GGF: An Acronym of Angst
December 4, 2010
Mr. Goose is back in the US of A. I got more hugs from TSA than I did from the legions of people at my various talks in Paris and London. What did I spy when I opened my RSS reader after a fun filled nine hour flight from CDG?
Groupon is playing hard to get. You can read the cornucopia of posts yourself. I found this one amusing: “It All Changes When the Founder Drives a Porsche.” Here’s a sample:
With Groupon, with the money problem solved, they can “go for it.” Basically, the motivation for a big exit is no longer motivated by “how much money can I get,” it is motived by “what is my legacy.” That simple shift makes their rejection of Google’s $6B offer not that surprising.
Yep, solved. For now.
My take on the deal was GGF. The first G is Groupon, of course. The hammer dial, people centric coupon outfit. The second G is Google. The company is running into some rapids, and it needs a home run. Heck, if the Math Club can’t come up with something that works, just throw billions at the problem. The method used to work really well for Microsoft.
The F is Facebook. Contemplate friends and members couponing their teenaged hearts out. So GGF may be a triad to watch.
Stephen E Arnold, December 4, 2010
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People Search: Potentially a Big Problem for Google
December 3, 2010
I am not much on the social thing. Geese flock, just not in Facebook. Geese land in Harrod’s Creek. We eat some bugs, honk at friends, and then move on. In “Social Media’s Interaction With Content More Trustworthy Than Google Search”, there is a different way to tap into information. Despite the reference to a graphic comic book, the guts of the idea seems sound. Humans curate comment better than Google’s algorithms in certain situations. What! People better than the Math Club’s numerical recipes? Here’s a heretical passage:
So whether you categorize LIKES as ‘social links’ or ‘peoplelinks,’ the Open Graph appears to be gaining traction over Google’s old school SERPs (search engine result pages). Since LIKES can be tied back to a specific user, searchers of content can now determine whether a link is vetted by people they follow and trust. However since Google and Facebook are rivals, and ‘don’t play nice together,’ it would take a lot for Google to gain access to Facebook’s social graph data to incorporate into their ranking algorithm. According to Clay, he thinks that “we’re going to see that LIKES and referrals and recommendations (will cause) a general shift towards ‘quality’ of sites (not quantity),” and that Google’s methodology will lose out to Facebook.
Potential trouble for the Google:
- Different demographic may embrace Facebook. Control of a demographic is a big deal.
- Advertisers may want the details about a specific membership centric demographic
- Facebook has screwed up and kept on going. Google has screwed up and seems to have another major ship on the rocks. I refer not to Street View or its staff retention problems. I refer to Google TV.
The Facebook Google thing is similar to the North Korea – South Korea thing. Fighting cousins.
Stephen E Arnold, December 5, 2010
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Facebook, the Pain of Change, and the Web
December 3, 2010
I have been thinking about the sky-is-falling message in Tim Berners-Lee analysis of Facebook. Widely reported, the “inventor of the Web” sees Facebook as a flea carrying bubonic evil in the fur of entrepreneurs. In short, Facebook represents a shift from the Wild Web Web to a walled garden with security cameras and listening devices.
You can get a breezy run down of the anti-change message in the current Scientific American essay.
I can visualize a scene around the campfire in what would become Kansas. The conversationalists don’t have Facebook pages but both work for an outfit paying them to ride a bunch of horses in serial like Christmas tree lights from one cow town to another.
Cowboy 1: What’cha think of that tel-ee-graph thing?
Cowboy 2: I think it’s-a goin’ to be less personal than us’ns takin’ the mail to folks we know.
Cowboy 1: Yep, I think it is the end of the mail delivery as we know it.
Cowboy 2: I would like to shoot the varmints that want to ruin a perfectly good way to communicate.
I think I could have heard a grousing clay tablet expert yammer about papyrus. The print dudes are struggling with twisted knickers over digital today.
What’s a-goin’ on today, partner?
First, the good old Web is already gone. Email is collateral damage. The mantra of Gordon Gekko has enchanted enough people to make information the equivalent of manipulated messages. So, the Web is dead and it is not coming back. Ever.
Second, the pace of change is accelerating. The reason is money, not what users need or think each needs. Greed is good and greed is transformative.
Third, walled gardens solve a lot of problems. Customers are chained to specific vendors. Captivity is what makes accountants happy. Captive customers behave in a predictable way and for budgeting purposes, that predictability is the chief good.
One can take different sides of the argument. That diversity is what passes for critical thinking today. Before grousing about Facebook, I think it is useful to look at the data. Facebook has stickiness, 650 million users, and a growing arsenal of features. Why go anywhere else?
Research has been changed. I like the word “devolve”. The Web is on a long hill with a street named decline. Remember the telephone and its early supporters’ idea that it would be used to disseminate important news. The phone today is the stuff that makes 12 years old have goose bumps. Change. Already accomplished.
Just my opinion.
Stephen E Arnold, December 3, 2010
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What’s going on?
Facebook Flexes its Facial Muscles
November 27, 2010
“Facebook Comprises Nearly 25% of Page Views in the US” reports Read Write Web, a rather shocking figure. The article states: “According to Hitwise stats, for the week ending November 13, 24.27 percent of page views were to Facebook, almost four times the volume of the site ranked number two – YouTube, with “only” 6.93 percent of all page views. Even YouTube plus Google’s search combined only comprise around 12 percent of page views.” Of course, counting page views is not quite the same as counting unique visitors and mobile views weren’t counted at all. Still, this is one more piece of evidence that Facebook continues to dominate the web, with no end in sight.
Alice Wasielewski, November 27, 2010
Google Chapter and Face Book Metaphor
November 24, 2010
I read “For Google, Social Networking Is Just One Chapter of the Book.” I was confused. The article summarizes alleged comments by Google’s top bean counter, Patrick Pichette. I understand the soft shoe around “don’t be evil.” Google has managed to trigger legal push back on every continent. I understand the cheerleading about Android, which is not a Google grassroots development. A solid acquisition for sure. But Android has to deal with the fragmentation issue, various telecommunications companies with Bell head DNA, and the problem of the “app”. In my opinion, Android doesn’t yet have a killer app and Verizon has bumped Google Search for the somewhat disappointing Bing.com search service.
The baffler was “chapter.” I found this passage difficult to decode:
“The digital world is exploding and it has so many chapters — it has cloud computing, it has mobile, it does have social, it has searches, it has so many elements. (…) Yes, absolutely it will be part of our strategy, yes it will be embedded in many of our products. But at the same time remember it’s one chapter of an entire book,” said Google’s chief financial officer Patrick Pichette to Australian public television on Sunday.
Google is a search system with ads. Like a young novelists first book, Google harvested deep consideration of search. By chance, Hewlett Packard fumbled AltaVista.com and Google got a jump start from some former DEC engineers. Then the Google “don’t be evil” crowd sought artistic inspiration from GoTo.com/Overture.com which were part of Yahoo. The legal matter was made to go away, and Google became the “go to” company for search.
The company’s efforts outside of search have been met with mixed results. The big new thing is the social craziness, and Google has managed to flub its opportunities. First, there was Orkut, then Wave, and then Buzz. I heard that Google is not building a Facebook killer. I understand that. Facebook is different from Google, and Google is trotting out “chapter” metaphors.
Wrong. Facebook is a new book. Different author, different audience, and different utility—there is no chapter at Google’s wordsmithing operation for Facebook. The name “Facebook” is apt. Google does search and wrote that book. It was a best seller. New “book” and a new bestseller is here. Wrong metaphor. Google can do knock offs, but it did not write the Facebook. Hey, Google is the math club, not a poetry club like so many fawning mid tier consulting firms.
Google is not in the Face Book. Maybe Google is a chapter in the Digital Domesday Book?
Stephen E Arnold, November 24, 2010
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Facebook: Dating Effloresces
November 18, 2010
The Facebook announcement triggered a flood of posts, punditry, and pandering. I quite liked “Locked in Paradigms.” Most of the other posts I did not like so much. Venture Chronicles struck me as coming closer to the Facebook email-instant messaging-kitchen sink communications service. The write up said:
It’s easy to see why Facebook is keeping Google executive up at night… they are innovating at the edge and at the core simultaneously, have complete control over users social graphs while Google has to piece it together, and have a distribution capability that is only rivaled by Google. Most significantly, Facebook doesn’t seem restrained by the way that common applications, like messaging, have always worked and their ability to lever into 3rd party applications gives them an enormous advantage just at the moment.
Facebook is riding a wave and generating buzz. Google lost the wave and people turned down the buzz. Dating has effloresced at Facebook. Membership versus generic services seems to have the magic. How long will Facebook’s momentum persist? Google’s run up was quick. Facebook’s may be quicker. Microsoft’s trajectory suggests that we are talking years. But the Facebook social Swiss Army knife will probably gut AOL and Yahoo. Collateral damage in my opinion. Oh, and if you want to know why some folks wax enthusiastic over Facebook, read this article. No comment about this percentage for the Math Club.
Stephen E Arnold, November 18, 2010
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A Real Jab at Google: Facebook and Artificial Intelligence
November 18, 2010
I know that the poobahs swarming around the various summits and “numbered” conferences are excited about the future presented through Dollar General eye glasses. Not me. I am warm and comfy at the goose pond, reading “DST CEO Yuri Milner: Facebook Will Help Power Artificial Intelligence In Ten Years.” In my opinion the comments about Facebook and artificial intelligence are more important than the Beatles on iTunes, the wacky predictions of a bubblicious venture firm, and the last gasps of companies ready for the rest homes.
Here’s the passage I noted:
Milner believes that Facebook could be one of the platforms that drives the development of Artificial Intelligence over the next decade or so. AI probably isn’t the first thing you think about these days when it comes to Facebook, but he has a point — that the site processes an incredible amount of data, and it has the potential to develop powerful filtering tools using both this content and social signals.
Please, read the original write up. I want to offer three observations and then paddle back to the shore for a evening snack of day old bread.
First, the remark underscores the importance of “member” input where the crazed postings are complemented by whatever data the “member” provides. Data with these characteristics are likely to be better than numerical recipes that try to build data sets and fill in the blanks. Google is better at the numerical recipe work; Facebook is a leader in the crazed postings and “member” provided data. Facebook has an advantage.
Second, the comment adds another example of Google’s inability to regain the momentum the firm had in brute force search prior to 2006 or 2007. Until thee pivotal years, it was Google’s world. The emergence of Facebook as a player in a key technical activity is like an aging athlete who finally hears, “You can’t do it any more, bud.” Ouch.
Third, Facebook is now officially a technical problem for Google. The Xooglers at Google know the weak spots and I think Facebook will exploit them. After I learned about the Facebook “permanent distraction” approach to communication, the flaws of Google’s offerings become much more obvious.
Check out the interview.
Stephen E Arnold, November 18, 2010
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Google Gives Advice to Facebook
November 15, 2010
No, really. Googlers are telling Facebook what to do to become more social. This comes from the outfit that rolled out Orkut to the delight of certain interesting user communities in Brazil and Buzz to the annoyance of many users. Google had to pay a fine for its social sensitivity over that “Buzz” saw.
This is a metaphor for the Facebook parade. Why doesn’t Google have a band or a float or some twirlers in this spectacle?
Not surprisingly, Google executives continue to amuse this silly goose. Usually former English majors and mid-tier consulting firms crank out management malarkey. But Google is playing this game as well. I think it may be construed as further evidence that Google has begun to show its shrewish side, navigate to “Apps Must Be More Social, Says Google’s Barra.” The main point of the write up is that Google wants applications to be more social. This from the Math Club! Here’s the passage about the Googler’s presentation that caught my attention:
Social media should be an integral part of any app, and personalization will be a key to success, says Hugo Barra, Google director of mobile product management. At this year’s Monaco Media Forum, he refuted speculation Google would be launching its own social network platform, adding, “But we do think social is an ingredient for success for any app going forward. So we’re seeing social more as an ingredient rather than a vertical platform play.” He said personalization would be “absolutely huge” and “being able to relate the different signals that users give you, whether on Facebook or Google, will be a key to success”.
I need to waddle from the goose pond to the shore to think about this.
First, isn’t Google the company that is paying employees to refrain from quitting their job at Google. The numbers I recall are $1,000 and a 10 percent raise for the average wizard and 30 percent raise for the ultra wizard to stay. But the ultimo wizard was offered $3.5 million. Now that’s a management decision that warrants consideration? Google seems to believe that money buys happiness or at least keeping people from abandoning ship? Here’s a question, “Is purchased “love” the same as “real” love?”
Second, hasn’t the Google demonstrated that its interpersonal skills have annoyed some government procurement professionals and the US television broadcasters?
Reflections on Ask.com
November 13, 2010
Ask.com used to be the premier search engine for the Internet. According to the article, “IAC’s Barry Diller Surrenders to Google, Ends Ask.com’s Search Effort” they don’t even break the Top Five. Because of this backslide, Diller’s corporation will be laying off 130 engineers and letting the competition take most of its brute force, Web search business.
In the era before Yahoo and Google you could type in any question and your trusty guide, Jeeves, would take you anywhere you needed to go. Not anymore. It seems that Ask.com can no longer keep up with the Jones’s or, in this case, the Google. The write up asserted:
It’s become this huge juggernaut of a company that we really thought we could compete against by innovating. We did a great job of holding our market share but it wasn’t enough to grow the way IAC had hoped we would grow when it bought us.
Google has grown to be the world’s top search engine, and it seems to control 65 percent of the searches performed in the United States.
Some observations:
- How long will Google be able to sustain brute force indexing? The more interesting services use human input to deliver content.
- Who will be the next Google? Maybe it will be Facebook?
- With the rise of “training wheels” on search systems, will most users fiddle with key words? Won’t “get it fast, get it good enough” may become the competitive advantage?
Google is now the old man of search. I see the company moving clumsily. There was the “don’t go to Facebook” payoffs earlier this week. There is the Facebook game and Google watching from the cheap seats.
Changes afoot. I fondly recall the third tier consultant who told me that Ask.com was a winner. I assume that young person is now advising the movers and shakers about search and content processing. Maybe Google needs an advisor to help the firm move from the cheap seats to the starting line up?
Stephen E Arnold and Leslie Radcliff, November 13, 2010
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Forrester Expert Dings Zuckerberg
November 10, 2010
I don’t know the Facebook wizard Mark Zuckerberg. I haven’t seen the movie about Mark Zuckerberg. I don’t have much stock in the baloney that appears on Web sites—especially when that baloney includes executive biographies. Look at my bio at www.arnoldit.com/sitemap.html. Baloney. Look at the Google executive bios. Baloney. Look at consulting firms’ executive bios. Baloney. Look at a 20 something’s bio. Baloney.
Solid, fat filled, nutritional black holes. Baloney. Thus it is and thus it will ever be.
Picking apart a 20 something and criticizing his management expertise is pretty much a waste of time and indicative that an Angry Bird bone is stuck in one’s throat. Navigate to “Perspective On Zuckerberg”, written by one of the mid-tier consulting firms. Read it closely. Make up your own mind about what it is saying.
For me, grousing about a 20 something is like my quacking at a crow who wants the same chunk of bread this goose does. The crow doesn’t speak goose, doesn’t want to learn, and doesn’t want much more than the chunk of bread.
A mid tier consulting firm wants billable projects. When I read criticism of a high profile company and its top gun, I say to myself:
I think that a certain firm did not get a certain engagement. The best defense is a good offense. Let’s use the handy dandy blogosphere to point out why a certain company / person / product is deeply flawed.
Yes, this is how one 66 year old, addled goose in Harrod’s Creek thinks. My hunch is that there is a deep subtext in this consulting firms’ blog post. Will Mr. Zuckerberg care? Probably not. Will Facebook attorneys care? Maybe. I know Alexander the Great was a good manager despite some personal oddities handed down over the centuries. Does anyone in a history class care? Nah. Alexander conquered the world. Too bad he caught the sniffles and died. Bad luck, not bad management.
Do I expect a 20 something to combine the polish of a McKinsey partner, the insights of a Peter Drucker, and the financial acumen of a Warren Buffet? Not in a million years.
One thing about Mr. Zuckerberg is clear. He knows how to hire Xooglers. I don’t know how many mid tier consultants, former English majors, and wanna be techno-poobahs he has on his staff. I do know the 20 something has got the Google behind a social eight ball and Microsoft close to a side pocket. Not good enough for a mid tier consulting firm? Okay. Good enough for 600 million users, a growing base of banner ad customers, and some investment bankers? Yep.
Oh, and an important point: Mr. Zuckerberg is still alive, seems healthy, and appears to have the cash to hire some advisers. Maybe Forrester has found a magic sales method?
Stephen E Arnold, November 9, 2010
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