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Google Striking Fear into the Corporate Masses
SpectralDesign writes "The New York Times reports that Google is striking fear into the hearts of even unrelated industries. From the article: 'We watch Google very closely at Wal-Mart," said Jim Breyer, a member of Wal-Mart's board. In Google, Wal-Mart sees both a technology pioneer and the seed of a threat, said Mr. Breyer, who is also a partner in a venture capital firm. The worry is that by making information available everywhere, Google might soon be able to tell Wal-Mart shoppers if better bargains are available nearby.'"
funniest reason to be scared, ever.
they are saying: the cheapest on the whole world, are they lying? No, it's simply not possible
btw, castorama (like wal-mart in europe, but smaller and focuses only on things that people may use when building/renoving a house) gives warranty on their prices. Their ad is: "if you find this thing cheaper anywhere, we will return to you the price difference". I've never tried if this actually works.
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#\ @ ? Colonize Mars
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Yes, Google will tell you if there is cheaper somewhere else but it will also bring you customers if your offer is the cheapest. However this is not new: many services like that exist (Kelkoo), but they are limited to online shops. Google already has Froogle. The wave is reaching the mortar shops. Fine for me.
Million Dollar Screenshot
I doubt its Walmart that should be afraid, more likely brands like Nike, Reebok and Gucci and not only that they should be afraid of the information thats out there not the search engines that find it.
..... times up.d =179
t s.asp
Let me explain:
A quick quiz:
Gucci is an Italian Fashion product maker right? Tick tock tick tock
Wrong! Gucci are an Amsterdam company that buy in practically all of their products that makes *brands* (Boucheron, Balenciaga...) they say they buy shoes from Italy, according to this guy, the Italian high-fashion shoe industry get most of the shoe from Romania and China now and as a result Italy is Europe's biggest shoe importer:
http://www.brandchannel.com/features_effect.asp?i
Quiz:
Nike are a high quality manufactured brand, Reebok are a high quality manufactured brand, Pan Shoes Bangkok are some crappy Asian brand? Right or wrong, tick tock tick tock... Wrong. Bangkok Rubber company make Reeboks for Reebok, Nike's for Nike and Pan Shoes for Pan Group (which owns Bangkok Rubber Company).
http://www.pan-group.com/
CAT Footware (From Caterpillar):
http://www.catfootwear.com/Main.aspx
Cat Footware are American made and 'Authentic since **1904***' (from their website)? Correct or not?
Tick tock tick tock... Wrong.
Cat brand products are made by Wolverine World Wide.
Here is the information saying they signed up the CAT brand in ***1994***, not 1904:
http://www.wolverineworldwide.com/brands_cat.asp
Here's their annual report:
http://www.wolverineworldwide.com/investors_repor
So where are CAT brand shoes made? Read the 2004 Report, page 29.
Risk factors:
"reliance on foreign sourcing and concentration of production in China; the availability and price of power, labor and resources in key foreign sourcing countries, including China;"
Made in China.
It's not the search engines, its the information they should fear. Look at the CAT thing, I simply clicked on their financial details and did a search for 'China' to locate the information. Nothing to do with Google or Yahoo.
Google isn't even the leader in web-based price comparisons. This is going to happen, Google or not.
I expect the main channel of delivery in the future will be via cell phones anyway: SMS, MMS (photo of product bar code), and cell phone browser.
I guess what he doesn't like is that, for a while, there was an information imbalance between sellers and buyers, with sellers being able to use sophisticated computer systems for pricing, but buyers being left clipping coupons. Well, that imbalance is going away. That's a good thing for a market economy and capitalism. You like market economies and capitalism, right?
Dear WalMart,
Why are you so afraid that Google might tell (potential patrons that there are better prices available nearby - when you, too, could be making use of this technology ?
As soon as you spot a better price nearby, drop your prices at that location - now YOU have the better price.
Sincerely,
Common Sense
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Not entirely off-topic... there was a grocery store chain here in The Netherlands that would set up a mobile grocery store bus right outside a competing grocery store and let patrons of that store compare prices for the articles they had just bought by scanning the bar code. That way, they could easily tell people how much they could have saved by comparing the register stubs. More on-topic with what I wrote: *if* a product would actually have been cheaper at the store they're parked outside of, they would pass this on to corporate HQ. They, then, could issue an update to all their registers across the nation to bill that product more cheaply - the goal being to be cheaper than the competition once again.
Google's near-monopoly in search doesn't bother Wal-Mart, it's the fact that Google has apparent interest in supplying data to shoppers while they're inside Wal-Mart.
We already know Wal-Mart is bad for small business, merchant exploitation, competition, and even larger suppliers, so I am in favor of anything that might allow good companies like Vlasic retain their ability to meet profit margins and pay their workers. I personally abhor and refuse to visit any of the Wally World constructs (or any of the other Mega-Lo-Marts) in favor of internet shopping and my wife's constant pursuit of the 1/2 price grocery store trip via coupon and sale shopping (not there yet, but getting closer). I also encourage anyone I work with or hang with to do the same, pointing out the examples above and following with the straight-forward explanation of how our family manages to avoid the ninth level of Hell.
when it rains, it gets real soggy. when it pours, i'm under the tap just _waiting_ for the joy
It won't cut into their business at all. It just makes certain tactics like loss leaders impractical. For everybody. So no-one gets a competitive advantage, and you're back where you started.
Which is a good thing, stores should make everyones lives a little simpler and SELL STUFF FOR WHAT IT COSTS*. Comparison shopping is a huge waste of everybodies time and effort.
*including distribution, staff/rent costs, +3% profit, etc. The same profit margin on everything is what I mean.
Google has apparent interest in supplying data to shoppers while they're inside Wal-Mart.
There are instances where WalMart doesn't have the lowest prices. Obviously, items on sale is one case. However, in my area the WalMart checkers will price-match if you mention another store's sale price. (Don't know if that's company policy or not.) The other case I've noticed is where one chain store's private label is priced a few cents lower than WalMart's.
But all retail stores should be wary, particularly when city-wide wireless internet takes hold. I can't begin to tell you how often I have wanted to price-compare Best Buy vs. Staples vs. Circuit City vs. OfficeMax when standing in any one of those stores.
To-do List: Receive telemarketing call during a tornado warning. Check.
Last week I had a series of meetings with attorneys and accountants about a new software product. It really helped me understand the corporate mindset that pervades the industry:
* IP, in and of itself is valued by attorneys because it generates huge ammounts of billable work. No attorney in his or her right mind would recommend using anything that resembels an open source license. Too many barriers to litigation and legal fees. No huge lawsuits, no complex negotiations.
* Accountants like IP because it is valued however you need it to be.
So when I threw out the idea of GPLing the software, the result was almost comical:
* One attorney tried to explain how he needed to read the GPL. And bill me hours to do so. (not going to happen)
* One attorney suggested I'd be giving away a cash cow. I asked him: yours or mine. And the answer was a "what do you mean by that?" (struck a nerve here)
* My accountant said the intangible asset would be useful at the end of the year, and that an open source license may dilute the value of the asset.
It's very clear to me now why most business people see Google as a threat: intellectual property speculation has replaced the bilking investors with electric lemonade stands and WebVans full of irrational exuberance of the late 90's as the trendy way to make money out of thin air. Reality is going to be absolutely harsh to IP squatters & speculators:
* Innovation renders entire swaths of intellectual property useless. In the case of copyright, style and fashion relegate properties to the clearance bin or worse.
* For every piece of prime real estate, there are thousands of acres of desert, swampland, uninhabitable mountain terrain and tundra. Investors, many of which think the latest biotech idea will pay off in 10-15 years will find out that their idea isn't the winner - and will find out that a worthless patent is about as useful as an EPA superfund site is a location for a strip mall.
* Easments, emminent domain and the like have not been established in the IP world, and for the public good they will have to be. And the best ideas are often the ones that will eventually be taken via emminent domain. After all, if I can take your office park in NJ because I can put a bigger one up that will generate more tax revenue, why not take, say your one click buy or miracle drug patent because I can put it to better use for the common good?
I hope that Greenspan's last act parallels his cooling of the internet bubble: throwing a barrel of icewatter on the out of control party that the current IP feeding frenzy has become.
-- $G
I believe there is a good chance you missed my point: Google is beginning to directly compete with a lot of major big-time players. Google sprouted up virtually overnight, and is already stealing marketshare from companies that have sprawled out their empire over the course of decades. This is an unprecedented level of growth, and Steve Ballmer is royally pissed that he hasn't found a way to compete with them yet. Wal*Mart is scared as well, because what if it's true? What if Google successfully leads people to consistently lower priced items? Especially lower priced, brand name, big ticket items? What is Wal*Mart going to do to compete? Their prices are already about as low as they can possibly get. You are right, that it is all about losing marketshare for Microsoft (and everybody else). If I indicated that I felt any other way about that, I apologise for the lack of clarity. I thought it was obvious that was the issue when I pointed out that these companies still have not found a way to compete with Google, which is quickly stealing away their customer bases.
It was nice while it lasted, but now its time to research those long term puts.
There is a conspiracy theory concerning WalMart: First, Clinton opened trade with China... where is he from? Arkansas. Where is Walmart headquartered? Arkansas. Where is most of the stuff you buy from Walmart made? This is the biggest outsourcing project of all time, and government funded no less. Now, add to that that both Walmart and China are restrictive of information and its time to put the tin-foil hats on!
I have never been a fan of Walmart, and I don't think that Google is the altruistic god of geekdom, but I do wonder about such links as described above. Besides that, its time for someone to have a site that tells you where the best deals in town really are. I'm talking about a voice link service, maybe you tap in the store name and bar code and the service tells you where the best deal is, so that while you are in the store shopping you can decide if that is where you want to spend your money. Of course, I'd also like the service to tell you where the best deal on US made parts/items are too, so you get the choice of supporting your home country or having your dollars shipped overseas, but that is another matter.
Support NYCountryLawyer RIAA vs People
This happens in many consumer markets. The one that springs to mind is the "duty-free shopping" products.
The duty-free shops almost always have products that can NOT be found in regular consumer shops outside of airports. It specifically is to prevent comparison shopping. I have a friend who produces wines and champagnes, one set of labels for most of the products, another set of labels specifically for duty-free. The same thing happens with most of the products, like perfumes, chocolates, alcohols and electronics. The duty-free shops require a special size not available in regular consumer channels. You can see this if you end up buying perfume for the girlfriend just before travelling. Shops will carry 25ml and 50ml sizes, duty-free carries 35ml and 60ml at the same price (with local TVA) as 50ml and 75ml in the regular shops.
The volumes of consumer goods sold in competition-protected markets is so large that any mass producer has multiple packaging schemes. It is so common, that my online MBA courses mention the practice as normal and expected. Some database oriented friends tell me that all the big stock management systems (like Oracle and SAP) have functions for tracking multiple stock numbers for the same product, as well as tracking multiple margins for each version of the product.
the AC
Hemos is like...sci-fi fans;he thinks technology is cool, but he hasn't bothered to understand the science it's based on
I am waiting for the special edition of Googgle: the one that maps information on politics. I would like to get all publicly available documents of all governments, political parties, speaches, transcripts of all legislation sessions and meeting related to legislation, name of financial contributors, bios of all politicians, bios of all advisors, lobbyist, all financial transactions, etc.
After all, all items here are paid by tax payers, none of these items can be hidden behind corporate "policies".
Every single piece of legislation should be "froogled", to point out the winners and loosers, persons or corporate entities, who supported, who was against it, and how actually the piece of legislation was won by one or an other interest.
There will be very interesting revelations how the world really works.
In fact, today's politics is so complex, distorted in so many ways by media spin, etc., that this would be the only way for the public to even have a chance to follow politics and vote based on knowledge, instead of emotions and perception.
In fact, even legislators have a great deal of difficulty to know what's happening in details.
Just remember the politician in the Michael Moore documentary, who said, you just don't think that we can read the hundreds of pages of a legislation we need to vote on, son?
Oh that's great, here's our resident arrogant spoiled whiteboy, slummin' it in mom's basement, passing judgement on strangers.
Listen up, 'smart' guy: Most of Wal-Mart's target clientele is lower working class poor and straight up 'poor' people. That's true. Wal-Mart creates poor folks overseas, employs working poor here, and sells to poor people and bargain hunters.
But stupid?
Try disadvantaged. Or maybe members of the lowest end of the two-tiered class structure of the Internet-connected. In other words, the disenfranchised. Individually, they may or not be very well educated. Chances are, they aren't in the 'class' of the educated, either. But that means they're ignorant. And guess what? There's a cure for that, it's called 'education'.
But the disease affecting you, the white kid equating disenfranchisement and poor education (and its attendant 'ignorance') with 'stupid', is actually "stupidity"...and there may, or may not, be a cure for that, since 'stupidity', unlike ignorance, can be eternal.
Who knows? I know this: You're a spoiled, arrogant, and yes, "stupid" individual, and probably racist, also. Or is it just poor people you think are 'stupid', regardless of color? At any rate, you, my friend, are a prime example of the real 'problem' afflicting this country: Stupid people, having wasted their freeloading upbringing and education, and espousing poorly thought out opinions of people and classes they know nothing about, and then, probably, to make mattters worse, voting for folks who seem to mirror your own racist, arrogant stupidity.
Need I say...Fuck you?
Have a nice, hateful life, asshole