2. Their culture
3. Their brand name
4. Their Adwords/Adsense programs
1. Algorithm - There’s no doubt someone at some point will provide better search results then Google. Powerset, hakia, Live.com, Wikia, and many other smaller companies are tackling this every single day. The differences in blind tests aren’t huge anymore and in my eyes, it’s really just a matter of time, say 2-5 years, and possibly less.
2. Culture - As Franky pointed our a couple of days ago, as first gen googlers are leaving, the culture changes. Who would have ever thought Google will try these kinds of tactics against their competitors? But second-gen don’t get it, and third will do worse.
3. Brand name - Google’s image is not as cute or as innovative as it once seems to be. Only recently they were chosen as the one company with worst privacy concerns for users.
Google’s privacy practices are the worst among the internet’s top destinations, according to a watchdog group seeking to intensify the recent focus on how the online search leader handles personal information about its users.
4. Adwords/Adsense - This for now is the only aspect of which is not yet hurt, but I believe with time, and some aggressive competition, it will as well.
Ebay is the FIRST to get Google to back off. This is a huge event in the future, and history, of Google.
Competing companies have not yet realized the one arrow to shoot is the one to Google’s heart - their cash cow. Once realizing that, hurting the nature of the pay per click model, can take Google out of the equation for a little while, putting pressure on them to stay in the race. And with the expenses they have on technology and personnel, such an attack can be devastating.
Why all this is important? Because google should hedge their bets on things that are more solid their their house of cards, things such as offline businesses, media companies, and of course domain names.
And to those who believe this cannot ever happen, let me remind you, where is Altavista today? Where is Excite today? Where is Lycos today? And.. where is Yahoo today?
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