The Goodness of Google

By Mark Evans in Google, Microsoft No Comments

Google
As the world’s dominant search engine, it’s not surprising that Google attracts a lot of attention and, along with it, a fair of criticism for how it operates.

But stepping back from the fray, the thing about Google that’s even more impressive than the power of its search engine is the portfolio of services it continues to roll out.

Google’s services meet specific needs so well that it’s easy to forget you’re using a growing number of them. Before you know it, GMail, Google Reader, Google Blog Search, Google Docs, Google Maps, YouTube and Google News have become regular parts of your daily digital world.

This is probably the biggest threat facing Microsoft. If you think about it, people are very aware they’re using Microsoft products – be it Windows, Internet Explorer or Office. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing but I think it’s more of a challenge for Microsoft when it comes to convincing people to embrace new products and services.

A good example is Live Writer, which is probably one of the leading blog publishing tools even thought it doesn’t get anywhere near the love and respect it deserves (Note: Having a Mac version would be a nice touch!). Live Writer’s is clearly a Microsoft product so there may be a small hurdle when it comes to bloggers embracing it – a hurdle that I don’t think Google faces.

You could also argue that Internet Explorer suffers from the same problem. Even though it is still the world’s leading browser, it gets nowhere the same amount of respect or buzz as Firefox. The world loves Firefox for obvious reasons but IE has been getting better.

What do you think? Does this thesis hold water at all?

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Who Gives a Flock?

By Mark Evans in Browsers 3 Comments

ReadWriteWeb’s Sarah Perez has an intriguing blog post about Flock, and how it has failed to capture the imagination of Web users despite teeming with social media goodness.

On paper, Flock seems like it should be the browser of our dreams. All our favorite social media addictions wrapped up into one shiny package. It’s built on top of the Firefox code base, too, allowing our Firefox add-ons to work in Flock – a feature that should make the transition from one browser to the next that much easier.

So what’s wrong with Flock? Where are all the users?


Here are my reasons on why Flock has dived while Firefox has thrived:

1. Flock launched prematurely with enormous hype that it was the new browser to knock off Internet Explorer. Sadly, the alpha should have been launched to friends and family as opposed to the world.

2. As Sarah notes, Flock has tried to be all things to all people. It looks and feels like a developer’s dream with all kinds of bells and whistles. Unfortunately, users like simplicity and ease of use. Where Firefox has done so well is offering simplicity AND the option to pimp the browser with a never-ending stream of add-ons.

3. As much as Flock is piggybacking on Mozilla, it’s also piggybacking on Firefox by embracing many of the same approaches such as add-ons

4. Flock simply failed to capture the imagination of browser users. In a world where fickleness rules, Flock has its shot at becoming super-popular but, for whatever reason, it didn’t stick.

The ironic thing about Flock is when I use it, I like it but not enough to lure me away from Firefox or Safari. I like some of the features and the UI but like many search engines trying to compete against Google, Flock just isn’t a whole lot better than the browsers already being used. At the end of the day, this might be the best explanation as to why Flock hasn’t hit it.

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Social Media Not a Marketing Medium. Huh?

By Mark Evans in Advertising/Marketing, Social Media 8 Comments

Earlier this week, Knowledge Networks issued a study, “How People Use Social Media”, suggesting that although 83% of the Internet population uses social media, it has failed become much of a market medium.

“Obviously, a lot of people are using social media, but they are not explicitly turning to it for marketing purposes, or for finding out what products to buy. It’s really about connecting with friends, or connecting with other people,” said Dave Tice, vice president and group account director with Knowledge Networks, told Online Media Daily.

My initial reaction was “Well, that’s interesting”. Then, I thought about it some more, and said “Huh?”

While it’s left to be seen if social media is an advertising medium, it is becoming a powerful marketing medium that is already have a major impact on how consumers think and buy services and products.

What Knowledge Networks clearly failed to take into account is social media is a different kind of marketing because it has much to do with people communicating with each other and sharing ideas, feedback and recommendations.

If, for example, you talk about your happiness about a new Acer netbook, that’s a powerful marketing message being sent to your friends and followers. If these people have respect for you thoughts and opinions, the fact you recommended an Acer network could have a bigger impact than if they saw an Acer ad in a magazine or on a Web.

The effectiveness of this kind of marketing explains why many companies need to embrace social media so they can engage in different kind of conversations with consumers that’s different but potentially as effective as “traditional” marketing.

And contrary to Knowledge Network’s contention that consumers are not using social media to find out what products to buy, social media is having a huge influence on what consumers do.

Social Media

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Where Did the Wonderful World of Wi-Fi Go?

By Mark Evans in Wireless 8 Comments

Starbucks
In the past few months, I’ve consumed a lot of Starbucks coffee and, occasionally, those snacks that quietly call out your name from behind the display booth.

Part of my Starbucks patronage has to do with business meetings, and part of it has to do with finding a free Wi-Fi spot when there’s time to kill downtown. With two hours of free Wi-Fi a day, Starbucks is convenient and ubiquitous. To me, offering free Wi-Fi is a stroke of brilliance, especially for social media aficionados who need to connect to update something or the other.

The problem, however, is that when it comes to free Wi-Fi, Starbucks is like an oasis within a vast desert. While Wi-Fi is everywhere, 99% of the connections are locked down – a far cry from a few years ago when there was an abundance of free Wi-Fi to quickly access.

The lockdown has a lot to do with how easy it has become to lock down a wireless router (Thanks, Linksys, Belkin, D-Link, etc.!). Some of it has to do with the paranoia someone could jump onto your Wi-Fi and start downloading terabytes of porn or the entire Led Zeppelin collection. And some people worried about the bandwidth caps imposed by ISPs.

That said, the disappearance of free Wi-Fi has caused Wi-Fi to lose its mojo. Wi-Fi used to be fun, and it made getting online a breeze. Free Wi-Fi felt like being part of cooperative in which we agreed to share for the greater good – you gave a little, and you took a little, and everyone was happy.

Then, Wi-Fi got all serious on us. Municipalities rolled out Wi-Fi networks – many of them failures – by deciding they were in the Internet access business, and charging a daily/monthly fee. Toronto Hydro, for example, had grandiose plans to cover Toronto with Wi-Fi but discovered few people wanted to pay for something that offered, at best, average service. One of the few cities to really get Wi-Fi is Frederiction, which offers it at no cost.

At a time when being connected is more important and people are struggling with the economy, it’s time to bring back free Wi-Fi. If cafes, restaurants and bars are looking for a way to attract customers, free Wi-Fi could be just the ticket.

There’s nothing like giving away something for free to generate goodwill and, in the process, some business. The reality is that even though Starbucks is giving away free Wi-Fi, I usually buy something when I’m there – business Starbucks would never get without free Wi-Fi.

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What if Google Started Twoogle?

By Mark Evans in Google, Social Media 5 Comments

Larry Page’s comments today about Twitter and real-time search prompted this question: What would happen if Google launched a micro-blogging platform?

I’m not talking about Jaiku, which is DOA, but a new service from the propeller heads within the GooglePlex that would match Twitter’s basic functionality AND offer a variety of frills that Twitter has no interest in providing.

Before this idea is summarily dismissed, Google has a track record for launching me-too products such as GMail, Google Reader, Picasa and Google Maps. So why not Twoogle? What does it have to lose?

While Twitter obviously dominates the micro-blogging market, I think it’s vulnerable to competition. Twitter’s biggest weakness – aside from the lack of a business plan – is how its platform has not evolved much over the past year or so. Sure, search is better and it recently introduced trends but Twitter still lacks sizzle.

Google could launch a Twitter-like service that would be integrated into your GMail username and password. It could throw in some Picasa functionality to share photos (a la TwitPic), some link-sharing via Google Reader and some document sharing via Google Docs. Voila, a multi-featured micro-blogging platform.

What do you think? Should Google take another stab at the micro-blogging game?

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The Pay-to-Play Newspaper World Unfolds

By Mark Evans in Media 1 Comment

Paytoplay
There’s been a lot of chatter recently about newspapers charging for online content, led by media doyen Rupert Murdoch who is pushing the idea of micro-payments.

The San Jose Mercury has climbed on the pay-to-play bandwagon by announcing it’s going to start charging for online content – a move Mike Masnick describes as a “move destined to fail dismally (and quickly)” given there aren’t many compelling reasons for people to read the paper online now for free.

While the Mercury’s move may not work, I wonder whether it’s a sign of things to come within the beleaguered newspaper industry. Over the past few years, newspapers have tried a variety of different models to stay financially viable. They’ve charged for all content; given some content away but charged for access to selected content such as columnists; and they’ve tried completely free content supported by advertising.

To date, nothing has worked to fix a business model that’s been broken by the Web. It hasn’t helped that many newspaper organizations have been hampered by huge amounts of debt, which they have to serve while traditional advertising revenue has declined.

If newspapers want to stick around, it’s obviously they have some very difficult decision to make really soon.

Among them is radically changing their operational structures. They will have to become much smaller with fewer reporters. With a few exceptions (e.g. high-profile columnists), reporters will make less money while being asked to do more.

Many newspapers will have to decide how large of a print foothold they can afford. It may not make economic sense to print and distribute newspapers to anyone in the region who wants one. The National Post, for example, has slashed costs in recent years by abandoning delivery in many cities across Canada.

At the same time, newspapers will also have to keep on exploring new technologies. For example, a device such as the Kindle may have potential to become a user-friendly way for people to consume online newspaper content.

I also think electronic paper has huge potential for newspapers to replace the cost of printing and distributing products made out of dead trees. Imagine how the business would change if you could subsidize the cost of giving consumers e-paper that could receive the news online via wireless or wireline connection.

A final point: While newspapers and the newspaper industry under siege, the reality is many people still get most of their online content from newspapers as opposed to bloggers or online media groups (e.g. Politico, TechCrunch). And newspapers are still providing the fodder that drives the blogosphere, and newspapers still play a key role in our economic and democratic process.

If newspapers disappear, what replaces them? Would the demise of newspapers be anything unlike what happened when the automobile replaced the horse and buggy? For some insight on these questions, The Economist has a must-read feature story. As well, the New York Times has a story, “Pay Walls Alone Won’t Save Newspapers”.

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