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Google Pushes Digital Lifestyle
Thursday, January 20, 2005
Mammoth search-engine company Google has upped the bar in another
user area: photograph organization. With its release of Picasa 2,
the company has integrated the photo tool more fully with other
Google functions, like search and e-mail.
That is good news for users hoping to get their arms around the
mounds of data multiplying on their computer hard drives. But it
may be bad news for those competitors who just now are catching
up to Google in the desktop search arena.
Integration is the key to determining who will win the loyalty
of the desktop search and utility market in the end, Forrester Research's
Charlene Li told NewsFactor. Those services that are able to cross-pollinate
the user bases of one of their tools with users of another will
be able to build their market share more quickly than others.
Integration Key to Dominance
Take, for example, Yahoo , said Li. The company rushed to market
with a desktop search tool based on licensed technology. It had
to make that move, she noted, in order to get in on the bottom floor
of the burgeoning field.
However, as desktop search tools become more sophisticated, Yahoo
has a chance to make its tool integrate much more fully with its
myriad other user tools -- like discussion groups and e-mail. That
is the sweet spot of the desktop tool market, she noted.
Following the Digital Lifestyle Trend
Google appears to be betting that the next quantum jump for desktop
tools will be media organization. Photographs are, after all, just
another type of file people store on their computers. Certainly,
Apple has indicated its intention to continue moving in that direction
with its iLife suite, which builds on the music, photo, and DVD
tools already wrapped into the 10.x versions of its operating system.
Google, however, must contend with the fact that the vast majority
of the users of its Web search engine , desktop search tool, and
e-mail application already are Windows users. Thus, it must add
functionality that may be difficult to find elsewhere in Windows,
such as photo searching and organization.
In addition, Google has integrated Picasa closely with digital-photograph
printing services, as well as with Gmail, to facilitate sharing
photographs with others. It is clear that as the digital lifestyle
expands its scope, Google intends to expand right along with it.
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