Says Microsoft Search Providing 31 Percent Of Revenues,” Microsoft is the reason why. Yahoo credits the 31% gain in its quarterly summary to its partnership with Microsoft. Yahoo claimed Microsoft only brought them 10% in sales from a previous statement. It has most definitely changed!
Yahoo and Microsoft signed a ten-year deal, where Microsoft would power Yahoo’s search and become the ad sales force for Microsoft’s premium properties.
The article states:
“Over the past year, Yahoo has been seeking a way to get out of the deal, claiming the company hasn’t found it financially lucrative. Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer supposedly also has sought Microsoft’s pending change in CEO as a possible loophole for getting out of the deal earlier than expected. As SearchEngineLand noted, there is a clause which would allow Yahoo to exit early from the partnership in 2015 if the revenue-per-share threshold vs. the market leader (Google) doesn’t pass muster.”
Microsoft would like the deal to continue past the ten-year agreement, but both companies failed to provide comment in the article. In a prior article from ZDNet, Yahoo might be building a new search/personalization technology to relaunch itself as its own search provider. Yahoo may not want to break the deal now, especially if they are working on a secret project. They will need the money to fund research and development if they want to stand a chance against Microsoft.
Whitney Grace, December 26, 2013
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
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