Thinking about Facebook’s Beacon from a partner perspective…
The Techdirt Insight Community recently addressed this issue and posited it to their group of experts.
“Does it make sense for a consumer-facing company to sign on to Beacon — or has the program forever been tarnished? How should we approach using Beacon? In an ideal world, we would like for it to be a way for fans of our products to pass on effective “endorsements” of the product, but we do not want to be seen as doing something intrusive or upsetting. If not Beacon, is there a better way to do this either within Facebook or through a different platform?”
(Continue »)
Aaron Katsman
www.IsraelNewsletter.com
What is going on at Incredimail(MAIL)? the last time we heard from the company was to
reassure investors that they had worked out their problems with Google(GOOG), and that they were buying back stock. Well that was 2 weeks ago. In internet time 2 weeks is a lifetime.
Today the company announced a change at CEO. Yaron Adler is stepping down and being replaced by his brother Ofer, co-founder and current Chief Product Officer.
Tami Gottlieb, Chairperson of the Company’s board of directors, commented: “We are grateful to Yaron for his vision, leadership, enthusiasm and determination, bringing together with Ofer the Company so far. We accept Yaron’s wish to allocate more time to other endeavors, resulting in a lesser involvement in the Company’s operations, and are thankful for his continued availability and advice, which we believe will contribute to the Company’s future growth and success.”
The whole thing sounds weird, especially the timing of the recent events. We interviewed Yaron a few months ago, and actually had a conference call with him 2 weeks ago, and he gave no indication whatsoever that he wanted to “allocate more time to other endeavors.”
The fact is that in our conference call, absolutely no new information was shed about the Google issue. The call was just a rehash of the press release. While we had our differences about whether the company should be an acquirer or an acquiree, we really liked Yaron and respected his creative vision, and we wish him well.
Unfortunately for investors the total lack of transparency is shocking. This is a publicly traded company, not some mickey mouse operation. We at Israelnewsletter.com are calling for the company to come clean about the whole Google issue, as well as the sudden change in management.
Disclosure: Author’s has no position in any stock mentioned as of 2/5/08.
Please see our Disclaimer HERE.
NEW! Introducing Israel Opportunity Investor, our monthly subscription-only newsletter. Stay ahead of the game and make smart decisions in Israel stocks. Go here to learn more.
Aaron Katsman is Managing Editor of the Israel Opportunity Investor newsletter. He is lead portfolio manager for the Israel Growth Portfolio and Managing Director of America Israel Investment Associates, LLC. For more information, go to www.israelnewsletter.com or call 1-888-327-6179, or email aaron@profile-financial.com.
InformationWeek’s Stephen Wellman is a smart guy. I like his stuff — I really do.
As editor of InformationWeek’s Over the Air blog, Stephen has covered the iPhone and rumor-mill surrounding Google’s phone launch with professionalism, insight, and good scoop.
But he’s got a bone to pick with Google (GOOG).
Not necessarily with Google, the Company — he’s set his sights on Google, the Search Engine which powers Google, the Company.
Stephen asserts that Google Search is assailable by the throngs of vertical and niche search engines sprouting up all over the web. His assertion, that big General Search Engine, Google, will face competition, not from Yahoo or Microsoft, but by the numerous Technorati-esque niche providers who can perform their niche better than Google can perform in certain niches.
While I agree that from a functionality standpoint — yes, Technorati may perform better blog search than Google — these smaller search engines may provide better results for a certain task, but that doesn’t mean Google’s business is assailable.
That’s the equivalent of saying that since Segway’s self-balancing mechanism is so much better than other transportation technology out there, Segway is poised to eat the Auto Industry’s lunch. OK, this assertion was made by Dean Kamen when he was building up to launch of the device, but reality has set in. It’s a great device to use instead of a bike or a scooter or walking, but it’s not ready to replace my Honda just yet and certainly not poised to revolutionize urban transportation (ever hear of the subway or city bus??).
It no longer makes sense to view Google as just a search engine. Google, the Company, is more than just a search engine for the following 4 reasons:
1) Google as Web User Interface: Remember back when everything was portals? I used my ISP to dial-in to the Internet and was dropped off into an environment designed by the ISP with numerous outbound links to begin my surfing. Now, I only use Google (OK, I use iGoogle which is stickier given that fact that I’ve taken the time to personalize it). The revolution that Google kicked off was that I now view Google as my interface to the web. I go to my search engine to surf — not a portal. This is something that Technorati and the hordes of smaller engines can never provide me. I’m locked-in.
2) Suite of properties: As we’ve seen Google evolve from just a search engine into a more Yah00-like web experience, we’ve gotten hooked on various Google properties as part of an overarching web experience. I don’t really care that Gmail isn’t making serious money on Gmail — I love it. I use it not only for my web mail but I route some of my business email through it for spam detection and even for better indexing (admit it, some of you do this as well). I’m also using Google Apps to manage email from some of the blogs I manage. With Google Desktop, the boundaries between my PC (actually, it’s a mac baby!) and the internet have blurred and I use Google to search them both. This is incredible lock-in and not something a niche search provider can provide me or will usurp from Google.
3) Buy vs. Build to Compete: Even if these niche providers have better technology for vertical search, Google is competing on every front. Google Coop is an emerging platform that allows users to tweak search results, refine searches, and create their own search engines on Google technologies. It’s been slow but I’ve played around with this and with Google’s API, this thing is set for future bling-dom. Also, Google can always purchase some of the smaller players if the technology is really that outperforming.
4) SEARCH vs. search: I dunno, maybe it’s just me, but I like using Google for everything. It’s actually great to give them all my business because in return I get adequate results for most everything I search for on and off the Internet AND it’s integrated into other apps that I’m running (Google Docs, Gmail for instance).
So, I guess Stephen is right and he isn’t right (my kids try to convince me that the same is true of me). There will always be startup companies developing cutting-edge search to compete against Google not head-on, but in verticals and niches in which they can compete. But, ultimately, Google wins.
Checkmate.
Disclosure: Author owns Google personally but his fund does not as of 8/13/2007.
Please see our Disclaimer HERE.
Like what you see? Sign up to receive daily updates from IsraelNewsletter here.
**************
Zack Miller is the lead equity analyst for America Israel Investment Associates, LLC. and a former equity analyst for a leading multinational hedge fund. For more information, go to www.israelnewsletter.com or call 1-888-327-6179, or email zack@profile-financial.com
