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A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

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Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#21

Post by wickedchicken »

michh wrote: post #14
gruseom wrote: post #8

I remember why I switched to Google: 1. speed, 2. simplicity. Relevance, meh. Never noticed much difference there. This led me to believe that PageRank was more about marketing (brilliant marketing) than technical edge.

Initially the no. 1 reason for me was peer pressure. It was simply unacceptable to use something other than Google in tech circles at some point. It was like having an @aol.com email address. If your users are that passionate, you're doing something right. After I gave it a go for a while, the other reasons you list made me stay.

> It was simply unacceptable to use something other than Google in tech circles at some point.

From what I recall, it was also the most programmer-friendly search engine at the time.

http://www.bing.com/search?q=DGGEVX

http://blekko.com/ws/DGGEVX

http://duckduckgo.com/?q=DGGEVX

http://www.google.com/#q=DGGEVX

This is purely subjective, but Google is the only one that links to the Netlib 'real' LAPACK, straight to the file/documentation in question. The others have mixtures of Java packages and other examples...

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#22

Post by dwc »

avichal wrote: post #18

I just realized that Google won on search the way Apple has won on smartphones. They control the full stack -- frontend, relevance, indexing, advertising -- and tightly couple these pieces. Inktomi couldn't control the user interface the way Google can't really control the interface on Android.

You are right, but IMO you miss the real point. Both Google's search and Apple's iPhone were about delivering a wholly satisfying product/service, and controlling the whole stack was needed to do that for those cases. This is not always true (though it often is).

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#23

Post by cpeterso »

FilterJoe wrote: post #10

According to a friend of mine who worked on the search team, Inktomi shifted its (management and CapEx) focus away from search and onto other projects. He thought at the time that even with the constraints of not competing with their own customers, there were things they could have done to better compete if management had chosen to do so. Edit: fixed typo

What other projects did Inktomi have? I thought "white label" search was their main focus. I guess that might explanation their decline.

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#24

Post by cpeterso »

gruseom wrote: post #8

I remember why I switched to Google: 1. speed, 2. simplicity. Relevance, meh. Never noticed much difference there. This led me to believe that PageRank was more about marketing (brilliant marketing) than technical edge.

I think Google's high quality search results were less due to PageRank than the fact they AND'd search terms instead of OR'ing them.

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#25

Post by mcguire »

gruseom wrote: post #8

I remember why I switched to Google: 1. speed, 2. simplicity. Relevance, meh. Never noticed much difference there. This led me to believe that PageRank was more about marketing (brilliant marketing) than technical edge.

Are you kidding? I was using Altavista, IIRC, and would routinely have to page down to the second or third page to find any kind of relevant link. When I switched to Google, I almost immediately stopped looking at more than the first page of results.

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#26

Post by pja »

silvestrov wrote: post #11
chrisacky wrote: post #2

I had no idea that that Diego worked on Inktomi. Although it makes sense why IndexTank worked fantastically. If I had to pick one reason why Google triumphed (and you can only pick one), I think it would be their Page Rank algorithm. It added that extra bit of awesome-sauce to and already tasty stew.

I'd say: The Google CEO's have the point of view from an end user. The Inktomi managers had the point of view of a generic MBA. Everything followed from that difference of view.

Did Google actually have revenue at that point in time? They bought Applied Semantics (for adsense / adwords) in what, 2003? (edit: mlinksva points out that they introduced adwords at the end of 2000)

Inktomi management would probably have had to raise capital on a risky pivot whilst at the same time dropping all of their existing revenue streams in order to compete head to head with Google who at that point didn't even have a way to monetise their technology.

That's a hard thing for any company to do: In this case it would have been the right choice, but it's far easier to say that with the benefit of perfect hindsight.

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#27

Post by brown9-2 »

In the next year and a half the stock went down by 99.9%. In the end, Inktomi was acquired by Yahoo for 250M.

This is unrelated to the main point, but does anyone know if Yahoo re-used a significant amount of Inktomi tech acquired for that $250M? Or was it spoiled?

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#28

Post by rometest »

brown9-2 wrote: post #27

In the next year and a half the stock went down by 99.9%. In the end, Inktomi was acquired by Yahoo for 250M. This is unrelated to the main point, but does anyone know if Yahoo re-used a significant amount of Inktomi tech acquired for that $250M? Or was it spoiled?

may be they used inktomi patents

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#29

Post by avichal »

dwc wrote: post #22
avichal wrote: post #18

I just realized that Google won on search the way Apple has won on smartphones. They control the full stack -- frontend, relevance, indexing, advertising -- and tightly couple these pieces. Inktomi couldn't control the user interface the way Google can't really control the interface on Android.

You are right, but IMO you miss the real point. Both Google's search and Apple's iPhone were about delivering a wholly satisfying product/service, and controlling the whole stack was needed to do that for those cases . This is not always true (though it often is).

Yeah, it's pretty hard to know when it is and isn't. Vertical integration is as old as business.

Re: A Relevant Tale: How Google Killed Inktomi

#30

Post by [deleted] »

bstar77 wrote: post #12

After I had switched to Google, I never understood why all of the competition just disappeared over night. You would think they would have given it a fight, but that never seemed to happen. At least this article gives a little insight to that. I still wonder what happened to Altavista.

[deleted]
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