Rage against the Google machine
With
Google just pounding and pounding the Internet marketplace in terms of
brand popularity (but not really product popularity) and revenues, a
likely partnership is starting to solidify between Google’s two top
competitors — Yahoo! and Microsoft. This past week, both companies
announced that they would make the Yahoo! Messenger and MSN/Windows
Messenger instant-messaging programs interoperable. Instead of having
multiple instant-messaging programs open, you could use either program
to communicate with you MSN or Yahoo! buddies. Strangely, AOL Instant
Messenger, one of the the world’s most popular IM services, was not
included.What does a partnership like this signal? It says that little
by little, Google’s competitors want to start nipping away at other
pieces of the Google pie, as both Microsoft and Yahoo! probably will
never be able to catch up to Google’s dominance in the Internet search
area — which brings, for now, tons of profits to the Google folks.
But, why attack instant messaging? Google’s Google Talk product is a
stripped-down instant messaging client that has failed to gain hardly
any traction against Yahoo!, AIM or MSN Messenger — so why attack
it?Well, it’s not being attacked more than Google itself it. The brand
is so strong with consumers that every needle prick into the Google
universe is not a bad idea — one of them will eventually hurt. With
Yahoo! just recently partnering with eBay to be the sole provider of
paid search advertising on eBay’s world-leading auction site, the
picture is that the entire online world is against Google, and all
angles are being shored up every day. How will Google respond? If it
continues to give customers what they want and how they want it
(easy-to-use solutions delivered fast and efficiently), it has little
to worry about. For now.