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I don't know if I believe that. It sounds too similar to: "Building a decent search engine requires index data. Altavista has a bigger index, so Altavista is

• londons_explore 5y ago
  Well that was true once. But people have higher standards for search engines now that they don't want to go through every result by hand, and therefore the main thing they're after is the ranking algorithm not the search algorithm.
  • mcphage 5y ago
    Right, and maybe for the next generation of search engines it'll be something else again. Having the most query/clickstream data is what counts now, but there's no guarantee it will always count the most.
• chrjxnandns 5y ago
  Building a good search engine requires 3 things: 1) A large index 2) Clickstream data 3) Distribution It’s a circular scaling product, as #3 increases it increases #2 which in turn improves results and leads to more #3. Google is buying distribution here which keeps their competitors from getting the valuable clickstream data that can improve their product. Thus they are reinforcing the idea that their product is the “best” while simultaneously preventing any competitor from matching them.