Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings • Hacker News Board

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#131

Post by 650REDHAIR » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:31 PM UTC

md224 wrote: post #120

ChuckMcM wrote: post #103

Google historically left a lot of money on the table (not using every spot on the page for ads, giving away services with real value, etc.) They decided to stop doing that when they decided they were a 'peer' of Apple's. The shareholders love it because it means Google will finally be pulling in as much cash as they 'can' vs as much as they needed. Users seem to be somewhat divided on the issue. Sophisticated users a…

> 'Ranking' on Google is very much a pay to play kind of thing these days with their page layout Could you expand on this? Are you referring to how AdWords content is visually privileged over organic search results?

Purely anecdotal here, but when I search Google on my mobile browser I'm only seeing 1 or 2 results per page. I've pretty much given up using it on my phone now.

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#132

Post by devx » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:31 PM UTC

ChuckMcM wrote: post #103

Google historically left a lot of money on the table (not using every spot on the page for ads, giving away services with real value, etc.) They decided to stop doing that when they decided they were a 'peer' of Apple's. The shareholders love it because it means Google will finally be pulling in as much cash as they 'can' vs as much as they needed. Users seem to be somewhat divided on the issue. Sophisticated users a…

> As others have mentioned they have gone all in as an exploiter of their demographic data

Oh, and exploit it they will. As expected, a future where "privacy" will become a lot more important, would be the "enemy" of what Google is trying to do, as long as ads are their main source of revenue.

> Lloyd made his pitch, proposing a quantum version of Google’s search engine whereby users could make queries and receive results without Google knowing which questions were asked. The men were intrigued. But after conferring with their business manager the next day, Brin and Page informed Lloyd that his scheme went against their business plan. “They want to know everything about everybody who uses their products and services,” he joked.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/10/computers-big-data...

I'm hoping sooner rather than later, Google will find another cash cow, perhaps in self-driving cars, or Google Glass, or Calico or whatever, that will allow them to make a lot of money from that, and not be as desperate about tracking every single thing everyone wants does online, almost as much as the NSA.

Until that happens, we won't be seeing any true secure or private services from Google, because the desire to track will always come first, before anything.

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#133

Post by ISL » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:34 PM UTC

trevmckendrick wrote: post #44

Share price is relatively meaningless. It needs to be paired to total shares outstanding. It's arbitrary by itself because it's a function of shares outstanding and total market value, one of which the company can (relatively easily) control via stock splits.

Also impressive is the market capitalization per permanent employee: $337B/46,421 = $7.3 M per employee.

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#134

Post by atlanticus » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:37 PM UTC

So I guess the Snowden leaks collapsing US internet dominance didn't materialize.

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#135

Post by jlgreco » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:38 PM UTC

tedunangst wrote: post #126

jlgreco wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The continuing problems with buffering on youtube have caused me to resort to youtube-dl/mplayer.

Your comment about maps is dead, fyi. No idea why. I agree.

Huuuh, curious. Maybe comments that include the string 'goo[dot]gl' are auto-killed?

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#136

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:39 PM UTC

icefox wrote: post #75

jwcooper wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some products have improved, and some have gotten worse (losing Exchange on Gmail, Reader, Google Talk, Google Checkout) and some haven't changed in years (Google Finance). I use a lot of Google services, and it's frustrating when they keep removing features, or killing off products that I use daily. It's gotten to the point where I'd rather pay for a service now and be the customer rather than signing up for another…

Google finance is one of those apps that seems to just work, but if you try to actually use it you keep hitting bugs. My latest bug is that it thinks UUU should redirect to UUU.TO I keep end up going and using yahoo finance for quick things, what about you guys?

[deleted]

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#137

Post by ChuckMcM » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:42 PM UTC

md224 wrote: post #120

ChuckMcM wrote: post #103

Google historically left a lot of money on the table (not using every spot on the page for ads, giving away services with real value, etc.) They decided to stop doing that when they decided they were a 'peer' of Apple's. The shareholders love it because it means Google will finally be pulling in as much cash as they 'can' vs as much as they needed. Users seem to be somewhat divided on the issue. Sophisticated users a…

> 'Ranking' on Google is very much a pay to play kind of thing these days with their page layout Could you expand on this? Are you referring to how AdWords content is visually privileged over organic search results?

I think Danny Sullivan over at Searchengineland has done a better job of chronicling the changes but to give you a flavor, the size of the ad space before the first organic has grown tremendously, the injection of Google properties (G+, Youtube, etc) has further pushed on search results. When a buying intent is detected the 'shopping' bar activates which only shows shopping results from people who advertise on Google, etc.

An interesting experiment is to look at every link on the search results page and try to figure out how many don't generate cash for Google, its getting harder to find more than one, yet when Google was started it only profited from the ad-links.

As others have mentioned search has changed. There is no longer a big push for 'finding things on the web' which was the appeal of early search engines, now the bulk of the web use search as their portal to a giant reference library and product catalog. One of the things Google tried to monetize and failed was reference information (Knol) so now more and more they just show you the fact you were looking for, scraped from some web page, right on their page, no need to click away.

I think it was a smart move on their part from the shareholder perspective (disclosure I sold all my Google stock at $650 :-(). The second order effects though will be interesting. You see if Google becomes just a catalog, sort of like SkyMall "Magazine" in airplane seats, then it risks losing all of its unique utility. I'm certain that Microsoft can construct an equally compelling catalog as can Yahoo. This will shape the future for them.

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#138

Post by holyjeebis » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:47 PM UTC

moultano wrote: post #130

leephillips wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You didn't really give me a query to debug." It's right there in quotes, at the top of the very discussion page you link to. I'd like to think you are really interested in these issues and not mounting a disingenuous public relations campaign, but you don't make it easy.

I am very honestly interested in these issues, and in the past HN has been a great source of queries that fail in interesting ways, which is why I keep posting this request. On "html title tag" what do you want to know about it that the w3schools result at 1 doesn't give you? I know you may not like the site in general, but is there more to a title tag than that?

Don't be evil, bro. Eric Schmidt smells everything you do.

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#139

Post by xentronium » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:49 PM UTC

smoorman1024 wrote: post #50

trevmckendrick wrote: post #44

Share price is relatively meaningless. It needs to be paired to total shares outstanding. It's arbitrary by itself because it's a function of shares outstanding and total market value, one of which the company can (relatively easily) control via stock splits.

Well GOOG added $36 billion dollars of market cap overnight. To put that into perspective that is 9 BBRYs (RIMM), 1.5 TSLA's, 1.5 LNKD's, or 0.5 UNP's (Union Pacific).

How come LNKD is so expensive?

Re: Google shares hit $1,000 after strong earnings

#140

Post by mkr-hn » Fri, Oct 18, 2013, 6:50 PM UTC

jlgreco wrote: post #135

tedunangst wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment about maps is dead, fyi. No idea why. I agree.

Huuuh, curious. Maybe comments that include the string 'goo[dot]gl' are auto-killed?

The URL updates in the new version. It's always the permalink. Much easier than having to go through a bunch of clicks to get it.