Google Places Bets, Yahoo Goes Hollywood And MSN Catches Up
from the search-company-roundup dept
The NY Times is running three different articles that separately talk about three different initiatives at the three leading contenders for the search crown: Google, Yahoo and MSN. However, taken together, it seems like the three do a pretty good job of showing how each company views what they're doing. Google, more or less for fun, has set up an internal predictions market, for questions about when certain products are going to be released and when new offices will open. While it's not entirely clear how useful this is, it could give some within Google a more accurate view on where things are going. Meanwhile, Yahoo under Terry Semel and Lloyd Braun, has decided (once again) that the internet is a broadcast content medium, and are working on "original video programming" for the web -- as if it were a TV network. About their only admission that it's different is that the new video programming will be shorter. Meanwhile, MSN has finally gotten around to launching its own ad system. So what can we make of this? Google likes to geek out, Yahoo thinks it's a media company and Microsoft is still trying to catch up. Seems like a pretty good summary, doesn't it? Anyone want to take bets on which strategy seems most sound?
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
No Subject Given
Not counting the huge amount of MVP they contracted, making everyone think they have some huge things under the hood...
Another thing is, google search is still better than yahoo's, after their claim about the new index, i tried it for a few days and the searches are not as relevant as google's.
MSN has nothing nice to it, its overbloated, slow, ugly, unless microsoft releases MSN Vista instead of Windows Vista, i dont see a way for it to reach the big ones.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: No Subject Given
Are you the inertia that's on their side?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]