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Not even ten days have lapsed since Google announced its social networking product Google Plus, and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg played the master strategy of killing two birds with one stone by announcing the Facebook Skype tieup.

The first one is pretty obvious, of getting close to Google's worst enemy, Microsoft which bought Skype last month, and second, not to be underestimated, to play the role of the kingmaker in the clash of the titans.

Facebook can never really be what Microsoft or Google really is. Social networking has its limitations and a peak beyond which it just cannot go. Google and Microsoft have utilitarian enterprise values. Till man exists so will software. Till software exists so will the demand for services provided by companies like Google, Microsoft and others. But in this battle, the Yahoos, Twitters and Facebooks of the world play a very crucial role, that of deciding who wins and who loses or who gets on top and who remains the underdog.

Google's war ammunition is supplied by the advertisers to fight Microsoft as is its growth. In other words, Google needs Facebook or an equally powerful social networking platform, something it has been trying for years now. Facebook lacks the enterprise appeal for obvious reasons, it has no software or utility value as such. Another crucial element in this battle is the Open Source. If Open Source seems small think of Wordpress, the world's most popular publishing platform or Linux just to get an idea of the power Open Source holds.

For now Open Source is friendly with Google. Apparently, Open Source is one of the foundations for Google's success. Ironically, Google is one of the biggest privacy violators. Coming from the school they do, the least they could have was transparency. Facebook lacks the enterprise appeal and  it also doesn't have the support of Open Source. Microsoft, even though shaken by free versions of its cash cows by Google has a solid revenue model which in spite of all pressures and turmoil are here to stay and Microsoft has proved that time and again. Microsoft Office is still the dominant market leader and so is their OS.

Google versus Microsoft is a saga that can be compared to none in the history of enterprise. The turnaround times of new products to outdo each other, new strategies can possibly be termed as some of the best case studies and precedent for future corporate battles. While in the earlier times corporate battles were fought over years or even decades, this is probably the first time a startup, Google, challenged the then mightiest company on earth, Microsoft and in less than 5 years of its launch Google became enemy no. 1 for Microsoft. Not many companies have enjoyed the success Google got so easily. It wasn't competing just on products, Google shook the very foundation on which the software enterprise model was based on. It changed the rules of the game. Facebook did the same for social networking, something Google and Microsoft tried many times but couldn't succeed. Facebook holds power for its mass appeal.

The Bottomline In simple words, Facebook has the masses. What can hurt Google the most is the advertisers leaving Google for Facebook. The Facebook and Skype association is probably the best missile Microsoft has so far. It's time for some overhauling and clearing of rusted neuro pathways of Google, which did work at one time, if its wants to survive. For now its advantage Microsoft and a huge one at that.

Source : Economic Times

Blog Comments

ted on 12/Nov/2012

Google and Microsoft have utilitarian enterprise values.Thanks for sharing it.

Ranjana Sharma on 09/Jul/2011

Nice Article....

Facebook announced a few new features to improve its social service. The three new features are: A new chat design includes a sidebar that lists the people you message most, multi-person chat, and video chat through Skype.

Facebook has been through numerous chat designs in these past years, and now, is again changing it. This time, there is a sidebar which lists the people you message most. Further, it self-adjusts and automatically appears if your window is large enough. This makes it easier to see who is online (and offline) and contact them quicker.

Ever since its launch, chatting on Facebook has been a one-to-one experience which made making a decision amongst multiple people difficult. Now, Facebook is launching multi-person chat which allows more than two people to take part in a chat –the name really does a rather good of explaining it for itself.

Video chat is, without a doubt, the most popular feature. Made possible by Skype, video calling is now built right into Facebook allowing users to have a one-to-one video call without having to use an additional application.

Video chat, now, is exactly what Facebook needed in order to keep up with Google Plus and its video chat feature (Hangouts). However, Google’s service offers group video chat while Facebook is limiting users to a one-on-one experience. It does make sense that, in the future, Facebook will open up its service to group video chatting. Whether or not this will take place in time before Google’s launch would merely be speculation.

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