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Google Wave as audacious as Windows

In the past month two juggernauts of the tech world have made announcements with the potential to shape the competitive landscape on the web for the next decade. Microsoft announced Bing, a "decision engine" looking to make inroads on Google's unstoppable dominance in search.  Initial reports indicate Microsoft has built a worthy alternative. I say worthy because whilst Bing is a vast improvement over Live, it doesn't seem to be bringing anything game changing. In other words, people will use it as a compliment rather than a replacement to Google Search. Ultimately, the attempt is reflective of Google's  current attempt at displacing Microsoft in the enterprise. Google Apps is worthy and some might say superior but ultimately not compelling enough for companies to disrupt decades of  development and business process around the Microsoft stack. Earlier this week I watched a joint interview with Steve Jobs and Bill Gates from 2007. What struck me about both their success was that they dared to be different, they were bold and they took risks. This was to be the catalyst for their dominance in their respective markets. In 1985 Microsoft bet on the Windows Graphical User Interface and won emphatically, dominating the desktop for the next 2 decades. In 2001, Apple launched the iPod which is now the "default" music player. Both of these strategies were bold, some might say audacious even. So it was with great interest that I watched the announcement and demo of Google Wave at Google I/O. Techcrunch does a great job of breaking down Google Wave. An open collaboration platform which wants to be your social network of choice at home and your productivity toolset at work. Also interesting is that by allowing companies to run Waves behind the firewall Google has enroached on Microsoft's "software plus services" mantra (albeit in an opensource non-threatening kinda way). In those one and a half hours, Google Wave presented an audacious idea not unlike Microsoft's efforts two decades earlier.

"We made a bet that the paradigm shift would be the graphical user interface" - Bill Gates

5 reasons why Google will acquire Twitter

There is no doubt that Google will acquire Twitter. Aside from the fact that only a handful of buyers are in a position to make this acquisition commercially, none is more suited than Google strategically.

1. Search - During the earthquake tremors in Melbourne I went straight to Twitter search for real-time updates not google.com. Fancy search algorithms aside, Twitter's real-time search is the best thing in search since....... Google.

2. Apps - Google's burgeoning apps offering would benefit greatly from a enterprise version of Twitter (as Gmail did). This feature is a no brainer and Google will probably acquire Yammer if it doesn't grab Twitter.

3. FriendConnect - Facebook Connect has proved a formidible opponent to Google's more open approach to social graph portability. Twitter users can already join Friendconnect enabled sites and Twitter profiles would merge with or supercede the underwhelming Google profiles.

4. Capability - Google is the leader in building and scaling internet infrastructure full stop - their grid platform a key competitive advantage. Anyone who has experienced the Twitter fail whale would know that Twitter would benefit  from this capability and needs it in order to reach critical mass. Twitter is the leader in micro-blogging, an area which is exploding in popularity but which Google has little or no presence.

5. Openness - Google's culture of openness and accessibility is directly aligned with Twitter's approach to their API. The possibilities to marry this with App Engine and  Google's ever increasing suite of open APIs is delicious.

What are your thoughts? Will Google acquire Twitter? Will Twitter go it alone? Will antitrust concerns foil their union? Or will another player emerge to snap up the hottest property on the Internet in 2009.