mediajunk

The March 04 issue of Wired magazine is entitled "Googlemania" and features 10 articles about the number one search engine. Could this be the peak of Google's fame? Yahoo has already launched its new search algorithm, and Microsoft has threatened that it will do the same. A piece entitled Google vs. Gates discusses the battle with Microsoft. But my favourite essay of the bunch is How to Kill Google, if only because of its killer (ahem) opening: "Do you Yahoo!? Of course not -- you Google." These two short lines sum up Google's marketing coup. Yahoo spent millions on advertisements aimed at turning Yahoo into a verb. "Do you Yahoo!?" was the slogan it plugged throughout the dot com days. Then along comes Google and, with absolutely no marketing campaign but highly relevant search results that win converts through word-of-mouth, suddenly "to Google" has become a verb. Surely Google thinks "this is great"? Nope. It sends cease-and-desist orders to those who have verbalised its trademarked, copyrighted noun. Sheesh.