Google Profits Double

[Mr. Analog]

Yow!

Google's profits more than doubled in its second quarter as it continued to perform more strongly than its nearest rival Yahoo.

"The opportunities before us really are unlimited at present," Eric Schmidt, Google's chief executive, told analysts. "It's another good day and a good quarter at Google."

[Lazybones]

Man I wish I had some money to play in the stock market

[Shayne]

I just dont see Google as a good long term bet. $435.23 on Jan 3, 2006.  $390.11 on July 21, 2006 (thats a loss of about 10%)

Google Talk, an instant-messaging service launched last August, now ranks No. 10, garnering just 2% of the number of users for market leader MSN Messenger, according to comScore Media Metrix.

Pretty much what i expected concidering its massive lack of features

Three-month-old Google Finance, heralded as a competitor to market leader Yahoo! Finance, has settled in as the 40th-most-visited finance site, according to data from Hitwise, a competitive intelligence firm.

Not really that fair concidering its almost brand new, but it truely doesnt offer anything over whats already available

Gmail, the e-mail service that was lauded at its 2004 launch for offering 500 times as much storage space as some rivals (they quickly closed the gap), today is the system of choice for only about one-quarter the number of people who use MSN and Yahoo e-mail.

I expected less numbers actually.   I know more people who use Hotmail then Gmail, the reason is that they have had their hotmail accounts for 10+ years.  Also the space is rather pointless, ive had my gmail account since the 3rd or so month of the beta program and im only using 197MB but have like 1,100 emails

"People give Google the victory in the beginning and don't show up later to notice that things didn't go anywhere," says Paul S. Kedrosky, a venture investor at Ventures West Management Inc. "Google has product ADD. They don't know why they're getting into all of these products. They have fantastic cash flow but terrible discipline on products," says Kedrosky. "It's a dangerous combination."

Exactly

Read more at: http://tinyurl.com/khld2

I just dont believe the hype.  I would bet on Apple personally, i thought i'd never own one, but their MacBook is masterfully built, and their operating system is unmatched (Vista doesnt hold a candle to it). 12% marketshare in notebooks, thats getting Firefox like in numbers. (I will admit that Apple has shed about 15% value as well)

Read more at: http://tinyurl.com/nqdad

[Darren Dirt]

Gmail, the e-mail service that was lauded at its 2004 launch for offering 500 times as much storage space as some rivals (they quickly closed the gap), today is the system of choice for only about one-quarter the number of people who use MSN and Yahoo e-mail.

I expected less numbers actually.   I know more people who use Hotmail then Gmail, the reason is that they have had their hotmail accounts for 10+ years.  Also the space is rather pointless, ive had my gmail account since the 3rd or so month of the beta program and im only using 197MB but have like 1,100 emails

Hey, I thought *I* was supposed to be "The Cynical One"

Actually, I am one of those (previous) Hotmail users who now use Gmail as "weapon of choice". The 2500MB of space is not pointless -- I feel free in using the account as more than just an email account, but as a defacto todolist, surfing history grabber, and even easy file transporter. And the SEARCH is the reason I use it for all these purposes -- have you noticed that Hotmail says explicitly "will search only FROM, TO, and SUBJECT" -- i.e. it's nearly IMPOSSIBLE to find a message based on what its contents were about. With Google, if I can't find a message based on its multiple labels (i.e. tagging) -- which is very rare -- then a search (first within that label, then if not found I just say "in the whole damn mailbox" I always am able to find it (at which point I might correct the tagging )


That's like saying the Lambourghini's top speed of (?) mph is pointless since you always drive it in the city

[Thorin]

Google Talk, an instant-messaging service launched last August, now ranks No. 10, garnering just 2% of the number of users for market leader MSN Messenger, according to comScore Media Metrix.

Pretty much what i expected concidering its massive lack of features

I agree, GoogleTalk didn't become what it was expected to be.

Gmail, the e-mail service that was lauded at its 2004 launch for offering 500 times as much storage space as some rivals (they quickly closed the gap), today is the system of choice for only about one-quarter the number of people who use MSN and Yahoo e-mail.

I expected less numbers actually.   I know more people who use Hotmail then Gmail, the reason is that they have had their hotmail accounts for 10+ years.  Also the space is rather pointless, ive had my gmail account since the 3rd or so month of the beta program and im only using 197MB but have like 1,100 emails

Yes, it's hard to get people to switch.  I am skeptical of the user count offered by any of the webmail providers, though.  They never break it down as "X used their account in the last year, Y used their account in the last five years, Z have been identified as bot accounts".  I'm also surprised the numbers are as high as they are, for the same reason as you - people find it a chore to switch.  Interestingly, almost everyone I know with a Gmail account still has a Hotmail account.  Can you auto-forward emails from Hotmail to Gmail yet?

"People give Google the victory in the beginning and don't show up later to notice that things didn't go anywhere," says Paul S. Kedrosky, a venture investor at Ventures West Management Inc. "Google has product ADD. They don't know why they're getting into all of these products. They have fantastic cash flow but terrible discipline on products," says Kedrosky. "It's a dangerous combination."

Exactly

Well, it's not like Microsoft and Sun don't suffer from the same product ADD.  And IBM makes some crap products (I hate @%&#ing Lotus Notes!).  The big difference is that when Google puts out a beta product, it's immediately heralded as the Next Great Thing.  But that's modern media for ya.

That's like saying the Lambourghini's top speed of (?) mph is pointless since you always drive it in the city

Lamborghini 350 GTV (first prototype Lamborghini): 280km/h
Lamborghini 350 GT (first production Lamborghini): 250km/h
Lamborghini Countach LP 400 S (first Countach, 4.0L V-12): 315km/h
Lamborghini Diablo 6.0 SE (newest Diablo): 328km/h
Lamborghini Murcielago (fastest production Lambo): "Over 330km/h depending on aerodynamic configuration"
Lamborghini Gallardo (cheapest new Lambo in Canada): 309km/h

Wait, this is what's called a thread hijack, isn't it?

[Darren Dirt]

The reason it's a chore to totally "dump" all my stuff from Hotmail is cuz Microsoft intentionally makes it difficult to go message-by-message (i.e. multi-select anyone!?) and say "forward to email account X". Or even "export as a single text file" or similar.

The prospect of clicking each email, and either "forwarding" the message, or even just "selectall-copytoclipboard-pasteintoNotepad(or preferably a little Javascript content-mining tool I've often thought about throwing together)" ... well, my time's pretty valuable, so though I no longer send any emails from hotmail ever and I do mean never I still log in to the accounts every 2 weeks or so and read the occasional non-spam, or job offer info, that sadly still arrives from those who don't know any of my half-dozen gmail accounts

[Shayne]

Well, at least I'm not alone in my thoughts.