Do any of you see a pattern forming where Google may start becoming very similar to Microsoft in how they will become controlling over everything? I am a great great fan of Google besides they liked my websites but now I begin to fear that what happens if they change their 'nice' manner to a similar Microsoft attitude? voi voi
they seem to have a better attitude towards everything, more so than microsoft. They at least present themselves as more likable and user oriented than microsoft, but its true they are branching into all the large internet markets. I'm not too concerned yet, i've been impressed with every project they've taken on
You could just do a search if you wanted to read about why everyone thinks the man and big business are bad. Here we go...
I still think they are very different though. Google is starting to offer different services but they have to compete on the merit of that service. For instance gMail is actually better then Yahoo and Hotmail. Microsoft bundles etc to get market share, usually not offering a better product, just a better distributed one.
if only my gmail would load today getting the mail on my desktop just cant get into the application as mentioned .. big fan of the googlegook but would hate for them to become another Microsoft entity in attitude maybe things have changed and that 1 company cannot bully everyone into a corner to monopolise the market but who knows Pluto
The biggest difference between Google and Microsoft (that I can see) is Google is about innovation... inventing new things. Microsoft doesn't do that... they acquire, rebrand and market. I can't think of the last time that Microsoft did something "first".
That makes me ask though, since I'm stuck on the beta issue. What has google finished? I'm not disagreeing with ya, but they sure have alot of services they are "testing".
Personally I like Google using the beta tag on so much stuff. Their beta stuff is much better than other companies final stuff... and it just shows they still don't think it's good enough.
I find that assessment from an investors point of view kinda amusing. hehe Imagine if Ford or GM put out a car and said, it's not what we intend to really market, we don't think it's good enough, but here, try this. I mean a few may try, but serioulsy, they would not do well IMO. But I don't invest, too scared.
Probably a big reason why anything that has to do with money isn't "beta" (like AdWords and AdSense).
At least google isn't lying about it. They could just call it "production" even though it's still beta. There's been a lot of recalls of cars, and stuff has taken a long time to be recognized as problem. Like firestone tire thing, and this http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/06/16/ford.vehicles/ . In some ways, it might be better to call something beta, so if it breaks you don't look like a total fool. =)
I have yet to see any information about Google being predatory the way Microsoft has. Microsoft isn't evil because of their licensing mechanisms or their security hole-laden software. Those are things that go with the territory when you are the biggest. Microsoft is evil because they use their monopoly muscle to bully companies around and force other markets to comply. Microsoft engineers are actually sincere in trying to "innovate", but they fail because the company has an intrinsic nature of not thinking things completely through and also of thinking that everything lives in a microsoft universe. Google opens new markets and leads them. In existing markets that they penetrate - like maps - they come to market with new ideas that are better in order to gain marketshare. I don't know if the Google Executive team is that idealistic, but the nature of what they do doesn't really allow them to be predatory. If they started penalizing sites because they mentioned yahoo, it would be a big to-do and they would lose significant marketshare quickly. Being nice got them to where they are today and they should follow that pattern at least for the next several years.
This is like listening to the "My dad is stronger than your dad" argument on the playground. If either company dropped out, someone would take the place quickly. Even though we bitch, everyone likes standards. That is the duality of the market.