Welcome back my friends to the show that never ends
We're so glad you could attend
Come inside! Come inside!
There behind a glass is a real blade of grass
be careful as you pass.
Move along! Move along!
Come inside, the show's about to start
guaranteed to blow your head apart
Rest assured you'll get your money's worth
The greatest show in Heaven, Hell or Earth.
You've got to see the show, it's a dynamo.
You've got to see the show, it's rock and roll ....Emerson, Lake and Palmer
Welcome Back My Friends to the Show that Never Ends
Since the fall of the big search engines and the internet advertising crash at about the same time, only one searching utility has captured the hearts of people all over the world - Google. In the late 1990's, the search engine of choice was AltaVista. In the early 2000's, it became Google. I clearly remember the change and it happened incredibly fast. It seemed occur almost instantaneously, fast even for the speed of change on the internet.
One day it was AltaVista, the next it was Google. By 2004, it seemed everyone was talking about this new search engine. It was on the news, in magazines and mentioned in articles all over the web. Several new words were even coined; I'm sure you've heard the term "googling", and Google-bombing was a short lived but fascinating fad.
My stars, that company looked like it could do no wrong. In fact, that was part of it's operating basis - do no wrong.
Thus, it came as no surprise when it "leaked" that Google might go public, and it certainly met everyone's expectations that the rumors became true. The IPO, far the biggest and arguably the most important one since the bubble burst, was on everyone's lips. Who didn't want Google stock, the hottest property around?
The circus started early, with the announcement of a bidding process which was, to say the least, strange. This led to severely overpriced stock, which appeared to defeat the "do no wrong" concept behind Google. The concept of the bidding process was to allow individual stockholders to have an opportunity to purchase shares, yet the inflated prices made the stock undesirable.
Then came other acts in the three ring circus - the Playboy interview, the non-disclosure of several million shares given to employees and contractors and other similar events. Wow, this was surely entertaining, yet somehow it all seemed hurried and amateurish.
What's really behind it all? In one word - Microsoft. You see, the giant corporation has been working on it's own search engine for over a year and plans to release it shortly. This will introduce some healthy competition into the mix that has been sorely lacking of late. Add that to the new rise of Yahoo's search offering, and Google becomes far less important fast.
That explains the circus. Hopefully the final acts are done more skillfully than those done so far.
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Unless otherwise noted, all photos and text is Copyright © Richard G Lowe, Jr.