All That Matters

“There will come a time when it isn’t ‘They’re spying on me through my phone’ anymore. Eventually, it will be ‘My phone is spying on me.”

Philip K. Dick

Yesterday Google announced that the current CEO, Eric Schmidt, who ran the company for more than 10 years will step down. The co-founder of Google, Larry Page will take over from him. It is interesting to see a giant like Google shaking it’s leadership even after consistent stellar performance on the balance sheet. At the face of it, it might look as if all this was uncalled for, especially when the company is doing so well on the stock market, on its revenues as well as net profits.
That’s where new age technology companies like Google differ. Balance sheets are the last thing to worry for them.
Google is at a stage where Microsoft was at one point in time. It had demonstrated phenomenal growth and leadership in technology innovation and a mass reach that seemed to be unparalleled in the history of computing. The king of Desktop software (Windows and Office) was on a dream run for almost decade with more than 90% share of whatever market it entered. However, things changed with the fast changing winds of early 2000s and it could not keep pace with the rapid innovation driven by the internet. In spite of an early advantage that it had with the acquisition of Hotmail, Microsoft has been by and large a laggard in bringing in internet based innovations. A small start-up from California like Google went on to become giant and has already started challenging Microsoft on its own turf of Operating Systems and Office Applications. While MS still continues to enjoy market leadership position in Desktop software, it is no more perceived as a Technology Innovation Leader.
Google has potentially similar problem in-front of it.
The way MS missed the internet innovation bus, Google is threatened by the Social Media trend. While the Social Media has reached billions across the world, Google has been rather unsuccessful in creating a space for itself here. Orkut was once popular in India and Brazil, but failed to have a global reach. Buzz was a disaster. Google Wave started with much fan fare but had to be shut down within 18 months for very low adoption. On the other hand, the world saw the rise and rise of Twitter and Facebook. Facebook, with an estimated revenue of 1 Billion USD last year, already has a valuation of 50 Billion USD. With a user base of more than 500 million and growing, it is the most popular internet app in the world. Two months back the overall time spent on Facebook surpassed the total time spent on all Google properties put together. It has already become a household name, just like Google.
Google can not just sit and watch this happen.
With the size and complexity of its business, Google has somewhere hit the Big Company Syndrome, making it slow and less friendly to innovation. The change at the top, is precisely to address this problem. Under Page’s leadership, Google hopes to bring back the pace, speed and nimbleness of the young companies like Facebook while still being a large financial giant.
The Adult Supervision that Eric Schmidt brought to the then young and budding Google, seems to have become a bottleneck, just 10 yrs down the line. Google has been proactive to fix this. Unlike Microsoft.

Recently I was reading the book - "The Facebook Effect" by David Kirkpatrick. Its the amazing story of Facebook - the phenomenon that has caught up the entire world since last few years and its effect the world over. I believe, especially in the Indian context, the impact of facebooks and orkuts of the world can be much more significant... I worry... to the extent of being cultural.

About facebook
With 500 million active users and growing at an approx pace of 100 million per 150 days, it the third most populous country in the world, next to China and India, if it was a country. Founded by a (then) 19 yr old Mark Zuckerberg at Harward, it has taken over all of its contemporaries Myspace, Orkut and bunch of others. It is the second most visited website on the Internet, next to Google.com. Its the most talked about Internet company today, loved as well as hated at the same time. It has also inspired a Hollywood Movie, "The Social Network", scheduled to release in Sept 2010.

facebook in India
Facebook is the most popular social networking site in India. It has surpassed Orkut's over last one year. The growth has been phenomenal. One significant observation is that it has been able to reach out to all age groups. Social media (at least India) was always perceived to be for young generation or IT savvies. However, people of all ages, professions, even those who have just learnt to boot a computer, all of them are hoping on to facebook. While its a good sign of IT penetration to the Indian common man, there are some strange observations.

• You can see colleagues sitting next to each other putting stuff on each others walls on facebook. What is so great about the wall that you can not directly talk ?
• Son/Daughters putting comments on their parents wall and vice-versa. This is extreme.
• I get friend requests from people whom I have never seen/met. What does that mean? I know nothing about them. The entire notion of "friend request" is at times misinterpreted.
• There are people who spend 2-3 hrs on facebook every day.
• People tend to use facebook as a medium of chatting.

These are indications of some fundamental changes the facebooks and Orkuts of the world are bringing to our society. They have given a fresh, new and lucrative channel of communication. As a result, instead of picking up the phone and talking to friends, we log on to facebook and write something on their wall. Instead of planning to meet a friend/relative on Sunday evening, people would spend time in reading useless comments others have put on their stuff and even contribute to it.
The Undesired Effect
This is an undesired side effect of the social media. Don't get me wrong. I am a heavy user of facebook. It is a very powerful tool to express yourself to your buddies, share your ideas, your thoughts, happenings in your life, your joys & sorrows. It is a great channel to find those old school friends you never met in last 20 yrs since you completed SSC. It has a potential to influence and move large groups towards a common goal. E.g. Facefook has helped large scale national movements like the one in Colombia a few yrs back. However, it can never substitute the charm and warmth of talking to your friend over a phone or more so, meeting them in person.
Especially in our society, which has traditionally given very high importance to family and social values, a facebook cannot replace the chaukats and nukkads of our bastees. If it does, its a major cultural shift.
So, go to the Profile info of your old friends in Facebook, pickup the contact number and give them a call. You will realize, it is much more satisfying than writing "wats up buddy?" on his/her wall.