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Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

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Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#131
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't block ads with streaming services or other captive audiences. They seen well positioned in this regard.

UBlock origin blocks youtube ads, if that's what you were referring to by "streaming services".

It doesn't seem to block the channel talking about how you need to support them on Patreon, or how Bose is giving away a new headset, or whatever.

Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#132
post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are the companies paying $10 per click? Otherwise I'm not sure you're making the appropriate comparison.

"mesothelioma attorneys" is $50+ per click. Expected value of a class-action asbestos lawsuit = Millions? 10s of millions?

That, and its really hard to lose those cases. Shooting fish in a barrel.

Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#133
post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cloud. I think they are very serious about becoming the market leader in this space. They are behind AWS, but if they can leverage the same technology that they use internally, they will have a compelling offering.

And yet they managed to make another complicated cloud service. Would be nice if someone would cater for Startup owners that do not have time to study documentation and overlook multiple processes just to run a simple bot etc.

If only ...

If only there were cloud products and services that were dead simple and just did one little useful thing just the way you wanted it.

If only ...

Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#134
post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cloud. I think they are very serious about becoming the market leader in this space. They are behind AWS, but if they can leverage the same technology that they use internally, they will have a compelling offering.

And yet they managed to make another complicated cloud service. Would be nice if someone would cater for Startup owners that do not have time to study documentation and overlook multiple processes just to run a simple bot etc.

GCE is much simpler to use than EC2. Google came to the party late and they have seemed to take some time to not replicate AWSs annoyances.

Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are doing a poor job of diversifying. Those side businesses are producing a small amount of revenue. It would be one thing if the profits hadn't caught up, the real problem is there isn't much in the way of sales to begin with. I see no example business of theirs that will get them even moderately diversified off of online advertising in the next five years. And I'm not speaking of technology Alphabet is messing…

I block ads because "native" ad producers like Taboola, Outbrain, Revcontent, ... you get the point. These advertising companies like to show NSFW content at the end of news articles at some sites. Therefore I block ads for the same reason I block pornographic sites. This was pretty liberating because before "native" ads I felt a pang of guilt for blocking ads. If Google wants to stop ad blockers they should hide sit…

> If Google wants to stop ad blockers they should hide sites that use these obnoxious "native" ad networks.

This would instantly and Google in court for anti-competitive practices...and rightfully so. Imagine if Google suddenly said, "we are going to punish any publisher that doesn't use Adsense within organic search listings." Holy cow that would be bad, and the scary part is that Google could easily do this without even announcing it.

Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#138
post #30

So, Google makes fantastic products. Much of our online interaction involves Google in some way or the other. And the only way these guys have figured to make money is ads. Why can't they sell products and be like an Apple, Oracle, Microsoft. I am guessing it's too much work to grow in such a massive pace without ads. Ads are a marketers/sales persons dream and these marketers are very likely to spend money. This ad…

"Anyway, I feel Google will be a much better company if it can get rid of dependence on ads"

Do you feel like the NFL will be a better company once it rids itself of that pesky "football" dependence ?

Will McDonalds finally break free of the hamburger racket and flourish as a company ?

Google isn't some company that just happens to make a bunch of money from ads - they are an advertising company. Period. The end. Online ads stemming from search results is the thing they do.

It sure sounds neat to bootstrap a world-beating conglomerate and dominate all market spheres with your plexes full of big brains, but it's not going to happen.

It's not going to happen.

They will live and die with the search ads. They will not disrupt the car industry. They will not launch rockets to mars. They will not solve homelessness.

Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#139
post #39

I wonder if other search engines are also starting to catch up? I've been using DuckDuckGo for a while now and there was a time when it felt like I was missing out; However the product has improved dramatically of late and forget I'm no longer using Google.

Its hard to believe, because tracking and especially tracking over search history both over the immediate term and the somewhat longer term is exactly what enables Google to surface such good results.

I've disabled search history and Google still tends to give me the most relevant results. Perhaps they also do some customization based on session cookie or something (I know YouTube does for recommendations) and I'm pretty sure IP location still plays a role. But I think it's mainly that I know how to ask Google for what I want, not that Google knows what I want necessarily. I still give DDG and Bing a chance once in a while, just in case, but old habits die hard.

Re: Alphabet slides 5% after missing earnings expectations on revenue of $20.3B

#140
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, they are: http://www.wordstream.com/articles/most-expensive-keywords

#20 is "cord blood"?! TIL that some people preserve their children’s umbilical cord blood in case the stem cells become medically useful someday.

Wait until you learn about placenta teddy bears: http://www.inhabitots.com/doing-it-for-the-kids-design-exhib...

(for the people who don't want to eat them)

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