> Let me repeat that and make it clear: Google simply cannot compete in a low margin business.
That reminds me of Intel. The addiction to high margin microprocessors and a captive customer base had two effects. a) Intel doesn't know how to play with customers that have a choice. b) Customers with a choice avoid designing in Intel solutions like the plague. Over the long haul Intel is a much smaller company than they would be otherwise.
Here is a good one. In the late 80's Intel fucked over Panasonic badly enough that Panasonic put Intel in their prohibited vendors list. I worked for a group that managed to get Panasonic in as a customer. And then Intel fucked them again. And back on the list they went.
Google has the same mindset that Intel does. They can't process the ramifications of their business practices on future business opportunities.
> They can't process the ramifications of their business practices on future business opportunities.
Here's where that really hurts them (IMHO). Google, as a whole, has a very short attention span. A lot of things at Google began as bottom-up engineering-led projects, the poster child for which is probably GMail. This seems to work really well for things that are engineering problems. I think it works incredibly badly for a bunch of other things though.
We, as engineers, tend to get bored. There are all sorts of quotes for this in software development like after you finish the first 90% you need to finish the second 90% (I forget who said this).
I see project after project come out of Google that might be promising but it gets abandoned as the talent moves on to the next hot thing until finally it's killed. The cost of this, as you say, is paid by future projects.
The classic counterexample to me is Apple Pay (vs Google Checkout/Google Wallet/Google Pay/Android Pay/Whatever it's called now). Every few weeks Apple announces some new bank or merchant or country is launched. Over years now they've slowly been building out this ecosystem. Google just doesn't have the commitment, focus and attention for this schlep [1], which is why they'll lose. Apple does.
Apple has their failures too (Ping anyone?) but it's fair to say Apple really does put more wood behind fewer arrows [2].
> after you finish the first 90% you need to finish the second 90% (I forget who said this).
I don't know who said it either, but I heard an alternate phrasing: "The first 50% of the project takes 90% of the time. But the second 50% takes the other 90% of the time."
I probably should've just Googled it as it was easy enough to find. According to Wikipedia [1], it was Tom Cargill of Bell Labs and it's called the 90-90 rule:
> The first 90 percent of the code accounts for the first 90 percent of the development time. The remaining 10 percent of the code accounts for the other 90 percent of the development time
That reminds me of Intel. The addiction to high margin microprocessors and a captive customer base had two effects. a) Intel doesn't know how to play with customers that have a choice. b) Customers with a choice avoid designing in Intel solutions like the plague. Over the long haul Intel is a much smaller company than they would be otherwise.
Here is a good one. In the late 80's Intel fucked over Panasonic badly enough that Panasonic put Intel in their prohibited vendors list. I worked for a group that managed to get Panasonic in as a customer. And then Intel fucked them again. And back on the list they went.
Google has the same mindset that Intel does. They can't process the ramifications of their business practices on future business opportunities.