Google as Web King - An interesting thread discussion in webmasterworld

A interesting thread in webmasterworld discusses an article written by Charles H. Ferguson at Technology Review,

This article neatly describes the future of google and how they can improve them selves from their current standings,



2 significant posts in this thread are from 2 regular users, they had a very good insight into the article, Source of the article; www.technologyreview.com/articles/05/01/issue/ferguson0105.asp?p=1

Iguana says,

I think I understand what Charles H. Ferguson is saying. He seems to be
saying that Google needs to develop commercial APIs to their search - because
this is what Microsoft has done before with windows and their applications and
made (nearly) all the facilities available to developers.
But I don't regard
'Web Search' as that important a function to require APIs. I still regard it as
a way to quickly access the statically delivered content on the web. Obviously
Google already have a developers API (with very limited usage) and Adsense
websearch. Amazon have their new e-commerce webservice that allows you access to
their search results (Google-derived and Alexa enhanced) that is in beta and may
be subject to a charge in the future. Both of these seem to be allowing websites
to incorporate their own websearch facilities. I don't think they will be taken
up in large enough numbers to have a big impact on searches done.
What he is
talking about is the next generation of search - the one that includes the
'hidden web' desktop PC file systems, emails, handhelds, and Linux. To provide a
cross-platform access to all of this would be nice - but hardly a 'killer app'.
I haven't bothered to download Google or MS desktop search - I know where my
files are and what they contain and can use windows explorer to check them. I
only need a deep search of previous web pages/emails/files about every 2 weeks.
If you said I could search and access the text of any book ever written, any
software, any album details (cover/real lyrics/ track listing/sample), access
MP3s of my music and the music collections of any friends (wishing all my vinyl
was converted to MP3) - then I would be excited both in my working and home
life. But copyright prevents a lot of this and I couldn't afford to actually
purchase these as products.
I just fail to make that jump from search being
a quick, sometimes frustrating, way to access web content to being the nervous
system that unifies my informational world. In the long term (10-20 years?) it
will be that. But for the next few years, when the Google/MS competition will
take place, it is the web search that will be the battleground. I used to think
the real crux could be how you access the search - when the browser disappears
from Windows and becomes part of the desktop then Microsoft can make it awkward
for people to change the default search from MSN to Google. It didn't work last
time with the built-in IE search but maybe will work better this time. Luckily
enough Google should have the financial clout to quickly stop Microsoft using
any unfair tactics, unlike some other companies in the past who have had to wait
5 years for their multi-million dollar settlements that are just loose change
for Mr Gates.
I realise that I am holding up my hand and saying I just don't
have the imagination/foresight to see how APIs and extending the search content
is the next step. Given that Microsoft won't be able to just leverage control of
the major operating system to eliminate Google, I keep on coming back to the
thought that for the next 5 years it's the same old, same old thing - quality of
the search results. All the pain of the Florida update, the obfuscations that
have reduced the power of Pagerank, the 'filters/sandbox/hilltop/ anchor text/
over-optimisation penalties' - has failed to produce better Google search
results. Google needed to move from a keyword-based search with Pagerank to
something else (now that Pagerank was understood and spammed rather than natural
web linking). I really believed that Google was going to move to the next stage
and figure out what a page was about before serving it as a result as opposed to
ever more elaborate counts/weighting of keywords in the document. But they have
failed. I think that Yahoo and Teoma may now be its equal and that Microsoft may
catch up in a year. Google could become a minor player long before the big
battle over control of access to digital content is fought - if one of the other
players comes up with a search engine that actually understands something about
what the user is searching for.

Namaste says,

Web search is a service, and in a service, the quality of service matters. MS
has never won a service war, only a product war.
From what I have seen of
Google's strategy so far, it seems to be sound:
1. Index deep. 2. Go beyond
the web 3. Earn revenue from increased distribution 4. Make search convenient:
fast, desktop, etc. 5. Build a WebOS 6. Don't be evil
These 6 are common
sense strategies and if they stick to them, they should have a sound future.
For all that is said, MS also sticks to some common sense strategies that
have seen it win many battles: 1. Make everything easy to use 2. Provide
reasonably good quality 3. Provide it cheap 4. Push it to the max 5. Get
developers on your side
It beat Netscape, Apple, Novell, IBM, etc. using
just these five strategies. But these strategies are blunt against Google,
because Google is already doing the first four, and there isn't much scope for
the fifth in search.
The big question is what will happen when MS provides
integrated desktop search? The answer is that Google still wins if it follows
it's own 1 and 2 and stays ahead of MS. People who are searching will goto
Google.
Further, we are moving to the high bandwidth era, where we are using
more web applications than ever before. If Google can successfully engineer some
key applications (such as Gmail) to be equivalent to desktop software (such as
Outlook), people will automatically migrate to web apps as they are completely
portable.
I am also surprised that the author hasn't spoken about patent
acquisition as a strategic advantage. We have seen many tech wars won as a
result of patents (Minolta vs Carl Zeiss for example). This important factor
could decide the MS vs Google battle. Both players realize the importance of
patents and must be amassing them in hordes. Google ofcourse has a head start in
this as far as search and WebOS goes.
As far as APIs are concerned, I
believe, Google will provide full fledged APIs when it can successfully offer a
WebOS. Possibly just before Longhorn.
Let us not underestimate the Linux
factor in all this. In one or two years, Linux will be as friendly to use as
Windows (still some issues with fonts, installations, etc.). When the time comes
for people to discard Windows XP, the big question is will they go for Longhorn
or the new Linux. In my opinion, it will be the new Linux.
The future:
People will "upgrade" from Windows to Linux; and use more web apps as compared
to desktop apps.
Has MS considered building a WebOS? No news there so far.
If they do, then we are talking serious competition to Google in a few years.

Source: of the thread, www.webmasterworld.com/forum3/27178.htm