4 ms·

Would MSFT or Yahoo really pay more though?

jakobegger 9y ago
If Google stopped paying, Apple could ask users during setup which search engine they want to use, instead of using Google by default. Right now you can choose in the settings app between Google, Bing, Yahoo and Duck Duck Go, but only a small percentage of people change the setting. If the setting was more prominent, and Google wasn’t the preselected first option, Google would lose a lot of market share on iOS.
- empath75 9y ago
  I really doubt that this is true. Google didn't just accidentally become the search engine of choice for the internet. People chose to use it.
  - Eridrus 9y ago
    Google was 10X better than alternatives when it was created and for a long time thereafter, but it's definitely not 10X better than Bing now. Google is not as dominant in other markets as the US.
    - tedeh 9y ago
      Actually Google is way more dominant outside of the US than in it, particularly in Europe (>90 % market share), as this 2015 Atlantic article about anti trust measures tells us about: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/04/europeans-use-google-way-way-more-than-americans-do/390612/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/04/europ... In my native Sweden, using anything other than Google is pretty much unheard of. I believe the average American internet user is ahead of the curve in this respect, using Bing and other search engines which are probably as good for most queries as Google is.
      - gommm 9y ago
        The thing is that Google is quite a bit better than Bing when it comes to localized search results outside of the US. I try to stay away from Google and use DDG but if I search for anything local outside, Google's results are much better than the competition
      - Eridrus 9y ago
        You're right, I got the direction confused. Though Russia has low Google usage, probably due to Yandex. China also has very little usage, but I assume that it's more than just Baidu.
        kalleboo 9y ago
        And Japan has Yahoo! Japan (28% market share and stable)
  - kharms 9y ago
    It's interesting that your respect toward google doesn't extend to their decision to pay apple. I suspect google, being as good as they are with data, wouldn't pay apple if it didn't make sense.
  - smhenderson 9y ago
    End users just don't always notice or care. Most search engines are reasonably good at returning results for basic queries. As long is it's "good enough" most people don't even notice they have a choice and make the switch. Sure, you and I do, but as another poster said the HN demographic isn't the norm here.
    - johnsmith21006 9y ago
      Not true in Mobile. Bing is not very good in comparison to Google. Then with MS down to 6.5% share in the US for all devices it will just get worse. http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/all/united-states-of-america http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/all/uni...
  - justacat 9y ago
    I agree people choose Google, but at this point I expect I could switch search engines on a 100 people's phones, and you'd end up with a few categories: 1. People who don't even notice the change 2. People who notice, but are too lazy or ignorant to change it 3. People who notice, put off changing it, and leave it 4. People who notice, but consider searching results a commodity product at this point and don't care 5. People who notice, have a real preference AND actually change it back Obviously I'm too lazy to write all of the possibilities, but I find the differences in search engines to be less and less noticeable at this point. Of course, I have no actual expertise in search engines beyond personal experience so this is just me typing on the internet.
  - ocdtrekkie 9y ago
    You're right in that Google didn't just accidentally become the "search engine of choice for the Internet", but wrong in that "people chose to use it". Google started with paying other software companies to bundle Google Toolbar in with their software, which would change your default search to Google. (This behavior was later changed to Google Chrome, which you still get with a dozen other programs today.) This is actually a big part of Sundar Pichai's claim to fame at Google, and likely chiefly why he is CEO today: He's responsible for Google being the default place for search. As noted in this article, Google has been paying to be default on the iPhone for years, and Google used to be the highest bidder for Firefox's default search spot as well (and still is in several other countries besides the US). People use the default, and Google invested an incredible amount of money in ensuring they were the default everywhere. Google has been the default in both Chrome and Firefox for many years, and used the Toolbar to change people's default in IE, and has also been the default on both iOS and Android mobile phones. And that is why Google has the market share it does today.
    - johnsmith21006 9y ago
      Google is the dominate search because it is just a lot better. That was true over Altavista and true today. Saying anything otherwise is ridiculous. Heck MS owns PC and down to tiny share with Bing. Look at browsers in 2016 we had 300 million leave and mostly go to Google. http://www.businessinsider.com/300-million-users-ditched-microsoft-browsers-2016-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/300-million-users-ditched-mic... Over 300 million users ditched Microsoft's browsers in 2016 ...
- telcodud 9y ago
  Is there any reason to believe that Apple would even have this setting, if Google stopped paying them billions? After all, there's no setting to use a different browser, maps app, etc., by default.
frandroid 9y ago
Yahoo is currently being sold for spare parts, and they're effectively out of the search business. Their search is mostly powered by Bing anyway. It would be a huge propaganda and traffic coup for MSFT to be the default search engine on iPhone. MSFT won't pay /more/ than Google (if they were currently willing to do so, they would already by the default), but if Google was to not pay, MSFT would definitely jump in and pay Apple something, which is better than nothing.
- wodenokoto 9y ago
  Do you know what will happen to the Yahoo-Mozilla deal?
moduspwnens14 9y ago
It might already be priced just above what competitors are perceived to be willing to pay. For all we know, its actual value to Google is much higher than what they're paying, but with nobody else able or willing to pay what it's actually worth, they're able to pay much less. Another factor worth considering is that Apple's been pushing pretty strong for user privacy across the platform. It's possible they're leveraging that to extract more from Google, when other providers (like DuckDuckGo) might pay less, but be willing to offer better privacy protections.

If Google stopped paying, Apple could ask users during setup which search engine they want to use, instead of using Google by default. Right now you can choose in the settings app between Google, Bing, Yahoo and Duck Duck Go, but only a small percentage of people change the setting. If the setting was more prominent, and Google wasn’t the preselected first option, Google would lose a lot of market share on iOS.

empath75 9y ago
I really doubt that this is true. Google didn't just accidentally become the search engine of choice for the internet. People chose to use it.
- Eridrus 9y ago
  Google was 10X better than alternatives when it was created and for a long time thereafter, but it's definitely not 10X better than Bing now. Google is not as dominant in other markets as the US.
  - tedeh 9y ago
    Actually Google is way more dominant outside of the US than in it, particularly in Europe (>90 % market share), as this 2015 Atlantic article about anti trust measures tells us about: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/04/europeans-use-google-way-way-more-than-americans-do/390612/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/04/europ... In my native Sweden, using anything other than Google is pretty much unheard of. I believe the average American internet user is ahead of the curve in this respect, using Bing and other search engines which are probably as good for most queries as Google is.
    - gommm 9y ago
      The thing is that Google is quite a bit better than Bing when it comes to localized search results outside of the US. I try to stay away from Google and use DDG but if I search for anything local outside, Google's results are much better than the competition
    - Eridrus 9y ago
      You're right, I got the direction confused. Though Russia has low Google usage, probably due to Yandex. China also has very little usage, but I assume that it's more than just Baidu.
      - kalleboo 9y ago
        And Japan has Yahoo! Japan (28% market share and stable)
- kharms 9y ago
  It's interesting that your respect toward google doesn't extend to their decision to pay apple. I suspect google, being as good as they are with data, wouldn't pay apple if it didn't make sense.
- smhenderson 9y ago
  End users just don't always notice or care. Most search engines are reasonably good at returning results for basic queries. As long is it's "good enough" most people don't even notice they have a choice and make the switch. Sure, you and I do, but as another poster said the HN demographic isn't the norm here.
  - johnsmith21006 9y ago
    Not true in Mobile. Bing is not very good in comparison to Google. Then with MS down to 6.5% share in the US for all devices it will just get worse. http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/all/united-states-of-america http://gs.statcounter.com/search-engine-market-share/all/uni...
- justacat 9y ago
  I agree people choose Google, but at this point I expect I could switch search engines on a 100 people's phones, and you'd end up with a few categories: 1. People who don't even notice the change 2. People who notice, but are too lazy or ignorant to change it 3. People who notice, put off changing it, and leave it 4. People who notice, but consider searching results a commodity product at this point and don't care 5. People who notice, have a real preference AND actually change it back Obviously I'm too lazy to write all of the possibilities, but I find the differences in search engines to be less and less noticeable at this point. Of course, I have no actual expertise in search engines beyond personal experience so this is just me typing on the internet.
- ocdtrekkie 9y ago
  You're right in that Google didn't just accidentally become the "search engine of choice for the Internet", but wrong in that "people chose to use it". Google started with paying other software companies to bundle Google Toolbar in with their software, which would change your default search to Google. (This behavior was later changed to Google Chrome, which you still get with a dozen other programs today.) This is actually a big part of Sundar Pichai's claim to fame at Google, and likely chiefly why he is CEO today: He's responsible for Google being the default place for search. As noted in this article, Google has been paying to be default on the iPhone for years, and Google used to be the highest bidder for Firefox's default search spot as well (and still is in several other countries besides the US). People use the default, and Google invested an incredible amount of money in ensuring they were the default everywhere. Google has been the default in both Chrome and Firefox for many years, and used the Toolbar to change people's default in IE, and has also been the default on both iOS and Android mobile phones. And that is why Google has the market share it does today.
  - johnsmith21006 9y ago
    Google is the dominate search because it is just a lot better. That was true over Altavista and true today. Saying anything otherwise is ridiculous. Heck MS owns PC and down to tiny share with Bing. Look at browsers in 2016 we had 300 million leave and mostly go to Google. http://www.businessinsider.com/300-million-users-ditched-microsoft-browsers-2016-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/300-million-users-ditched-mic... Over 300 million users ditched Microsoft's browsers in 2016 ...
telcodud 9y ago
Is there any reason to believe that Apple would even have this setting, if Google stopped paying them billions? After all, there's no setting to use a different browser, maps app, etc., by default.

frandroid 9y ago

Yahoo is currently being sold for spare parts, and they're effectively out of the search business. Their search is mostly powered by Bing anyway. It would be a huge propaganda and traffic coup for MSFT to be the default search engine on iPhone. MSFT won't pay /more/ than Google (if they were currently willing to do so, they would already by the default), but if Google was to not pay, MSFT would definitely jump in and pay Apple something, which is better than nothing.

wodenokoto 9y ago
Do you know what will happen to the Yahoo-Mozilla deal?

moduspwnens14 9y ago

It might already be priced just above what competitors are perceived to be willing to pay. For all we know, its actual value to Google is much higher than what they're paying, but with nobody else able or willing to pay what it's actually worth, they're able to pay much less. Another factor worth considering is that Apple's been pushing pretty strong for user privacy across the platform. It's possible they're leveraging that to extract more from Google, when other providers (like DuckDuckGo) might pay less, but be willing to offer better privacy protections.