I don't get these sorts of articles. The author did not present any sort of argument beyond the implied "because it would be cool". Does he actually think that at no point has it occurred to anyone at Google to buy Twitter? What exactly is he expecting to accomplish with this article? Does he think that after reading this article, some Google fat cats will change their minds?
I should start my own blog. First article will be "Google should buy Uber so that once they roll out driverless cars they already have a customer base".
The argument is that Google+ is unsuccessful, and Twitter is, on the other hand. Twitter is booming with growth and is a prime target for Google if their goal is really to own a social network with a high amount of usage and and public knowledge. Google+ is not.
Arrington presents that it would be akin to Google purchasing YouTube even when it had Google Video gaining moderate traction over a slower period of time. Twitter is to YouTube as Google+ is to Google Video.
I do. Does that improve the quality of the article?
Your argument is assuming that Twitter and G+ are comparable products which they are not (unlike YT/Google video). So it's debatable whether Twitter has the same value to Google as a more successful version of G+.
Regardless, is he really expecting that after reading this article, the people who the deciding power at Google will fall to their knees and exclaim "How could we have been so blind? It's so obvious and so genius!"?
Did you intend your question about knowing Mike Arrington in a serious or sarcastic manner? I couldn't tell, though the sarcastic one makes more sense.
I think he presented an argument other than "it would be cool". The post is unlikely to influence the decision makers much if at all. But I don't see any downside to the post. You could write your thing about Uber (which is kind of lame) and I don't think anyone would care.
It was a sarcastic suggestion to suggest that you could take the combination of any large company and any startup and write an article "$LARGE_COMPANY should buy $STARTUP".
Except, counter to your assertion, several other actual arguments were made:
- People care about Twitter, but not Google+
- Twitter has achieved the "network effect"
- Twitter could be a hedge against Facebook
- Combined with Google's data needs, the value could be much higher to Google than the price
Nowhere does it suggest "because it would be cool". All of those are concrete arguments.
Also, you seem irritated at the perceived pretentiousness of the idea that Arrington might think Google will listen.
I don't think that's the point at all. I can't put words in Arrington's mouth, but he's been writing his own thoughts about the industry -- both reflection and speculation -- for years. I'm sure part of the reason he does it is to simply create a conversation -- like we are having here.
Oh boy. "No one I know uses Google+ much, if at all." I'm getting sooo sick of this argument. Noone I know uses Twitter, but a lot of friends are active on Google+, sharing things in private. Yet I don't call Twitter a failure. It's just different groups of people that use either service, and just because you have more connections to one "side" doesn't mean the other doesn't exist...
These claims that people make about Google+ are ridiculous. Sure, if you count account sign-ups then they are probably #1 but active users...no way.
"Google+’s user numbers are juiced simply because Google forces the product on everyone, and if you use Google to authenticate yourself to third parties, you are using Google+"
I feel the same way, I know a lot of people online that use Google+, but zero of my IRL friends use Google+ (most use FB, Instagram and Twitter).
You're confusing the cause and the effect. Google± is not being juiced up with integrations to make G+ popular, but rather those integrations are the reason for why G+ was created in the first place.
Google simply wanted a universal Google account for YouTube, Google Play, Blogger and so on. As to for why the wanted that? Well, Facebook is proving that there is value in collecting people's likes and comments, and then using those for serving ads.
On the active G+ users remark, I disagree. Every YouTube user is now a G+ user. Every GPlay user that wants to write reviews is now a G+ user.
So the point that their growth is not organic is rather moot.
This statement surprises me. Casual video-viewing is a large proportion of YouTube's attraction and does not require authentication ( except for age-restricted content ).
I don't have any Google accounts and I don't have any problems viewing YouTube content.
Every Youtube uploader might be a G+ user, but what proportion of the audience is that? 10% at most?
I go to YouTube all the time to listen to music. Organizing playlists on YouTube requires an account (playlists which are public by default, something that really annoys me). Liking a video on YouTube requires an account. You really underestimate the number of active YouTube accounts. And even if 10% is a good estimate, given that YouTube is the de facto destination for videos, 10% is huge.
And btw, Facebook is a competitor because a great deal of YouTube traffic comes from Facebook and so many people end up liking or commenting around YouTube links on Facebook. And that's what Google is trying to prevent with Google+: lost traffic, lost opportunities.
Note, I'm not saying that what Google is doing is good for us. After all, the Internet's strength is in its decentralized aspect. All I'm saying is that, from Google's point of view, Google+ already is a success. People miss the point when they view Google+ as a failure. Larry Page once said that Google+ is now the new Google. And he wasn't joking about it.
People laughed at Android when it came out. Nobody's laughing now. I fear a Google dominated near future, which is why in the Google versus Facebook battle I actually hope Facebook wins, but I admire Google's execution.
Did you even read the post? They specifically mentioned sharing things in private. Of the friends I have who use Google+, most exclusively post privately.
I think the key to understanding Arrington's perspective here is to look at this sentence:
"And I certainly don’t see people giving out their Google+ names on the cable news networks and other TV shows."
My guess is that Arrington isn't interested in numbers as much as he is in what technology has more fully permeated the public consciousness. The assumption here is that mass media is still an accurate reflection of whatever's dominating the cultural mainstream... Arrington sees celebrities on TV advertising themselves via twitter handles but never a G+ account, so to him, G+ is essentially a fringe product.
...because Google buying a loss making company for $12 billion+ on the basis of some notional 'value' to the business has worked out fantastically well for them in the past (replace 'Twitter' with 'Motorola', and replace 'data' with 'patents')...
Google only bought Motorola a year ago - it's far too early to judge the value of that acquisition. Plus, in terms of patents it seems like the patent wars of the past few years have pretty well calmed down.
A better example would be YouTube, which I think most people would consider to be a good acquisition (I think it's profitable now?).
That being said, I don't see where the money is to be made on Twitter. Anecdotally, as someone outside the bay area (24, M, Western Australia), I do not know anyone (really, not one!) who has a Twitter account which they actively tweet from [1], though a few (including me) have one which is used as a Twitter feed reader.
[1] As additional context for this, I know only a couple of people my age do not have Facebook, and I have plenty of friends on Instagram, Snapchat, Pinterest, a few on Tumblr and even a couple on G+
Weren't there mails exchanged between Youtube founders at the time that were going like "let us ignore those legal worries until someone big buy us, then we tell them" ? So Google didn't really get the full problem until it got its hands on it (hard to believe, maybe they bought Youtube despite that ? Can't remember).
...replace 'Twitter' with 'YouTube' and replace 'data' with 'users'? Not sure I agree with either conclusion, but I'm not sure I understand your argument either.
Amongst the big players, Twitter is the one who cares the most about Open Source and transparency. I wouldn't want to see them being swallowed by Google, or anyone else for that matter.
I don't understand why he cites Google's market cap since that doesn't really support the purchase cost as "pocket change."
Google has a free cash flow of ~$2.8 billion [1], so no, it wouldn't be pocket change.
Twitter's data worth tens of billions? Well, CNBC is saying they've sold their data for +$47 million [2] but I don't find any clear indication of that on the SEC filing [3]. A part of me doesn't believe that data would be worth billions to Google's search team seeing that they made ~$13.8 billion just on their own data.
Personally speaking (as in I have no data supporting the practicality of these thoughts), where Google could profit in buying Twitter is in using tweets for machine learning conversations, connecting geography with social interests & economic impact (Japan loves anime, US loves football, etc), and asset acquisition.
It is both a measure of Internet companies strength & weakness that multi-billion dollar acquisitions are taken so lightly. "Spent 3-4 years building a product which didn't become a winner? No problem, buy someone else!"
"Strength" because compared to other industries, integrating two Internet companies is not that tough. Strength also because of the speed at which startups build scale and become world dominating. And the sheer amount of finance at their disposal to make these acquisitions.
"Weakness" because all of it seems so ephemeral. All it takes is a few years and a leader is often a laggard. Conversely, if you don't sell out before your bubble pops, you're history. And of course there's the network effects curse - if you're not among the top few players, you might as well sell out or close down.
Problem is, whatever I read from Arrington, does not make me feel, that he really believes, he could be wrong.
And that is my problem with most so called tech-journalists (or celebrities). They oftentimes seem to make a great show of learning. At least, this is what it seems to me.
I should start my own blog. First article will be "Google should buy Uber so that once they roll out driverless cars they already have a customer base".