Google To Rival Facebook And Twitter?

By: Gino Lattarulo

Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) has been the eponym for online search engines almost from inception. The company’s success is legendary and it seemingly has hands in every technological cookie jar you can think of. From the cloud formatted clone of Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) Office to the video phenom YouTube, Google just seems like it can do no wrong. Now the rumor is that Google wants to make another attempt at social networking by launching a service to rival Facebook and Twitter. Ehhh… umm….. hoo boy, I really have a hard time thinking this will be a success. “Why” you ask? Well allow me to retort.

First:   Google has already purchased the social site Orkut which is popular in Brazil and India but has failed to really make a splash in America. Then they launched Buzz (accessed through GMAIL) which has been a total flop.  I mean let’s get real here, when you have an application built directly into 100 million accounts and it isn’t being utilized, just let it die.

Second: Facebook, MySpace, and  Twitter already dominate the social networking scene; with Facebook owning 58% of the real estate, MySpace 9%, and Twitter 1.1%.    I am an admitted Facebook-aholic myself and personally it would take something profound to make me switch.

Third:  Even if Google did come up with something so incredibly special for me to entertain the thought of managing two social sites (because I ain’t leaving Facebook) , it would mean all of my friends would have to do the same thing. And why would we do that anyway?

Finally,  the social networking space is already cluttered with Facebook wanna-be’s like Ennook, Friendster, Hi5, etc.  Granted these websites don’t have the financial clout of Google but that probably won’t make a difference.

Don’t get me wrong here, I love Google. I couldn’t live without my GMail Calendar or cloud documents but when it comes to competing in the social arena they are going to have to come up with one a hell of an angle to gain customers. No, I think Google would be better served by doing what it does best and throw money at a company who already has a foothold in that area. But what do I know?  Maybe Google has already attempted to purchase Facebook or Twitter and was turned down but  I find that very difficult to believe.    I really think they should just reach into those infinitely deep pockets and by up Twitter while they still have a chance because with Facebook going public soon it is probably only a matter of time before Twitter follows suit. Why compete from the ground up when they could just throw cash at an already established company? After all, they paid 1.65 Billion for YouTube. On the other hand, Google always seems to have something special up its sleeve so this could be interesting.  Alas, my opinion means next to nothing compared to the Ivy League minds at one of the richest companies in the universe.

In the mean time, see you on the Cyber Social Scene