Sergey Brin: Yahoo shouldn't abandon search

SAN FRANCISCO--He wasn't on the program, but nobody was disappointed that Google co-founder Sergey Brin showed up at the Web 2.0 Summit on Thursday afternoon and agreed to sit down for an onstage chat with conference organizer John Battelle.

Sergey Brin, Google co-founder

(Credit: Google)

Battelle said Brin had been extended an invitation to speak but turned it down, to which Brin joked, "I didn't say no, I just never responded."

But it was an appropriate time to hear from one of the minds behind Google because one of the most evident trends at the conference is that the search market is heating back up. On Wednesday alone, Microsoft announced a partnership with Twitter and Facebook for real-time search results, Google announced a similar deal with Twitter, and Google executive Marissa Mayer previewed a new "social search" feature in Google Labs.

Brin talked about the new competition with a "bring it on" attitude. "I think what Bing has reminded us is that search is a very competitive market," he said. "There are many interesting companies out there." He said he's disappointed that Yahoo is retreating from the fight and planning to strike a deal with Microsoft instead.

"I think Yahoo had a number of innovations there, and I wish they would continue to innovate in search," Brin said. He didn't go into specifics.

Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz had been slated to speak at the conference on Wednesday but canceled at the last minute, citing a bad case of the flu.

[dargon19888]

Of course Google is upset that Yahoo! is backing off. It now means that there's less room to argue that Google isn't a monopoly.

Its one thing to be a monopoly. Its another to be publicly recognized as a monopoly. ;-)

[mathcreative]

why would he even say that! Number one it's not going to change things afaik. Number two it makes him look like an ass, cause I bet almost everyone's that read's his statement is going to think he's just saying that so he can get less competition.

[t8]

Google is a successful company. In response to that, lets wait for all the negative Google comments from people who are either jealous, or shills employed by Google competitors.

[ssterno]

With 75% market share, Google *has* to have more, not less competition.

The Department of Justice is already looking at anti-trust around them.

[cbscowards]

It's hard to believe that the justice dept has a case. Google has that market share because they are that good. Nobody's forcing people to use them, and they've had competition all along. Their success became viral on the web. I've been using them since their early beta days back around 1998. I was hooked the first day because every search I tried found exactly what I was looking for.

[rrod182]

They have no case. Google did nothing but make a better engine. Serious every PC has come standard with IE pointing to MSN and now Bing search for 10 years, and still Google beat the hell out of them.

[Renegade Knight]

@cbscowards

They don't have a case. There is too much competition. Google flat out does it better for most of us so we use it. That's where their market share comes from. If tomorrow Google commited corporate suicide we would all just use one of the competing sites and not a heck of a lot would change.

[jonathan0766]

The most fascinating aspect of anti trust law is that the federal government has a case against every business that currently exists within US jurisdiction. It was created as an intentionally vague law to enable a massive regulation of large business entities (on a whim).

If you charge too little, they can prosecute you; after all who can charge so little except a monopoly. If you charge the same, they can prosecute you (price fixing!). If you charge too much, well clearly you're a monopoly with pricing powers the rest of the market doesn't have, and they can prosecute you.

Being guilty has nothing to do with the nature of anti trust. The only monopolies the US has ever actually had were created by the government itself. Everyone else is subject to market competition. It wasn't the anti trust actions that weakened Microsoft's position, it was competition from Google, Oracle, Linux, Apple, etc.

[utznosalt]

I take his comment as genuine opinion without any agenda or motive.

[Renegade Knight]

Agreed.

[celticbrewer]

I don't. A person like that doesn't operate without agendas or motives. And that's not to say he's wrong or "evil." It's just the nature of a brilliant business person. Would he prefer a weak 2nd and 3rd competitor in yahoo/bing that fight amongst themselves; or a strong 2nd competitor and threat in a combined bing?

That's like Jobs saying "I hope Google keeps innovating with Android."

[jeffyablon]

Translation:

"we don't want an anti-trust suit".

No kidding, Sergey?

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