Rich Skrenta: Google won already

by Anders Bylund

Computer industry heavyweight Rich Skrenta thinks that Google has essentially won the online search and advertising war, and that the entire Internet is Google's to enjoy, direct, and profit from. Does he mean "won" in the sense of Athens at the battle of Marathon, or how the Iraqi information minister used it? Let's have a closer look.

Skrenta, who played instrumental parts in Netscape's search strategy, building the Open Directory, and developing the Amiga Unix OS, bases his claim on Google's technological lead and, in turn, the massive mindshare the company has built up over the years. He cites a study reporting that users looking at Google search results under a Yahoo logo are inclined to think the results less relevant, and vice versa. Following this, he argues, it doesn't really matter if Ask or Microsoft can beat Google at the search game, because it has already won that battle in the hearts and minds of consumers.

And what follows from Google's position at the center of the 'Net is a massive monetizing opportunity—which Google nailed down as well. The AdSense program is undeniably successful, though Skrenta may overstate its position. He claims that "Google's CPMs are $90-120, vs. $4-5 for an average browse page view elsewhere." We're somewhat suspicious of those figures here at the Orbiting HQ, and they may be his own best guess based on ad revenues at his own sites.

Skrenta keeps repeating his pithy mantra, "Google is not your competition, Google is the environment." He then says that Yahoo, for example, should follow the lead of Ask.com and surrender to the Google money machine. By his calculations, the Y is leaving $1.7 billion of annual revenue on the table by trying to run its own advertising network rather than letting AdSense/AdWords run the show.

By making advertising partners out of even potential competitors, and backing the whole thing up with arguably the best search engine available (though you may have other favorites), the Mountain View online Brobdingnagian has cemented its place as the central point of the Internet, the one place where all the buyers and the vendors, the readers and the publishers, meet up to conduct their business. To beat Google now, somebody would have to come up with a better search and a better advertising solution, and then convince the general public and the business world, respectively, of these feats.

It sounds daunting indeed, and Mr. Skrenta makes sense on many levels. I use and like a lot of Google's products every day. The company has plans to grow beyond the invisible borders of the online world pretty soon, starting with some tentative radio and print advertising programs. Call it the world's librarian, making a few pennies off every piece of information we all consume. Still, no victory is everlasting. We'll just have to see how long Google can sit on this throne. 10 years on the 'Net is epoch. Will Google still be the leader 10 years from now?

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