Should the company really try to compete with Google's search?I got into a huge argument with West Coast Editor Sebastian Rupley on the most recent weekly CrankyGeeks videocast/podcast last Thursday, when he asserted that Web search was in some way a good business for Microsoft. The company has continued to pursue it in every way possible, including upgrades to the miserable Internet Explorer browser, which I consider "The Great Microsoft Blunder"
I know where this loss of focus all started. I first heard it over ten years ago. Microsoft and the entire computer industry have been convinced by boneheads that Microsoft Office in particular and perhaps the Windows OS were short-term products that would eventually stagnate and die. In fact it is generally believed that all shrink-wrapped software is a short-term phenomenon. I think I first saw shrink-wrapped software back in 1976. So this is the 30th year of shrink-wrapped software. The total sales of shrink-wrapped software have never been higher. But according to the experts, it's dead. And apparently it died around 1996. Reports of its death are greatly exaggerated.
Most of these "shrink-wrap is dead" assertions come from the Microsoft bashers such as Oracle and Sun, companies that in some ways intellectually dominate the thinking in Silicon Valley. They, of course, mostly practice the pre-shrink-wrap methodologies of software distribution, using a combination of salesmen and high monthly fees. You'd think that this fuzzy groupthink would not worm its way up Highway 5 to Redmond, but it does. The result is that Microsoft begins to think like Sun and Oracle. Thus the company lets its core products languish. How tired is PowerPoint, for example? Geez.
As an aside, it's interesting to note that nearly all the executives at Sun and Oracle use PowerPoint, don't they? So according to Rupley and the pundits, Microsoft can make a lot of money selling ads with its search engine. So now Microsoft is no longer in the business of selling code, but instead wants to compete with the Seattle Times and sell ads. Oh brother.—Continue reading...
Of course this strategy is even more brain-dead than killing shrink-wrapped software, since Microsoft is way behind in search technology, and I do not think it's even sincere about it. Either that or it is totally naïve.
I mean to say that its entire search engine strategy is half-hearted. As someone who runs a popular blog with around two million page views a month, I look at endless stat packages and the results. One of the most interesting systems runs on the server and identifies the search engine bots as they pass through to index the site. Microsoft's bots are not even number two. So who are they kidding?
Here's a screen shot from one day last week. Note that Google pounded the site 2,180 times, Yahoo hit it 218 times and MSN hit it 93 times. While 93 shots is probably more than adequate for a blog the fact is that Google is probably hitting all the sites 20 times as often as MSN. And I assume it does a deeper index job too. It's apparent that Microsoft is outgunned here by both Yahoo and Google. Nobody ever talks about this simple fact. Don't expect to have a showdown with the big boys if all you've got is a peashooter.
To worsen the situation I'm not sure that Microsoft knows what search is really all about. Take for example a comment by Bill Gates, excerpted from a Donny Deutsch interview, the transcript of which is floating around the Net:
Deutsch (interviewer): So how far are you behind Google? Is it too late to catch up?
Gates: We'll look back on this time and realize that search is pathetic. If I ask for something, I should get it, not a list of things to click on. It's great for where it is, but it will get so much better. Right now, there's no way to qualify results by authority, by trusted sources. Sources I trust, that is.
This "no lists please!" attitude completely misses the point of search in general since it denies the concept of discovery. It actually says more about Gates than anything else. That said, I should mention a personal anecdote that could shed light on this idea. Before Bill moved into his new megamansion he lived in a large but comfortable house that I managed to visit. In Bill's office was a very neat desk, a computer terminal and a large bookcase. The only books were a massive collection of Encyclopedia Britannica volumes. He's an encyclopedia guy! One lone trusted source, period. And he is directing the search efforts with this stunted intellectual curiosity? Puh-leeeze.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. Microsoft needs to refocus its energies on what it does best: developing computer code for the masses. Where's my Vista?!?!
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