Bing vs. Google - There's another to consider

Yesterday Yahoo and Microsoft finally announced their search partnership. If you haven’t kept up on how Google is changing the shape of their competition, Yahoo decided to get out of the search business and have agreed to outsource their search service to Microsoft. This comes at a great time for Microsoft as they finally have what should be considered a viable search alternative in Bing. If you haven’t yet checked out Bing you should just for the user experience. Bing provides an option when you roll your cursor over the search results to view the content on the link without actually clicking on the link. With that said they’ve had some significant indexing issues and you won’t find exactly the same kind of results that you will in Google. Microsoft claims that they have indexed the most significant results but good indexing takes time so if you’re looking for some a bit more obscure you may be disappointed. (On a side note I have been frustrated over the lack of indexing my personal consulting site www.baer-consulting.net. While it showed up in Google the day after I went live, it still, two weeks later, has yet to show up on Bing.)

Following the ultimate implementation of Bing on Yahoo -- this deal should take a good six months to roll out -- consumers will have to choose between Google and Bing. The only remaining alternatives are a collection of third tier players including ask.com among others. (Remember askjeeves?) But actually there is another alternative: WolframAlpha. Have you checked that engine out? If not, you absolutely should! (www.wolframalpha.com) For a subset of search needs WolframAlpha clearly exceeds anything offered by Google or Bing. Are you looking for the answer to a mathematics equation? Chemical formula or historical information on a date? You need to check out WolframAlpha! Not only does this site approach search in a different way, its results are far superior for its focused type of searches over any rival.

It’s been so de rigueur to type your own name into Google to see how high you may rank in their search results -- come on, you know you’ve done it! With WolframAlpha, it’s way too much fun to type in your own birth date or hometown! Check it out. If you’re as geeky as me you’ll bookmark it immediately!

So how cool will this be?

Over ten years ago while I was living in Los Gatos I met a wonderful couple from North Carolina. They were our next door neighbors. Thinking out of the box they came up with a great idea: “drive-in movie night.” Play a movie on their VCR and output via an inFocus projector borrowed from work onto a large white sheet hung over the garage door. What a phenomenal idea and great invitation to friends and family to pop the popcorn and watch movies with the neighborhood. I know that quite a few of you have amped this idea up with DVD or Blue-Ray, surround sound and an even bigger bed sheet. The amazing part about this is how much more advance the projectors have become.

A few years ago a friend of mine was looking into investing in a new home theater system and ran across a couple of HD projectors specifically designed to project in widescreen HD. Major benefits: small footprint, scalable image from 26“ to 110”! Big drawback: any ambient light washes out the image. In other words if you’re watching during the day you better have the best black out curtains.

Funny thing is that since I went on my first sales trip I always dreamed of better image quality coupled with more portability. Sure projectors have shrunk to a very useable size of a large paperback book but I’ve dreamed of an even smaller and more portable version. Well my dream is almost a reality. PicoProjectors -- projectors so small that they can be embedded in cell phones -- represent the ultimate in capability and form factor. Afterall my cell phone is nothing more than a handheld computer. I can install applications, edit MS Office documents, view images and watch movies. Wouldn’t it be great if I could project my sales pitch or movie onto a wall for all to see? And do that without plugging into a separate device? Soon you will be able to do all this!

Pico Projectors for mobile phones:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13772_3-10284209-52.html

If the World Wide Web was invented in 1980

Have you ever wondered where we would be if the world wide web had been invented in 1980? I know that we’ll likely have a clear idea in another ten years or so but I got to thinking about what Twitter and Facebook really mean to us won’t really be clear for another ten years - in societal terms I truly believe that what we’ve seen in Iran with the rapid adoption of Twitter as a social tool for dissent comes to pass more broadly throughout the world. If the neww reporting and communications business is truly going through dramatic change to incorporate a very different business model (which it is) and Twitter and new online collaboration tools become the norm then the world as we know it today will be dramatically different in 2020. While a world like that portrayed in Minority Report won’t likely come to pass there will certainly be some elements very familiar: interactive advertising, video cameras streaming live from every street corner, personal preferences integrated into our daily interactions -- much of which we can already experience today.

Will this world be better? Worse? I believe that the consensus has to be that it will be a very different world. A world where there are fewer secrets and one in which our children expect less privacy, modesty along with increasing amounts of technological integration. Why would they expect to interact with their video games with a Wii-like wand and then interact with there computers with a keyboard. As a matter of fact there likely will be fewer computers and more special purpose devices with deeper and richer capabilities. Think of your cell phone as a communications tools that can interact with a different type of typewriter access files universally (in the cloud). It may be a world where the idea of a computer will make future generations laugh... you mean you actually carried that thing around?!

While we contemplate what kind of world we’re building here in Silicon Valley you may wonder what provoked this outburst in the first place? (Have you noticed that the day-to-day content of this blog has been driven by the news?) I ran across this wonderful graphic on the web:

What would Apple’s website have looked like in 1983 with Lisa launch?

http://www.flickr.com/photos/davelawrence8/3663647101/sizes/o/

I love this kind of creativity. Heck, look what it provoked in me...

How much Facebook is worth and why we need them to IPO

If you’ve kept up on this blog over the last few months you know that I’m really not a fan of advertising based business models. It’s clear that very few companies can build truly robust and growing revenue numbers from advertising. As more niche web sites, news aggregation sites, iphone apps and other targeted advertising distribution mechanisms are created the value of advertising drops to near zero. Too many avenues competing for too few advertisers. Now it’s very important to note my subtle caveat: “very few companies” can build robust revenue from advertising. I think that today there are two companies that have proven they can and do build tremendous revenue engines from a relative pure advertising model: Google and Facebook.

Google just announced a “poor” quarter (for them) with revenue up only 3% to $4.07B. While advertising is becoming commoditized it’s good to know that the King of Online Advertising Distribution continues to take their percentage off the top. Facebook? Well, we don’t know for sure. We know they continue to grow their user / eyeballs which means that they continue to add value to advertisers eager to sell their wares to Facebook users. One thing that we can track however is Facebook market valuation. Everytime Facebook accepts outside investors we know how much they’re getting and how much equity they give up. Thanks to News.Com (C|Net) we can quickly see how this valuation has changed over the years:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-10286111-36.html

So, while it’s been as high as $15B (thanks to a Microsoft infusion of $240M in October of 2007) it’s now around $6.5B. That’s a market valuation for a company that -- as far as we know -- has never been profitable and has never publicly announced revenue! There have been some rumors that Facebook may be considering a public offering as soon as 2010. Considering there is no expectations that there will be an tech IPO at all in 2009, we can keep our fingers crossed that Facebook does indeed look to IPO in early 2010. Remembering the Netscape IPO in the mid-90’s as the beginning of the Dot Com hysteria we can only hope that a wildly successful (as it will undoubtedly be) Facebook IPO will provide exactly the kind of market and investor enthusiasm as we desperately need right now.

What's in my coffee? More on Great Visualization

A while ago I blogged (see Geography of Job Loss) about the power of data visualization, the art of presenting data in a compelling way. One of my other traditional online haunts is Dark Roasted Blend (www.darkroastedblend.com/) which continues to provide my one stop for what’s new and cool on the Internet.

Persuant to provide information in an interesting and informative manner I present the following link (courtesy of Dark Roasted Blend) that, for those of you like me who love Coffee and have always wondered exactly what makes a Mocha different from a Cappucino:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/two-eyes/1285147549/

Again, for all you marketing folks out there looking for inspiration on how to turn that bar or pie chart into something a bit more powerful and communicative please pay attention! There is no reason that you can take that data and present it in widgets! See how much more powerful that is?!

I think the frustrating part for me is that while I know what I want I don’t necessarily have the talent to create it. So I hire a professional to do it for me. Afterall, if you hire a professional you get professional results!

Funny thing happened today

I decided to find a nice quiet place to sit and write today.

As a marketing consultant my optimal projects tend to the 90% writing, 5% listening and 5% talking. This ultimately means that I absolutely need to find a place to sit and be productive. In this case it was a coffee shop. (I’ve increasingly become a fan of the local public library as it presents free internet access with virtually no distractions. And by no distractions I mean inane conversations, hot women or frankly not having to worry about running into someone I know.) However regardless of how efficient I can be in working in a public place -- often with my iPod and headphones to eliminate aural distractions -- I find a large limiter is the efficiency of my laptop battery. Sometimes I can find a place to plug in but most times I can’t.

My best solution to the power problem is to simply turn off the wifi on my laptop. The resulting power savings will often translate into an additional three hours of battery life on a fully charged battery. Yes, I spend significant amount of time on my computer NOT connected to the Internet. Not distracted by the latest news, IMs, twitter feeds, etc. Just trying to write.

As I already mentioned the problem with a coffee shop is ultimately running into someone I know. The first response after the niceties is ultimately: “OMG You’re not connected!!” It wasn’t really that long ago when being connected meant a noisy modem connection. (Please, I really didn’t want to go back farther than that.) Now it’s simply expected that if you have a computer, cell phone, netbook, etc. you are connected to the Internet. Actually I believe the entire utility of a netbook is that you WILL be connected to the Internet at all times.

Why do we have that expectation? Creating content that makes the Web so much fun is all about doing something creative offline and sharing it online. Unfortunately there are so many distractions in everyday life that finding the time to create the content is impossible when email and IMs keeping ringing in. So, I’m disconnected. Don’t make that sound like a disease!

The Genie is Free

Over the last few months I’ve had a number of conversations with folks about what constitutes a viable business model. I’ve even blogged a bit on the insanity of an advertising-based business model in the vein of Facebook. (What drives me the most crazy about Facebook however is the fact that I strongly believe there is between $5B - $10B in B2B business that they simply have ignored but that’s another story.) The interesting thing is that most of these conversations ultimately turn to Twitter.

I’ll state up front that I do think that Twitter is inane. I really don’t need to know nor care to know what someone is doing or thinking on a regular basis. With that said, I use Twitter largely as an easy way to update my Facebook status and update interested followers on new posts to this blog. I truly believe that Twitter is a fad technology that exists and thrives today because it can. I believe that, unlike Facebook for example, five years from now Twitter will be completely passe and our attentions will have refocused on whatever is hot in 2014. While I’m not sure what that will be I know it won’t be Twitter.

Now, with all that said I have been surprised (pleasantly) by the way Twitter has empowered and energized the Iranian election revolt. It has provided a fantastic platform for communication, flash mobs, and news delivery to the outside world. So, again, the technology has proven it has value and can provide a strong platform for diverse and instantaneous communications. It still doesn’t have a revenue generating business model -- that is, outside of advertising.

This morning I ran across the following stinging obituary from McClatchy Group on the passing of former Defense Secretary Robert McNamera:

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/homepage/story/71328.html

I have to admit that I followed Mr. McNamera’s passing with a sense of historical redemption. Prior to the power of the Internet to share, collaborate and inform, Mr. McNamera’s legacy had dramatically improved over the years since the Vietnam War. It also dawned on me how powerful the anti-war and anti-estabilishment forces were in the late 60’s and early 70’s. Imagine how much more powerful and forceful they could be today with Twitter, email, and cell phones! It’s now only because of the power of online media and blogging that I am forcefully reminded that Robert McNamera was personally responsible for tens of thousands of deaths and that while he died with an improved public perception he could not escape the power of the Internet to remind millions of his role in The Bay of Pigs, Vietnam and the ultimate role of the World Bank in financially undermining and colonizing developing countries throughout the World.

Twitter may not have a financially sound business model but because of it’s power to easily and instantly communicate to millions will always have a place in the world. The Company may disappear one day but the genie is out of the bottle and we’re so much better for it.

Changing our view of being disconnected

As I twittered last week I was shocked by a recent recruiter cell phone conversation:

“... yes, I’m returning your call from my car on the way up to the Sierra’s. My family and I are going camping and will be entirely out of touch for the next four days so i wanted to be sure to return your call now before we are entirely incommunicado.”
“OK. Great. Can you send me a quick email so I can confirm with my partner why we called you in the first place?”
“Yes, no problem. I’ll send you a quick email from my phone.”

I figured he wanted my email address, correct spelling of my name, my contact information... A few minutes later I get an email response with a very terse statement: You didn’t include your resume.

Are you serious? What part of this conversation was missing? I am in a car on my way up to the mountains. I will be completely without internet or cell phone access. Now I could make a statement about the recruiters ability to listen however I think that there was something even more fundamental missing in the communications. That is that incommunicado didn’t include access to the Internet. Have we gotten to a point in our technological adoption that there is an unspoken expectation that no one would really want to go somewhere where they would be forced to be completely unconnected?

I have become a bit hypersensitive to the connected mass transit options and I remember how excited the employees of a previous employer became when they announced the fully Internet connected shuttles. I admit that I once joked to a co-worker who also happened to be a virtual employee (one without an office that is) that he should simply get on a San Francisco - Palo Alto shuttle buss in the morning and stay aboard as it runs back and forth between SF and PA. He had a cell phone and a laptop and the shuttle had a wireless internet connection. The only reasons to get off were for lunch and a potty break...

So here we were actually choosing to go somewhere entirely disconnected (sorry, AT&T no bars where we were) and the expectation was that I would still be able to forward a resume on. Don’t laugh but my alternative was to direct the recruiter to my LinkedIn profile. Unfortunately I didn’t get a call back. I guess that if I was serious I would not be trying to take a vacation.

On vacation this week (through July 4th)

I promise to get back on track with two new entries a week starting after the Fourth of July holiday break! Thanks for your continuing interest...