Through tech history there has been a cycle of dominant companies, companies so untouchable that you wonder how things will ever change. Just a few years ago Microsoft was in this position and you really wondered how it could all go wrong. Well I’m not sure that it has all gone wrong completely for them yet, but certainly Apple seems to be winning the PC war, Microsoft still hasn’t developed a phone platform that interests anyone and neither have they found a social media or search platform worth mentioning.
Now look at Google. They still have in excess of 75% of the UK search market, their Android phone operating system is no.1 and their Google+ social media platform has been welcomed and viewed as successful…..so far.
There are indications that all might not be well at Google though, as like other dominant companies they have been perceived to be leveraging their position. In the past few days there have been three separate reported stories –
1, Google expanded its own “plus” results prominently into the middle of its search results, causing uproar. Now. We hear that the US Federal Trust Commission enquiry into Google will be expanded to include this -
2, Elsewhere, just a couple of weeks ago it was widely publicised that Googles own PPC Adwords system was publishing illegal ads, and Google was profiting from it.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16468846
3, In the same time we heard how Google was forced to downgrade its own Chrome website after discovering that bloggers were being paid to promote, and like it.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/jan/04/google-chrome-browser-search-rankings
Its very early to say this, and its certainly not clear who, if any one company can profit from this situation. But when Microsoft spent all that time fighting anti-competition lawsuits it also wasn’t obvious who would profit. Could 2012 be the year where Google finally starts to make some wrong decisions?