The Purpose of Microsoft Research
May 23, 2008
Stefanie Olson has a remarkable story ‘Microsoft Exec: Survival Is All about Research’. You can read the story here. For me, the most significant part of this story which was cited by Techmeme here is this quote, ‘Ultimately, the goal of Microsoft Research is to make sure Microsoft is still here in 10 years.’
My thought is that Microsoft needs to leap frog Google. I’m not sure the research agenda described in Ms. Olsen’s article will do the trick.
Stephen Arnold, May 23, 2008
Attivio Interview Runs on May 27, 2008
May 23, 2008
We will post the exclusive interview with Attivia‘s founder Ali Riaz. A former Fast Search & Transfer executive, Mr. Riaz’s comments about search, information retrieval technology, and market trends contains some insightful observations. Because of the US holiday, we will post the complete interview on Tuesday, May 27, 2008. The feature for the Monday, May 26, 2008, posting will be a look at IN-Q-TEL’s investments in the period from 2000 to 2003. (IN-Q-TEL is the investment arm of the US Central Intelligence Agency.)
Stephen Arnold, May 23, 2008
More on Buying Traffic
May 22, 2008
Navigate to TechCrunch for a very good discussion of “Microsoft’s bold move”. You can find the story, screenshots, and some useful data here. You should click on the link now because it’s an important commentary. Unlike some sites, TechCrunch does an excellent job of keeping content findable. A gentle quack to TechCrunch for the analysis and the data management on the site.
Now to my observations. Microsoft’s paying-for-traffic play underscores the dwindling options that Microsoft has for catching up to Google in Web search traffic. Under normal circumstances, a company would find a better technical mousetrap, build traffic, and then turn its attention to expanding its reach. An example of this approach in Web search is Exalead, the Paris-based company that shares some Google DNA. Exalead has done a solid job of using its Web site as a way to make the features of its system available to anyone with an Internet connection. Plus, the company has done old-fashioned marketing and selling to build its business for its search and content processing system. Exalead is a company I visited two years ago, and it is now on a double digit growth tear. Check it out at Exalead.com.
Illustration is from US20070198481. Figure 5.
I’m too old to get in the social network whirl. But Facebook.com is another example of a company that has managed to solve a problem, expand traffic, and move into a broader, increasingly disruptive role. I don’t want to argue the merits of Facebook.com, but I do want to point out that the company has attracted investment attention, including Microsoft’s money and affection. Facebook.com’s management–decades younger than I am–looked around for talent and has made a habit of plucking some Googley wizards from the Googleplex. The model seems to be working.
In both cases, Exalead and Facebook.com have managed to move forward in spite of or with some indifference to Googzilla. In my opinion, both Exalead and Facebook.com compete and compete successfully against Google. Neither of these companies is awed by Google. In my brief conversations with professionals from both Exalead and Facebook.com, Google is recognized as a pretty sharp outfit, but neither company finds it necessary to go to extreme and out-of-spectrum actions to compete, thrive, and grow in a Google-dominated world. That could change, but as I write this after a super-pleasant late flight from Washington, DC, to the metropolis of Harrod’s Creek, my mind wouldn’t let go of the pay-for-traffic play.
Here are the points I wrote on the Southwest Airlines’ “discomfort” bag this morning:
- Google’s success is search is due to companies like Microsoft’s and Yahoo’s relegating search to no-brainer status. Google, on the other hand, put search front and center, ramped its investment in the plumbing necessary to deliver on-point results quickly and consistently for the last decade. Let me repeat that: the last 10 years. Google isn’t a tyro in search. Google is, except for Exalead, arguably the most sophisticated free Web search provider in the world. You don’t catch up with a season of 24 when you’ve been asleep for years. Certain technical work is serial in our real-time, massively-parallel world.
- Microsoft continues to aim where Google was or is today. I’ve just finished some open source sleuthing that reveals Google is poised to release another leap frog technology. Yesterday in my endnote at the Enterprise Search Summit I showed this diagram. The email this morning contained five separate comments about this single figure. The importance of this screenshot is that it is possible only with certain behind-the-scenes data plumbing. In effect, you can’t deliver a dossier unless you know how to slice, dice, prioritize, value, and assemble uncertain data. My research suggests that Google now does that and more. Google has not released what I have discovered internally. One Googler came up to me and said, ‘That screenshot is Photoshopped.’ The implication was that I swizzled a fake illustration. Nope. This bright and perky Googler was clueless about the figures that Google’s attorneys include in Google’s own patent filings. Attorneys, dangerous as they are as a species, don’t Photoshop very well. Attorneys use information that can be verified in a legal matter. The screenshot, therefore, is an output of the Google brain factory, not a paralegal’s laptop.
- The Microsoft innovations I have seen are often clever, extremely useful, and increasingly tasty (almost as if Apple’s design gurus contributed). The problem is that these are atomic innovations that run in the existing Microsoft computing environment. The job, therefore, is to get a better platform than Google has. Microsoft’s engineers are trying to catch up with applications that run on a zippier, more flexible computing infrastructure. So, applets are useful, but more robust services need a next-generation infrastructure.
What’s this mean? From my lofty vantage point in rural Kentucky, I think the pay-for-traffic play is indeed disruptive. But it is not the type of disruption in which Google specializes. Google’s approach to disruption has been structural. The Microsoft pay-for-traffic disruption is tactical, and it is unclear how the economics will play out if the traffic does not increase sufficiently to close the Grand Canyon gap that now exists between Google and Microsoft.
Second, I think that advertisers and users may be eager to give the pay-for-traffic play a try. If the results are not slam dunks, advertisers may find themselves pulled back into the gravitational field of Google. Google could tweak its approach to accelerate this process, but I think Google may sit and watch, a characteristic of the firm’s business behavior. What’s Microsoft’s next move if the pay-for-traffic play doesn’t work? What’s the next move if it does, particularly if the Microsoft infrastructure is stretched beyond its limits?
Finally, I think this is one more example of Microsoft’s management looking for a short cut. There’s not much you can do when the traffic gap is large and inelastic. There’s not much likelihood of leap frogging Google when resources are channeled into moves that create greater pressure on an aging technical infrastructure.
Google is not perfect, far from it. Yahoo is not perfect, and its management team has made that abundantly clear. Microsoft is not perfect. Its most recent actions reinforce the impression I have that it is trying to solve one problem while ignoring a larger, potentially company-breaking challenge in its fundamental technical infrastructure.
Let me know what you think.
Stephen Arnold, May 22, 2008
Stephen E. Arnold on Microsoft and Google in Portfolio
May 22, 2008
Stephen E. Arnold’s observations and opinions about the Microsoft/Google war are starting to get some attention. Steve Rosenbush quoted him in his “The Fast and the Curious” article in Condé Nast’s Portfolio, a new business magazine featuring investigative reporting and breaking news. (Alternatively headlined “Microsoft’s ‘Googlephobia’ Breeds Panic Buying” at Wired.com)
The article sums up Microsoft’s “world-class” knee-jerk reactions to Google’s growth that have spurred pricey acquisitions, and statements made by Arnold connect the Microsoft purchases of aQuantive and Fast Search & Transfer to his main point: “Microsoft has a great track record of flopping in online. Google just keeps rubbing it in and edging ever closer to Microsoft’s crown jewel — enterprise revenue.”
Jess Bratcher, May 22, 2008
Enterprise Search Endnote
May 22, 2008
A surprised squawk from the Beyond Search goose. In the end note (the wrap up talk for the two day conference about enterprise search in New York City), the data bunny made a brief and long-awaited appearance. The introduction to the end note made a note that her name was henceforth ‘search bunny’. After the laughter subsided, I made these points to summarize the more than 36 presentation dilivered over the 14 hours of the formal program.
The Data Bunny makes an appearance
First, this conference marked the first major meeting about enterprise that discussed ways to improve usability of existing systems and move beyond key word retrieval. The point was that most enterprise search users don’t feel comfortable sticking words and phrases in a search box and then perusing lists of results to see if the magic answer has been delivered.
Second, research data from my work and other industry experts substantiate the need for alternative interfaces. Graphics, although tasty eye candy, are not the answer. Information must be provided in a manner that meets the needs of individual users and the work task at hand. Forcing a laundry list of results on every user is out of step with today’s information environment.
Third, interfaces can use mobile functionality such as that available from Coveo’s mobile mail search service. An interface can combine a search box with a list of topics and categories like the one on the Oracle Technology Network’s Web site which is based on Siderean Software’s technology. Google has disclosed in a patent application an interface that presents a dossier or report. Instead of a list of topics, the output includes facts about the topic. One feature is a hot link to a map showing the location of the subject. There is no one-size-fits-all solution.
To wrap up the conference, the audience was challenged to:
- Demand more from vendors. Passivity, which allows the vendor to lead the licensee, has to give way to the licensee getting the vendor to deliver the solution the organization needs to succeed.
- Recognize that Google’s more than 9,500 Google Search Appliance licensees are buying into the idea that complex search is expensive, expensive, and prone to problems. Simplicity, stability, and extensibility are more important than 1,001 meaningless features.
- Embrace the opportunity to take a clean sheet of paper and redeine search in terms of information access.
The novelty of typing in two words and getting some results has given way to a greater appetite to solutions that work in the context of a work task.
After the formal presentation, several of the more than 300 in the audience, posed some questions. Here’s a summary of the questions that were asked more than one time:
Question: What’s the future of metadata and taxonomies?
Answer: Metadata is becoming more important. News types of metadata — who changed what in a document when? Who were the recipients of the document? — and similar trans-meta types of tagging are the next wave in metadata. So, the work associated with metadata is in its infancy.
Question: Why do you say ‘Search is dead?’
Answer: That’s shorthand for saying, “Most users don’t want to be shackled to a search box. Some users will want the search box as a primary means of access. A larger number of users want options for access. The search box, therefore, can no longer be the primary access vehicle in my opinion.
Question: Why did you mention only three companies?
Answer: I speak extemporaneously. I don’t read my talks. The examples–Coveo, Google, and Oracle–seemed relevant when I put together my examples 30 minutes before my remarks. I would like to have time to name many other vendors. I track the search and content processing technology of more than 50 organizations. In 20 minutes, there are hard limits on what I can do.
Question: Are you paid for these types of remarks?
Answer: I charge for everything. If organizations did not pay me, I would not be able to fund my research, pay for dog food, or buy airline tickets. As a consultant, my product is my time. Therefore, to use my time means that the conference organizer has to pay me.
Stephen Arnold, May 21, 2008
Payola Pony or Nerd Stallion: Who Will Win the Search Derby?
May 21, 2008
The software maker plans on Wednesday to launch a cash back program to those who buy things after using its search.
An IQ Boost for Traditional Publishers
May 21, 2008
Traditional publishers face stormy seas in leaky boats. Translation: business models don’t float in today’s data stream.
Miles 33 Financial Group is a company I learned about when a friend from the UK visited with me in early May 2008. The company provides services for the legal and publishing industry.
In March 2008, the company bought Datamix Ltd., Property Wizard, and net-linx Publishing Solutions. You can wade through the company’s announcements about its buying spree here. (I’m a bit fuzzy on how these moving parts mesh to form a lean, mean revenue machine, but I’m old and dumbed down by my backwoods’ ways.)
Miles 33 said that it would resell IQ4BIS, a system that caught my attention because of its name. As it was explained to me, “IQ” means smart, “4” is a preposition, and “BIS” equates to business intelligence system. IQ4BIS offers an easy-to-use business intelligence solution. Miles 33 will explain, package, and resell this system to publishers.
The idea is that Miles 33 will provide an analytic bundle consisting of modules to analyze ad revenues, accounts receivables and circulation data for their print and electronic properties. A typical report, which can be generated without involving an analyst or programmer, looks like this:
IQ4BIS runs on Microsoft Windows and has connectors for Microsoft Dynamics and other enterprise applications. You can learn more about IQ4BIS here.
ArnoldIT.com hopes publishers embrace this point-and-click approach to analytics. As revenues erode, publishing will need superior business intelligence to outfox the wisdom of crowds. Influential demographics are embracing digital information, not the books, newspapers, and magazines that I find so enjoyable. The leaky business model may be able to plug some leaks with improved business intelligence. It’s none too soon.
Stephen Arnold, May 21, 2008
eDiscovery
May 21, 2008
I’m at the Enterprise Search Summit in New York City. There’s quite a bit of talk about eDiscovery. What’s missing are a number of vendors who compete in this market sector. To fill this gap, here’s a partial list of vendors in this sector. Let me know if you have others whom you want me to add to this list.
| Company | Comment |
| AlphaLit | Litigation support and discovery document management |
| Applied Discovery | Electronic discovery |
| Digital Mountain Inc. | Discovery management – electronic discovery, computer forensics,data collection, filtering and processing |
| Discovery Mining | Hosted platform to manage electronic documents for regulation, retention and litigation. |
| EED, Inc. | Electronic evidence discovery |
| eMag Solutions | Electronic discovery, data conversion and data recovery, computer forensics |
| Global Digital Forensics | Computer forensics, electronic discovery, security auditing |
| InterLegis | Electronic discovery and data analytics |
| Kroll Ontrack | Electronic discovery, computer forensics, ESI consulting |
| LDiscovery | Electronic discovery and digital forensics |
| LitSoft, Inc. | Electronic discovery (Web 2.0) |
| Oce Business Services | Document process support, archiving and records management services |
| Recommind | Electronic discovery, enterprise search, email and information access management |
| RenewData | Electronic discovery, ESI risk management, evidence storage |
| RVM Inc. | Litigation support, document and content management |
| Techlaw Solutions | Electronic discovery,litigation support, information management |
Stephen Arnold, May 21, 2008
Database Shift to Data Management
May 20, 2008
The troubles with traditional databases are legion. Even die-hard database administrators struggle to cope with inflating data tables,increased transaction loads, and the grunt work required to keepthese systems running. Sure, RDBMS works, but the cost and hassles are creating opportunities.
MySpace.com–whose catastrophic outage annoyed teen users–has licensed Aster Data Systems next-generation data managment system. Click here for IDG’s scoop. (Hurry. Some IDG stories can become tough to find after a day or two online.)
Aster’s approach is to distribute data over nodes. The company uses “tiers” to handle specific functions. A loader tier handles data intake and export. A queen tier adds intelligence to data management and database operations.
Aster includes management and analytic tools. According to the company’s Web site, the principal benefits of the approach are:
- Easier scaling
- Fault tolerance
- Better performance.
The founders of Aster are products of Stanford University, and the system shares some broad design features with Google’s data management techniques. Pricing for the system begins at about $100,000.
Stephen Arnold, May 20, 2008
Malik’s Microsoft Memos: Another OMinous Insight
May 20, 2008
A happy quack to GigaOM, Om Malik’s useful Web log. The story is ‘Yet Another Microsoft Memo.’
The head of search, Satya Nadella, announces YARIS or yet another reorganization in search. GigaOM provides the list of executives involved in this deck shuffle.
Mr. Nadella’s assertions about what Microsoft has to do to close the Grand Canyon sized gap with Google gave me pause. The to do list includes:
- Invest in MSN (paraphrase)
- Build expertise in media and technology (paraphrase)
- “Create an organization that wherever possible helped drive global and cross network capability while always enabling and empowering the local aspects of our media business (direct quote)
These three points strike me as very important. I think the Live.com brand is for the moment taking a back seat to Live.com. I’ve been confused about MSN-Live-Hotmail for months.
The notion of adding people and knowledge seems okay on the surface. But
Microsoft has quite a few bright people based on my limited exposure to
the company. With more than 80,000 employees, hiring more may not
pay immediate dividends particularly when the competitor is moving along
at a quick pace.
The notion of local media evokes Craigslist.org to me, not ads for the
auto mechanic in Harrod’s Creek, Kentucky.
To be truthful, I can’t figure out Mirosoft’s new direction, if I understand Mr. Nadella’s writing.
But the point that confuses me is this, and I quote:
Lastly it’s imperative that we set up for blurring the lines between Portal and Search to drive experiences that enable more seamless exploration of content across the search continuum. We want the combined expertise of the team to drive this innovation and also create more scale with vertical efforts.
The thoughts nagging me concern the Web indexing and Web search
capabilities of Fast Searh & Transfer. Microsoft paid $1.2 billion
for a company now spidering and indexing the Web for Yahoo. This is Fast Search
& Transfer, and I think it does a better job of search than ‘regular’
Yahoo search. Furthermore, Fast Search & Transfer is headed by a
technical wizard who knows how to scale Web search. Dr. John Lervik,
prior to refocusing fast on enterprise search, was giving Google a
run for its money.
Mr. Nardella, if I understand what he’s saying, wants to work across
‘the search spectrum’. His team, which doesn’t seem to include
the Fast Search experts, will create ‘more scale with vertical
efforts’. Frankly I don’t know what this means. ‘Scale’ is required
to index the Web and delivery the services built on top of search.
Without scale, there’s little chance of catching Google. My research
has revealed that ‘vertical search’ is one of those buzzwords that
people use without defining.
‘Vertical search’ is little more than a subset of content organized
around a topics or function. So far, vertical search has not been able
to generate the revenue needed to make it the game saver some want it
to be. Check out the financial performance of Convera, a search firm
that focuses on vertical search.
Bottomline: I can’t mesh this Microsoft memorandum with the
current buzz about a deal for Yahoo’s search business. Instead of
clarifying the search strategy at Mircrosoft, the reorganization and
the lingo in Mr. Nardella’s memo communicate fuzziness to me.
I don’t think Google will be shaking with fear after perusing
this document. A happy quack to GigaOM.com.
Stephen Arnold, May 20, 2008
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
