Santa is bringing coal for Google--shoveling up a ton of it
Summary: Can Google reign in its ambitions and slow down its red-shift acceleration in new business launches--and let society catch-up?
The general sentiment towards Google has definitely turned negative lately. It's to be expected, such things come and go, we've seen it time and time again.
The media hoist companies onto a pedestal, write adoring articles, and then kick-in the pedestal. Or try to
The negative sentiment could all just be part of an expected reversal in the media tides, or it could be something more serious. It could be that Google is unable to control its ambitions and is moving way too fast--too fast for everybody's comfort.
In Silicon Valley, Google is thought of as the giant sucking sound [along with Yahoo], sucking in all the cool companies, top engineers, and out innovating Sand Hill VCs' finest portfolio companies.
If you were to take a look at all the products that Google (and Yahoo) have launched this year, you would be stunned. And it is this red shift acceleration in the rate of Google's product/service launches that is going to lead to problems.
It's because culture moves slowly. The reason we have been able to absorb many of the new and novel internet services such as deli.cio.us and many others, is that we had some lag time to catch up with.
I'm talking about a cultural lag time, in that we had spent the dot-bomb fall-out years getting very comfortable with internet technologies. It has all seeped nearly invisibly into our surroundings.
These days, there often feels to be a tighter linkage between the pace of technology change--and our society's reflection of those changes in its speech, mannerisms, and concepts. Even so, culture changes slowly, and a tighter linkage can work in both ways.
A cultural sonic boom
The danger that Google faces is that it is moving way too fast--and it will create a cultural sonic boom that will shatter many windows. And usually, such booms result in protests and the clipping of wings. [As in Concorde--the British-French supersonic airliner.]
Can Google, even let's ask, should Google slow things down? Fiduciary duties to shareholders would preclude slowing things down. And I'm not sure Google can slow things down without damaging its internal culture of innovation.
Which means you should tape up your windows :-)
Kick off your day with ZDNet's daily email newsletter. It's the freshest tech news and opinion, served hot. Get it.
Talkback
Too late
More "Google Hype"
Too, much, too fast, but no track record in these areas, and not much to show for alot of the talk.
And thses days, you really can't believe anything as you really don't know who owns what stocks these days. Alot of hype comes from trying to get a big payout from a stock purchase/sale...
Never mind the man behind the curtain
Sad to say, in the free market of ideas, the only product Google has that ever been sucessful with in reality, once the Google Halo wears off, is search.
J.Ja
I disagree
Ok - I'm taking the bait
Add to it that Schmidt has been trying to hit Microsoft since Novell was sidelined as a NOS. He learned from the NT days - make your product work with the competitor's service.
Too fast for whom
are u serious?
How does Google save us from Microsoft?
This is an idea that has been gnawing at me for some time now. Why do people feel that Microsoft and Google are competitors? Google has nothing to do with the vast majority of the markets that Microsoft makes money in. The last I checked, Google does NOT make any of the following products:
* An operating system
* A network operating system
* An office suite
* CRM
* Video games (hardware and software)
* Programming tools
* Database servers
* Email servers
* Other backend servers
OK, Google and a division of Microsoft compete (MSN), but honestly, is Microsoft actually making money on MSN? Even if MSN is a loss leader, is anyone adopting other Microsoft technologies or paying for other Microsoft products as a result of MSN? I think not.
MSN was originally a way to help push Internet Explorer, which would help push Microsoft's "embrace and extend" technologies like ActiveX. While Internet Explorer thrived, it was more due to it shipping with the OS than anything else. Heck, you needed IE to go download Netscape. Few people took up Microsoft technologies in a way that made it impossible for non-IE users to work with their sites. The end result? Microsoft never managed to lock users into IE.
Until the day when Google releases any of the above products, that are substantially different and/or better than Microsoft's existing competitors in those fields, I really don't see how Google has anything to do with Microsoft, or Microsoft's revenue stream.
J.Ja
It isn't Google vs MS
Santa is bringing us coal...since the dot-bomb
As a whole, the internet content/services industry isn't innovating, it is like a glacier, moving along inperceptably by its own weight.
Slow the Pace of Innovation?
Define ?cultural sonic boom"
Tom Foremski needs to define ?cultural sonic boom? and give a practical example analogous to breaking windows! That WAS his point. How exactly will slow acceptance cause a sonic boom?
Reminiscent of past MonopolieS?
So, those of you who misunderstood this wise columnist, go ahead: go ahead and raise your Google banners high; go ahead and mock my response as you play the role of the noble Google defendant. Just spare us the whimpering and whining when the Google dynasty is swallowed up in the complaints and lawsuits of a society whose panties get wadded up at the mere thought of another company monopolizing the world of personal and business computing...we've all been through that once before...
Harm or Benefit?