re: Is Google on crack?

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: dewayne () warpspeed com (Dewayne Hendricks)
Date: July 28, 2007 7:17:37 AM EDT
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <xyzzy () warpspeed com>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] re: Is Google on crack?

[Note:  This comment comes from reader Charles Brown.  DLH]

From: Charles Brown <cbrown () flyingcircuit com>
Date: July 27, 2007 9:37:26 AM PDT
To: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Cc: Charles Brown <cbrown () flyingcircuit com>, Dewayne-Net Technology  
List <xyzzy () warpspeed com>
Subject: Re: [Dewayne-Net] Is Google on crack?

Dewayne,

This is an excellent article.

There is another possible scenario. It is precisely that Google's  
franchise is so precarious that they need to do something bold.  In  
addition, I don't think anything they do, or not do, would change the  
perception of the duopoly of Google as Cultural Enemy No. 1 that  
needs to be bandwidth-taxed out of existence.  Finally, the duopoly  
wants the mobile advertising market for themselves.

However, what if Google partners to finesse the market as opposed to  
frontal assault?  They could spearhead a whole new genre of  
businesses and markets, assuming they understand that few surviving  
wireless entrepreneurs I know would care about academic  
classification.  In other words, they don't need to put up $10  
billion, they need to evangelize interested parties, create  
consortia, pool and draw capital into the market.  They provide a  
sort of catalytic downpayment.

The Sprint-Google deal is an example of a second scenario; a flanking  
movement into the wireless market.  Sprint is catching hell from  
shareholders for their plans to spend $3-4 billion on WiMax  
infrastructure build-out so this helps both companies.  With the CLWR  
deal with the satellite carriers, the WiMax business model is being  
driven by the capital markets, and becoming more complex.  There  
doesn't yet appear to be any core conflicts of interest, yet, but it  
depends on how these deals are constructed and managed.

Let's hope that Google learned the lesson of Icarus.  If not,  
Cringely has the right bet.  You don't bring a bunch of Ph.D's to a  
knife fight.

Charlie


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