Where is Google Going In The Next 5 Years

[Fendal]

Hi All,

I read an article the other day about Google making their own payment service to rival paypal called Gbuy, I think this is a good thing for the customers, it should make paypal review their charge prices, in my opinion paypal hasn't been as good since eBay bought it.

http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB113918924045565647-jtBYW5A_4ZI6WZiwUaUJNSbVAQI_20070206.html

the question is, do you think Google will start an auction site like eBay ?, also what else will they be likely to do, how many baskets are there and will Google have enough eggs to put in them. ?

 

[jsteph]

In my opinion, the long-term goal for Google is to be a complete operating system.
--Jim

 

[Sympology]

I don't think Google will do many of the things they are constantly romoured to do.

Her's way.

They earn billions of $'s in advertising and are very successful.

The Google PC?
Why wuld they enter the hugley competetive PC market, where margins are very low and investment is extremely high? Do you think unestablished Google could compete with Dell and HP? Remeber corporate is where the money is at and compaies will not rush to an unkown.

OS?
So sell and compete with Microsoft? See corporate above.
Do their own version of Linux? So will you pay or get a free version? Mmm tough choice.

For both OS and PC, are they also going to invest in the millions of $'s required for help and support? Have a helpdesk manned by thousands of people?

Ebay?
A possible, but again, pitfuls. You are pitting the against another super player, the risks are enormous. If it doesn't take of, they could lose millions of dollars. My folks don't have internet, never heard of Google, but know what eBay is. That is what they are up against.

Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[Sympology]

PS sorry about the appalling grammer and typos, bad weekend.

Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[CajunCenturion]

I don't think Google is interested in selling PCs, nor entering the OS competition.

However, I do see Google providing the "Google Workstation". The hardware would still be provided by Dell, HP, et. al, but that machine would not have a full blown OS, like Windows or Linux. That machine would have nothing but a Google browser which would provide basic hard drive (paging and cache) services with Internet browsing (via Google of course) capabilities.

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[Sympology]

So a kinda HTTP Wyse terminal then?
Not sure how useful that would be. Maybe Libaries and public surf stations, but that's it I can think of. Heck even cash points (ATM's) run Windows these days...


Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004

 

[Fendal]

Some interesting points/views there, I also read an article about google setting up their own network,

http://markbnj.blogspot.com/2006/02/tech-googlenet-googletv-googlepc.html

I'm not sure how true this is but for now I take it with a pinch of salt.

They have moved on to alot of different things already, gmail, google maps, google earth, google talk(new), google videos and google desktop to name a few.

It will be good to come back to this post in three or four years to see if any predictions match up.

 

[Sympology]

I'd take a huge pinch of salt !

A container stuffed with Processors. Fantastic...so what about power, cooling, lightning protection even parking?
Would you trust a datacentre in a truck to provide critical services?

Of course in the UK we've had local adverts for decades, even more so if your on the like of Telewest were you had adds for the local kebab shop!

So some things may work in the US, but not elsewhere.

Stu..




Only the truly stupid believe they know everything.
Stu.. 2004