The new offerings of two of the most commonly recognised brands in the Computing and Internet industry carry well thought and nicely sounding names… Is that all or is there anything behind the names?
In our opinion, Google is converting from the best search engine to a Tsunami (not just a wave) aiming to eliminate (or aggregate) all the others under its platform whereas Microsoft, the once upon a time monopoly in Operating Systems and Web Browsers seeks attention to demonstrate that can make an impact in the search business, one of the most crucial aspects of Internet and the area it constantly failed to dominate or even be perceived as a strong player - something totally against its nature.
In our opinion this is what these 2 companies are currently doing. Google is no longer the friendly fairytale sympathetic alternative to the arrogant dominance of Microsoft, Intel, IBM etc. Is an even more arrogant powerhouse that offers everything for free depending on advertising and aims to concur our browsing paths towards controling more of our clicks (and personal data) to generate more revenues. Microsoft on the other hand, seeing a dark and irreversible future in its core competence arena (Mobile phones is a good example that OS arena is no longer a Microsoft playground whereas Internet Explorer is loosing market share by the hour and now Google Wave aims to eliminate the need for Microsoft Exchange Server) decided to attack in a playground where the dominating power seemed untouchable by changing its attitude - no longer trying to kill all others but instead offers an alternative approach that can attract a portion of the user-base. Not everyone - i.e. Microsoft seems to be happy just by a slice of the pie.
Whether Google will succeed to get people communicating only through waves and convert from “Email it to me” into “Pop it on my Wave” and whether Microsoft can manage to change reverse things back from “Google it” into “Search it on Bing” its a question that needs its time…
What remains our strong opinion is that both companies are indeed on fresh objectives and strategies… Google rides the wave to dominate the entire Internet whereas Microsoft bings “Am also here…” defending its deteriorating glory. Other players are around too and new players may emerge from time to time. The Internet is a big battle-field. Hopefully users will continue to enjoy pluralism and companies will seek new things to provide than re-invent the wheel or eliminating each other. In an ideal world Google would just offer the best and constantly improving search engine and Microsoft a reliable operating system that makes better use of a computers resources and enables smooth running of the applications . In reality Google provides search engines that returns more junk results than before and Microsoft provides operating systems that need faster computers to do basic things and always carry more bugs than the previous version…
