Ideas, Opinions, Trends, Markets, Thoughts that can make a difference to our lives and shape the future
BBC News Magazine has done research about the five major search engines - Google, Yahoo, MSN, AskJeeves , A9.com and
gives its verdict . The Search engine were tested on five key areas.
- First a search for "raleigh" - chosen as it is a word with several meanings including the bike company, the US city, the expedition charity and the Elizabethan explorer.
- How fast? Although engines can be slowed down by problems in receiving networks, searches made within minutes can give a comparison.
- Then how did it look and could it tell us an Alsatian's IQ (reportedly 60 - whether this is true or not is irrelevant).
- Finally, the simple question - what is the time in Sydney?
The Author Tom Geoghegan writes," I was a slave to Google although only a basic user who rarely used the advanced tools. It's clear how it's become the market leader with its reach unrivalled since it doubled its index this week. And it got the obscure fact easily". But the basic search could be a little more refined - a triumph of mass over classification, perhaps?
- More details are available at
here on Google search.
- The new competitor MSN has had teething problems and we should bear in mind this is a test mode. But it failed to home in on some of the raleigh references picked up by its rivals and the search builder tool is time-consuming if you're in a rush. The mechanisms designed to trump Google, such as the Near Me and direct questions, seem limited at this stage. Details are available
here on MSN Search.
- Yahoo! did try and help me with its "also try" section and it answered the Sydney question too. But it is cluttered on the engine's front page. Details are available
here on Yahoo search.
- All three could take a leaf out of the butler's book. Ask Jeeves gave a great classification of raleigh into its different definitions. And it got the question and the obscure fact. Here are the
details on Askjeeves search.
- A9 looks like a good bet for the popular culture references, with its access to the vast Amazon retail cupboard. The details ar available
here on A9 search.
via Kuroshin Not saying anything - almost every blogger and non blogging internet junkie has a certain view about this..
Via optimizemag Issues and readiness to adopt RFID Here top guys from GM, Unilever, UPS and IBM discuss their viewpoints - quite insightful in that how global enterprises evaluate/embrace new technologies - Looks like RFID may have a delayed start for wide usage.
Via Wired Jeff Inmelt gets noticed Being Jack welch's successor is no easy thing - Jeff has so far proven to be very competent and here he says that threat of competition from China is insignificant and GE recognises the difference between a commodity product and a great one
A survey report on organisation DNA and ability to execute Too often all of us must have at some point in our life felt "when everyone agrees about changing - nothing changes". This study classifies organisations into seven types - The Resellient, The Just-in-Time, The Military, The positive aggressive, The Fits & Starts, The Outgrown and The Overgrown. You can also take an online diaganostics survey about your organisation / organisations known to you at www.orgdna.com.
Search is a billion dollar business today and Microsoft and Yahoo now want to seriously challenge Google It took less than two years for Google from launch to attain leadership - we need to watch the results in the next round of slugfest. Google's growth is amazing - has added 50,000 computers in their data centers in the six months before thanksgiving to raise the total no of systems to be 100000 and from almost neglible revenue in 2001 to around 1 billion dollar in 2003..amazing success story
Singapore annouces variable pay guidelines- expected to be implemented by this year end Singapore, one of the few developed nation in Asia, annouces variable pay structure to remain competitive. Singapore worried about its future is initiating a lot of measures to bring down the cost structure and maintain competitiveness
The economic restructuring of the last decade had finally taken root and helped Indian industry become globally competitive Interestingly,while the GDP is growing at 8%+, not even 2 percent of the Indian population has been directly affected by the boom, and point to the abysmal state of infrastructure in urban centers and the stark poverty in the villages.The challenge is making the growth more broadbased, easier said than done given the distribution of employed across organised and unorganised sectors and the need for enterprises to look more competitve.
Via washingtonpost - A very intersting study in contrast between Amazon and EbayEBay and Amazon.com, the Internet's top two e-commerce sites, are taking opposite approaches to growth. EBay raised its prices this month for the fourth year in a row, while Amazon renewed its pledge to keep cutting prices even if it means lower profits and more.
