5 ms·
I think this is more around trying to force the broadband providers to get their act together. Scare them ;0)
by hypermatt 17y ago
I think this is more around trying to force the broadband providers to get their act together. Scare them ;0)
- stingraycharles 17y agoRight. At Google's scale, it will even benefit them a lot if other broadband providers provide a better service, since it promotes more use of the internet, and thus more ad income for Google.
- waterlesscloud 17y agoOr will make video ads more practical. Uhm, yay?
- MikeCapone 17y agoI guess people said the same thing when pictures were first being used on the net. I'd say that it was still a net benefit not to be text only, wouldn't you agree? Ads can be annoying, but they also pay for a lot of what we're using online every day.
- bad_user 17y agoThe way Google throws products on the market to increase competition for the benefit of its core products ... it's genius. Are there any other companies that do this?
- emmett 17y agoYes, tons. See "commoditize your complements". Microsoft is a master of this as well. http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/StrategyLetterV.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/StrategyLetterV.html
- brianobush 17y agoI don't know of any real market changers from microsoft, save IE, which was an attempt to kill competition and preserve market. Maybe I am too far from the microsoft circle to know of any...
- mmphosis 17y agoWasn't the XBox hardware pretty much sold at cost to sell their games for their own platform? How many recent games does Microsoft have for the PS or Nintendo?
- danudey 17y agoAll consoles (at least at launch, and for years afterwards) are sold at a loss, with profits made up on the games. The difference for Microsoft is that the XBox division has never made a profit, unlike Sony's or Nintendo's. Note: the Wii is the only recent exception to this rule that I know of; the hardware has been sold at a profit since day one.
- Lazlo_Nibble 17y agoIf I recall correctly the GameCube, DS and GBA were all profitable from day one as well. It's possible this goes back as far as the NES.
- ximeng 17y agoThere is an important difference between compliments and complements.
- jimbokun 17y agoWhich is interesting, as Google certainly wants to commoditize operating systems. I'm sure Bing is intended to commoditize Google somehow, but I don't think it's working so far. Microsoft appears to be more in the role described for Sun in Joel's article, of the company trying so hard to sabotage potential competitors that they act against their own interest. (Not nearly as spectacularly as Sun creating Java to spite Microsoft, and ending up commoditizing their hardware business. But I do not think Bing would look like such a good business strategy without the obsession of beating Google.)
- bad_user 17y agoYes I know about that strategy ... but Google's means are different. When they release a freebie (like Chrome or Android), they force their new competitors in that market to follow their lead. The browser's speed, instability and lack of proper standards implementations hurts them? ... so they release a super optimized browser with a clear design and with tabs running in their own process. Now Firefox, Opera and Safari (at least) will follow. The mobile-market is too closed and becoming more so? So they release Android, a pseudo-open OS with an online-store that has more relaxed rules. And I'm pretty sure they don't need an Android-monopoly (as Microsoft is trying with everything they release) to achieve their goals. Their strategy is not (directly) for increased lock-in (as Microsoft does) ... it's more for eliminating distribution channels / middle-men that might get in their way on reaching customers.
- fnid2 17y agoThey use the scare tactics a lot, but they didn't work in the wireless spectrum auction did they?