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Comparisons to Google are worthless, primarily for 2 reasons: 1. Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for fa

Comparisons to Google are worthless, primarily for 2 reasons: 1. Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for failure - there was no money in search. They got lucky in finding one -adwords - that worked. 2. Had the timing of their discovery been off, or had the dot-com bubble busted a few months earlier, they would have died. In saying that, they are useless as a measure of anything because they are such an anomaly that they shouldn't be used as a guidepost to success. In other words: If you were to operate the way Google did today, 99 times out of 100 you would fail. They are the exception to the rule. Although, PG's comparison to Facebook is apt, as they're also in the same position as Google was. I'll put my money on them being in the majority though. I did like Paul's point about VC's, but then again, you could extend that to how pretty much any industry operates. That's why innovation is so profitable, after all.

aswanson 19y ago
Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for failure From a make something people want theory of value, they were worth way more than anybody back then. I used to jump from engine to engine trying boolean queries, metacrawlers, keyword mixing, etc, coming up snake eyes. I think most engines were on the 'portal' kick, which I think meant beating people over the head with banner ads and trying to force them to go to content partners. I think if those sites just stopped for a second and histogrammed what users used rather than what they were trying to force them to do, it would have been absolutely obvious that search was the key.
- rms 19y ago
  I remember my search engine of choice was hotbot, because they had advanced search on the front page. And you sure as hell needed advanced search then.
deleted 19y ago
[deleted]
pg 19y ago
Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for failure I didn't think that. I remember telling the powers that be at Yahoo in 1999 (I worked there then) that they ought to buy Google, and it was the only company I ever suggested they buy.
- aston 19y ago
  Yahoo's MO at the time was to swap in the current "cool kid" of algorithmic search to fill out Yahoo's own search results. Google didn't really have much of a business outside of selling their results to folks like Yahoo, so I think many logical minds would've agreed that Google was heading for failure--short of being acquired by Yahoo or something other big guy in search. At the least, you'd have a hard time making a believable argument that they'd be making billions of dollars a year in less than a half decade. And, truthfully, an even harder time trying to make that same sort of argument if they were actually acquired by Yahoo.
- run4yourlives 19y ago
  Fair enough Paul, but I think we've already proved your as much an exception to the rule as Google is. :-) My point was that "most people" would have considered Google a bad investment prior to adwords. Given the response, it's obvious I should have been more clear.
gojomo 19y ago
1. Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for failure - there was no money in search. They got lucky in finding one -adwords - that worked. Lots of "logical minds" invested in Google in 1998. In 1999, Yahoo was profitable; Excite was bought for billions; Compaq and then CMGI tried to relaunch AltaVista. The best ways to maximize search revenue were not yet clear, and many thought the existing search incumbents would be harder to displace, but many smart people saw there was "money in search" and clearly did not think Google was "headed for failure". Google didn't "get lucky in finding" a model; they looked around for what was working for others. They first tried CPM ads -- "text banners" starting December 1999 -- and later in 2002 moved to Goto.com's wildly successful CPC formula. And they were making money outside of advertising before the AdWords rocket took off. 2. Had the timing of their discovery been off, or had the dot-com bubble busted a few months earlier, they would have died. Google raised money in 1998 -- so even moving the 2000-2001 bust forward a year wouldn't have put them on thin ice. And the search-linked ads market didn't collapse post-bubble; Goto.com reached strong profitability on search CPC ads in 2001, a "bust year" of very low overall ad spending. Anything as successful as Google is, at some level, sui generis. Survivorship bias also makes it hard to draw lessons from winners. But your characterization of Google as being just a lucky discovery and a few months' timing away from inexorable failure is inconsistent with the real events of 1998-2001.

aswanson 19y ago

Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for failure From a make something people want theory of value, they were worth way more than anybody back then. I used to jump from engine to engine trying boolean queries, metacrawlers, keyword mixing, etc, coming up snake eyes. I think most engines were on the 'portal' kick, which I think meant beating people over the head with banner ads and trying to force them to go to content partners. I think if those sites just stopped for a second and histogrammed what users used rather than what they were trying to force them to do, it would have been absolutely obvious that search was the key.

rms 19y ago
I remember my search engine of choice was hotbot, because they had advanced search on the front page. And you sure as hell needed advanced search then.

deleted 19y ago

[deleted]

pg 19y ago

Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for failure I didn't think that. I remember telling the powers that be at Yahoo in 1999 (I worked there then) that they ought to buy Google, and it was the only company I ever suggested they buy.

aston 19y ago
Yahoo's MO at the time was to swap in the current "cool kid" of algorithmic search to fill out Yahoo's own search results. Google didn't really have much of a business outside of selling their results to folks like Yahoo, so I think many logical minds would've agreed that Google was heading for failure--short of being acquired by Yahoo or something other big guy in search. At the least, you'd have a hard time making a believable argument that they'd be making billions of dollars a year in less than a half decade. And, truthfully, an even harder time trying to make that same sort of argument if they were actually acquired by Yahoo.
run4yourlives 19y ago
Fair enough Paul, but I think we've already proved your as much an exception to the rule as Google is. :-) My point was that "most people" would have considered Google a bad investment prior to adwords. Given the response, it's obvious I should have been more clear.

gojomo 19y ago

1. Every logical mind (even within Google) in 1999 would have seen that Google was heading for failure - there was no money in search. They got lucky in finding one -adwords - that worked. Lots of "logical minds" invested in Google in 1998. In 1999, Yahoo was profitable; Excite was bought for billions; Compaq and then CMGI tried to relaunch AltaVista. The best ways to maximize search revenue were not yet clear, and many thought the existing search incumbents would be harder to displace, but many smart people saw there was "money in search" and clearly did not think Google was "headed for failure". Google didn't "get lucky in finding" a model; they looked around for what was working for others. They first tried CPM ads -- "text banners" starting December 1999 -- and later in 2002 moved to Goto.com's wildly successful CPC formula. And they were making money outside of advertising before the AdWords rocket took off. 2. Had the timing of their discovery been off, or had the dot-com bubble busted a few months earlier, they would have died. Google raised money in 1998 -- so even moving the 2000-2001 bust forward a year wouldn't have put them on thin ice. And the search-linked ads market didn't collapse post-bubble; Goto.com reached strong profitability on search CPC ads in 2001, a "bust year" of very low overall ad spending. Anything as successful as Google is, at some level, sui generis. Survivorship bias also makes it hard to draw lessons from winners. But your characterization of Google as being just a lucky discovery and a few months' timing away from inexorable failure is inconsistent with the real events of 1998-2001.