Easy lies this head with a crown …

Shakespeare wrote “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown” … but Google wears it’s crown as the undisputed leader of online search quite easily. After dominating the space for years, it seemed as if new threats would shake their monarchy. Real time search, decision engine type search, Bing, mobile search etc. But they seem to blow them away !!

It’s fascinating to watch how Google added every such innovation as a simple product extensions (time based searches, indexing twitter feeds etc.) … then positioned themselves at the pole position in mobile search (both with the search portal optimised for mobile as well as extending adwords to WAP content … and buying AdMob).

Now they set the re-set button on the entire search experience with Google Instant and AJAX (?) powered search results that avoid full-page refresh for pagination. You just can’t do search anywhere else after using Instant … they feel like dial-up after using broadband.

I can only admire the innovation and boldness that drives Google (at least for the search part) that make them look so comfortable wearing the crown of the search space …

I won’t write about what Yahoo could have been (with mail, portal, groups, messenger etc.) … every one beats them up.

Instead I am hoping Nokia would take a leaf out of Google’s book and retain their market share with some bold moves.

(May be bear all access charges to synchronisation of contacts to Ovi free with leading telcos …. allowing non-Nokia mobiles to sync / use OVi etc. or give free downloads to a desktop client for top end models … I know they are allowing unlimited music downloads to X6 but who has the data plan and time to use that?)