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You can’t blame this on Google’s size. Neither Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, or Amazon (Disclaimer: I work at AWS) have this problem. Google has never struggled

You can’t blame this on Google’s size. Neither Microsoft, Facebook, Apple, or Amazon (Disclaimer: I work at AWS) have this problem. Google has never struggled as a company. Amazon barely survived the dot com bust, Apple almost went bankrupt and even Microsoft had to pivot or become the next IBM after Balmer and missing out on mobile. Facebook being still founder led and having the advantage of knowing how fleeting social media networks have been in the past, keeps Zuckerburg paranoid. Google’s ad revenue is covering up a lot of project/program mismanagement.

ryanbrunner 4y ago
It's less size and more lack of competition. As dominant as the companies you listed are, none of them completely capture a market to the degree that Google does with search and ads. Having a golden goose that has very little risk of going away can definitely be a curse.
- scarface74 4y ago
  Google’s “market” isn’t search, it’s “selling ads” and capturing attention (mostly YouTube). Google is under assault in ad selling by Facebook who knows more about you and Amazon (same disclaimer I work at AWS) who knows your buying habits. You also can’t block Amazon and Facebook ads. On the YouTube side, you have TikTok that is becoming more competitive for attention and maybe Twitch (???)
  - pb7 4y ago
    You know this is not a good take, right? This is like saying Amazon's market isn't e-commerce, it's taking payments.
    - scarface74 4y ago
      Amazon makes most of its profits from AWS. It’s also making plenty of money these days from advertising. Who gives Google money and what do they give Google money for? When I was working for B2B companies, our “customers” were the IT department and the companies. Our customers weren’t the end users. We tried our best to make the software easy for the end users. But we marketed to the CxOs and made sure they were happy. In the case of Amazon Retail. They (we) have to convince the customer to give us money in exchange for goods and services.
      - pb7 4y ago
        >In the case of Amazon Retail. They (we) have to convince the customer to give us money in exchange for goods and services. Right, and Google needs to convince users to love the products and continue using them, so that ads can be shown, and maybe even despite ads being shown. I have noticed a strong sentiment against paying for products even here on HN where the average user probably makes quite a bit of money. People would rather block ads than pay for YouTube Premium, for example. It shows me that ads are actually a pretty good business model because if "wealthy" people won't pay for products, less wealthy people definitely won't.
        scarface74 4y ago
        Does anyone love Google search or does it just suck less than the alternative? Search for “bicycles” on Google with Ad blockers turned off. How do you like the experience?
        pb7 4y ago
        Maybe we're seeing different things but I do not mind it at all. It is exactly what I would expect for such a broad query. In fact, I was prepared to see way worse things. It sucking less than all other alternatives is a pretty good reason to like it. There is a lot of vested interest in good search engines and the fact that no competitors, even from behemoths like Microsoft, have been able to do any better shows that it's a hard problem to solve. I think a lot of people are naturally resistive to change and are stuck in the past when the web was simple and 10 links was all it took. Nowadays, the web is so complex that it's nearly impossible to tell what you want to see off a broad query. In my experience, it guesses very well and the complaints about Search having gotten worse are really complaints about the Internet as a whole having gotten worse. What used to be dedicated websites are now uncrawlable pages on a large company's website (e.g. Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, Facebook, Amazon, etc). I personally like all of the "onebox" results that don't require me to go elsewhere -- search has become much faster for me in that way. I actually really don't like Amazon's retail site. It's complex and it's not clear why I see so many repeated identical items as separate listings. One a single listing, I can choose alternative sellers than the default. Is that linking to other listings or is still the same listing? Who knows. It hasn't changed or improved in decades.
pb7 4y ago
Microsoft choked their lead in the console market to Sony despite being much larger with bigger pockets. PlayStation 4 and now 5 both outsell Xbox 3:1 or so despite Xbox 360 having outsold PlayStation 3 and had loyal customers. They also choked with Mixer, losing to Google (YouTube), Amazon (Twitch), and Facebook (Gaming). Windows Mobile was a complete failure. It is not a "Google problem". Google (and Apple and Facebook) hate is just trendy on HN.
- scarface74 4y ago
  Microsoft is playing an entirely different game than selling loss leader hardware. They are all about subscriptions and streaming games. Then again, look at the revenue mix of the other companies to see how well they were able to move into new markets - Apple - phones, tablets, watches, computers, accessories, services, and even the AppleTV+ series have been getting rave reviews. Apple Arcade even isn’t in any danger of being cancelled. - Microsoft - Windows, Server software, Azure is a strong second, at least they didn’t cancel XBox and I bet their streaming game service will be around for awhile. - Amazon (same disclaimer I work at AWS): Amazon retail, AWS, Twitch, advertising, Prime Video, the Alexa devices - Facebook - FB proper, WhatsApp, Instagram -yes two of those are acquisitions. But how many acquisitions has Google screwed up completely? And then you have Google. - YouTube is believed to be barely break even from a profit standpoint - it was revealed in the Oracle trial how relatively little Android makes in profit . Yes I realize the numbers are old. But what has changed since then? By the time of the trial, Android already had the dominant market share. Google pays Apple a reported $18 billion a year to be the default search engine. That has to be more than Google is making from Android per year. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-21/google-s-android-generates-31-billion-revenue-oracle-says-ijor8hvt https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-21/google-s-... After all these years, everything that Google has don outside of advertising has been a failure as far as profitability.
  - pb7 4y ago
    >Microsoft is playing an entirely different game than selling loss leader hardware. Same can be said for Google, right? Google is playing an entirely different game than having paid-for-products but instead funneling products into the money-printing Ads machine. >But how many acquisitions has Google screwed up completely? I actually don't know and am very curious, how many? More or less than other similar companies? From my memory it's not many but I could be very wrong. Firebase for example, is alive and strong and rarely gets mentioned. I don't think every company needs to have the same type of business model. Google became popular because it made really great products that were all free* which increased adoption. Maybe some of them (like say, Search) would have never gotten popular if they had charged for it right away. I'm not convinced there's a single right path. >it was revealed in the Oracle trial how relatively little Android makes in profit It makes sense though, right? I don't even know how Android would make money directly (ok, I do know of ways, not sure if that's how it is) but it's a precursor for making money from the Play Store.
boppo1 4y ago
> Facebook being still founder led and having the advantage of knowing how fleeting social media networks have been in the past, keeps Zuckerburg paranoid. Them going all in on the 'metaverse' is basically 'microsoft missing mobile'-tier. I'm interested in it and even still I haven't seen a single impressive thing yet. It seems like a worse product than VR second-life. They're trying to sell an MMO to people who don't play games. The internet is already a 'metaverse', and I think the role of our digital lives will continue to expand with increasing proliferation of consumer electronics, barring a major world war or natural cataclysm. But Meta is just trying to force a paradigm shift and EVERYONE sees right through it.

ryanbrunner 4y ago

It's less size and more lack of competition. As dominant as the companies you listed are, none of them completely capture a market to the degree that Google does with search and ads. Having a golden goose that has very little risk of going away can definitely be a curse.

scarface74 4y ago
Google’s “market” isn’t search, it’s “selling ads” and capturing attention (mostly YouTube). Google is under assault in ad selling by Facebook who knows more about you and Amazon (same disclaimer I work at AWS) who knows your buying habits. You also can’t block Amazon and Facebook ads. On the YouTube side, you have TikTok that is becoming more competitive for attention and maybe Twitch (???)
- pb7 4y ago
  You know this is not a good take, right? This is like saying Amazon's market isn't e-commerce, it's taking payments.
  - scarface74 4y ago
    Amazon makes most of its profits from AWS. It’s also making plenty of money these days from advertising. Who gives Google money and what do they give Google money for? When I was working for B2B companies, our “customers” were the IT department and the companies. Our customers weren’t the end users. We tried our best to make the software easy for the end users. But we marketed to the CxOs and made sure they were happy. In the case of Amazon Retail. They (we) have to convince the customer to give us money in exchange for goods and services.
    - pb7 4y ago
      >In the case of Amazon Retail. They (we) have to convince the customer to give us money in exchange for goods and services. Right, and Google needs to convince users to love the products and continue using them, so that ads can be shown, and maybe even despite ads being shown. I have noticed a strong sentiment against paying for products even here on HN where the average user probably makes quite a bit of money. People would rather block ads than pay for YouTube Premium, for example. It shows me that ads are actually a pretty good business model because if "wealthy" people won't pay for products, less wealthy people definitely won't.
      - scarface74 4y ago
        Does anyone love Google search or does it just suck less than the alternative? Search for “bicycles” on Google with Ad blockers turned off. How do you like the experience?
        pb7 4y ago
        Maybe we're seeing different things but I do not mind it at all. It is exactly what I would expect for such a broad query. In fact, I was prepared to see way worse things. It sucking less than all other alternatives is a pretty good reason to like it. There is a lot of vested interest in good search engines and the fact that no competitors, even from behemoths like Microsoft, have been able to do any better shows that it's a hard problem to solve. I think a lot of people are naturally resistive to change and are stuck in the past when the web was simple and 10 links was all it took. Nowadays, the web is so complex that it's nearly impossible to tell what you want to see off a broad query. In my experience, it guesses very well and the complaints about Search having gotten worse are really complaints about the Internet as a whole having gotten worse. What used to be dedicated websites are now uncrawlable pages on a large company's website (e.g. Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, Facebook, Amazon, etc). I personally like all of the "onebox" results that don't require me to go elsewhere -- search has become much faster for me in that way. I actually really don't like Amazon's retail site. It's complex and it's not clear why I see so many repeated identical items as separate listings. One a single listing, I can choose alternative sellers than the default. Is that linking to other listings or is still the same listing? Who knows. It hasn't changed or improved in decades.

pb7 4y ago

Microsoft choked their lead in the console market to Sony despite being much larger with bigger pockets. PlayStation 4 and now 5 both outsell Xbox 3:1 or so despite Xbox 360 having outsold PlayStation 3 and had loyal customers. They also choked with Mixer, losing to Google (YouTube), Amazon (Twitch), and Facebook (Gaming). Windows Mobile was a complete failure. It is not a "Google problem". Google (and Apple and Facebook) hate is just trendy on HN.

scarface74 4y ago
Microsoft is playing an entirely different game than selling loss leader hardware. They are all about subscriptions and streaming games. Then again, look at the revenue mix of the other companies to see how well they were able to move into new markets - Apple - phones, tablets, watches, computers, accessories, services, and even the AppleTV+ series have been getting rave reviews. Apple Arcade even isn’t in any danger of being cancelled. - Microsoft - Windows, Server software, Azure is a strong second, at least they didn’t cancel XBox and I bet their streaming game service will be around for awhile. - Amazon (same disclaimer I work at AWS): Amazon retail, AWS, Twitch, advertising, Prime Video, the Alexa devices - Facebook - FB proper, WhatsApp, Instagram -yes two of those are acquisitions. But how many acquisitions has Google screwed up completely? And then you have Google. - YouTube is believed to be barely break even from a profit standpoint - it was revealed in the Oracle trial how relatively little Android makes in profit . Yes I realize the numbers are old. But what has changed since then? By the time of the trial, Android already had the dominant market share. Google pays Apple a reported $18 billion a year to be the default search engine. That has to be more than Google is making from Android per year. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-21/google-s-android-generates-31-billion-revenue-oracle-says-ijor8hvt https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-21/google-s-... After all these years, everything that Google has don outside of advertising has been a failure as far as profitability.
- pb7 4y ago
  >Microsoft is playing an entirely different game than selling loss leader hardware. Same can be said for Google, right? Google is playing an entirely different game than having paid-for-products but instead funneling products into the money-printing Ads machine. >But how many acquisitions has Google screwed up completely? I actually don't know and am very curious, how many? More or less than other similar companies? From my memory it's not many but I could be very wrong. Firebase for example, is alive and strong and rarely gets mentioned. I don't think every company needs to have the same type of business model. Google became popular because it made really great products that were all free* which increased adoption. Maybe some of them (like say, Search) would have never gotten popular if they had charged for it right away. I'm not convinced there's a single right path. >it was revealed in the Oracle trial how relatively little Android makes in profit It makes sense though, right? I don't even know how Android would make money directly (ok, I do know of ways, not sure if that's how it is) but it's a precursor for making money from the Play Store.

boppo1 4y ago

> Facebook being still founder led and having the advantage of knowing how fleeting social media networks have been in the past, keeps Zuckerburg paranoid. Them going all in on the 'metaverse' is basically 'microsoft missing mobile'-tier. I'm interested in it and even still I haven't seen a single impressive thing yet. It seems like a worse product than VR second-life. They're trying to sell an MMO to people who don't play games. The internet is already a 'metaverse', and I think the role of our digital lives will continue to expand with increasing proliferation of consumer electronics, barring a major world war or natural cataclysm. But Meta is just trying to force a paradigm shift and EVERYONE sees right through it.