Google buys Twitter-beater Jaiku
Posted 23 October 2007 at 8:24AM by Simon Dickson in Email and communications
If you've ever heard of a service called Jaiku, it's a fair bet that the word 'Twitter' appeared in the same sentence. At first glance, a Jaiku page (say, that of the Finnish company's co-founder Jyri Engestrom) looks a lot like a Twitter page (say, that of Twitter boss Jack Dorsey). Both, at heart, are 'microblogging' services, where members send SMS-style updates on where they are, or what they're doing. But dig beneath Jaiku's surface, and you'll see much more.
Jaiku isn't just a prettier face. It also includes the ability to pull in updates from other places via RSS feeds (etc). So any time you update your blog, or add a new photo to your preferred sharing site, it can add itself to your Jaiku stream. It's actually a great way to consolidate all your online activity automatically into a single page, or indeed a single feed.
Twitter may have caught all the headlines, but Jaiku caught the attention of Google - and at the start of October, it was announced that Google had bought the company. What's in it for them?
Speculation seems to be that Jaiku's activity in the world of mobile phones has been of particular interest, with Google widely rumoured to be preparing to launch a phone operating system. Jaiku have an application for Nokia Series 60 mobile phones, which turns your contacts list into a live application, much like the 'buddy list' in an instant messaging program. A great little tool, but it's reliant on everyone you know using it. A small company in Helsinki couldn't achieve that kind of reach... but Google certainly could.
But is there something more immediate? There's widespread speculation that Google is poised to launch something special on 5 November, as a direct response to the success of Facebook. The announcement, when it comes, is likely to be couched in technical language, and it may take some time for its real impact to become clear. But insiders are suggesting it'll be a way for Google's various services to talk to one another, and to external services and applications. Interesting...
Tags: facebook, google, jaiku, twitter
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Comments
2. At October 24, 2007 4:09 PM, Mark Henry wrote:
wow William, maybe you need to understand to be successful you need to aquire other companies products and services, its called GROWTH. Google want to become big and strong, and therefore need these services.
Hounded Out or Top Dog.
the choice is theirs.
3. At October 26, 2007 10:28 AM, anjanesh wrote:
agree with Mark -rather prefer a extremely user friendly company like Google buying out other companies as a natural process to provide better service via reliability than letting giants (you-know-who) who don't care a damn about users but increased paper profits.
Toyota once said - market leadership is incidental to customer satisfaction and not just profiteering.Ditto.
4. At October 27, 2007 7:11 PM, Tanvir Ahmad wrote:
Totally disagree with Anjanesh. How can you guarantee that once they acquire what is out there would not pose threat to other businesses and become a monopoly? It's all about making money. Nothing is impossible, especially, if there is no competition!
5. At October 29, 2007 12:29 PM, Nicola McBlane wrote:
Google used to have a good rep - and I've always been a big fan of their services - but in recent years I've heard more mutterings about them becoming yet another company referred to an an evil empire - not at Mircrosoft's level yet of course - but maybe getting a little spoiled by growing too big? Maybe it's just an inevitable consequence of growth - gaining more of a corporate mindset - but I hope they manage to find a way around it.
6. At October 30, 2007 11:09 AM, anjanesh wrote:
tanvir - your arguement holds ground if all competetion is dead and a precedent exists.
No garuntees that google will exploit its monopoly position but how many times has this happened in a open market ?
microsoft even with its dominant position ;still behaves responsibily because sanity still exists in the real world by way of regulatory compliance and self control. EU courts recently handed down fines to MS for monopolising media player market.
Yeah , it is true that google could turn around once dominant and become the agressor - but for sheer innovation and simplicity no one beats google.If you are truly in the business of delivering service to customers ; you wouldnt say 'it is all about money ' . no.
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1. At October 23, 2007 10:31 AM, William Baskerville wrote: