Mashable - The Social Media Guide - Latest Comments in Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

Luis Galarza — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 00:16:23 -0000

My grand father used to say "To become rich, you need to think of money as milk and income opportunities as the cow, if you only drink milk from one cow, what are you going to do if your cow dies? The only way to become wealthy is by building multiple stream of income, in other words, get more cows to have unlimited supply of milk"

This is exactly what this big corporation do, the problem is that they forget to customized for their customers and deliver a top product with quality support before moving to the next cow...

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

PaulGlazowski — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 16:31:30 -0000

Yes, still a lot of room to improve, too.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

sam — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 13:27:07 -0000

Great article. AOL seems to be focusing on places it can win while shutting down areas that are not working. As you point out, it creates problems with internal and external stake holders. Btw, AOL is growing page views again with this renewed focus. Let's hope the media doesn't try to kill it.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

PaulGlazowski — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 09:19:51 -0000

One thing I failed to mention in the original post was AOL's shutdown of several services, including XDrive and Bluestring. Those moves definitely show signs of an internal recognition that focus needs to be at the center of its circle of properties.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

PaulGlazowski — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 09:17:42 -0000

It may well be true that Google bought Jaiku for the smarts of its developers rather than the product/service itself. But that doesn't mean keeping Jaiku active in this sort of sluggish state is beneficial to its brand.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

PaulGlazowski — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 09:15:45 -0000

It's not so much about the bottom line as it is a lack of focus. Each company follows another in its own way, but they've gotten so genericized that you can choose any one and they're pretty much all alike.

The exception is Google, because it's corporate framework and strategy is different than the rest. It's relied very much on the 20% doctrine, which has helped the company retain a fresher image than its competitors. But I maintain that Google Video is one item among several in Google's repertoire that need not operate any further.

As for Jaiku's potential, the idea of "what have you done for me lately?" is worth repeating.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

S. Neil Vineberg — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 03:20:57 -0000

Paul,

Do you really think Google bought Jaiku for the community?

I believe Google acquired Jaiku to leverage its talented team of former Nokia mobile developers for one reason: Android. Great move by Google, for sure.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

S!ick — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 01:21:23 -0000

My latest frustration has been with the lack of (what I consider) serious support for OpenID.

So far, my best experience has been with using Yahoo! OpenIDs with websites. Compared to AOL's version, the OpenID I can create from my Yahoo! account is much easier for me to remember and use.

There are some websites that don't use version 2.0 of Yahoo!'s OpenID...so I don't use those websites.

After creating a couple of Identi.ca accounts (using my OpenID) I have begun to feel Google should consider migrating Jaiku's current users to Identi.ca. (I hope Twitter and Pownce will allow me to integrate my OpenIDs into my current accounts, as well.)

In the past I appreciated Microsoft's Live ID, and still do, but it doesn't appear to be usable with as many different websites and services as OpenID is...

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

Ling — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 00:17:16 -0000

One thing more - Their actual worth. These companies have now gone well above and beyond their base worth. Brick & Mortar comapnies have physical assets to back their share value. The only thing internet companies have are intellectual assets and visitors. Its all in the mind, and on Wall Street. If they make a mistake, like Yahoo as done, then they, and shareholders, end up with squat.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

Bryan — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 23:17:14 -0000

Every time one of the big Internet companies cans a service it affects at least thousands (often millions) of users. It hurts their reputations and it undermines the trust their users have in them. It's easy for someone who primarily uses Google for search and email to deride the other email and search providers for providing redundant and inferior products, but millions actually PREFER to use those non-Google services. They won't be impressed by the company that leaves them out in the cold. Google, Yahoo!, Microsoft, and AOL are all big companies with a lot of money and a lot of employees -- it's OK for them to have a lot of fingers in a lot of pies. They don't need to look for niches to fill like a startup does because they already have huge audiences.

If you're arguing that the giants need to be concerned about their bottom line, then I don't disagree -- if a service isn't turning a profit, it may be necessary to can it for the sake of the business despite the fact that the users won't be happy. With that in mind, I find it really interesting that you mentioned GeoCities specifically because Yahoo! uses GeoCities to market their paid hosting services; you cannot signup for GeoCities without being made aware of the alternative, paid hosting options Yahoo! offers. Is Yahoo! Buzz really the more profitable service at this point? I'm not sure of that at all. There's also no reason why Jaiku cannot be profitable insomuch as it is possible for a microblogging service to be profitable; why should Google destroy what potentially could be a great service? Obviously, Google hasn't developed the service like it should have been developed to this point, but that doesn't mean it can't do that in the future.

Re: Web Giants Are Stretched. It’s Time for Them to Tighten up.

Nicki B. — Sat, 26 Jul 2008 22:43:18 -0000

Simply, it's about time that these 'web giants' start sharing a piece of the Internet pie, and get used to it. They need to realize (and so do web users) that it's not all about them, and, perhaps, others may actually know how to do it better.