All over the news sites in the past 24 hours you will have found plenty of coverage about the Google deal with MySpace. In essence it means that Google is working with developers at MySpace to allow applications to be built that work on any social networking platform.

In other words this is very technical. It has helped spur on the share value of Google and - surprise, surprise - has knocked Facebook off the front pages after its deal with Microsoft. Do you suspect a PR battle going on?

How did Google make its billions? By focusing on being good at search. What's it doing now, bit by bit, day by day? Moving away from its core business into every area of the Internet - social networking, online applications, blogging. You name it, Google has a finger in the pie. Then when Google sticks its finger in, along comes Microsoft to have a go as well.

Meanwhile, while this battle is going on, all around the world people are building better search engines than Google. Microsoft refocused a few years ago after trying to get into all things computing. Google is now trying to get into all things Internet and whilst it is doing that its eye is off the ball - search.

Just like thousands of businesses before them, Google is attracted by the latest big thing - social networking. This helps provide space for competition and before they know it someone, somewhere will steal their customers. Sticking to your niche, to your focus is the long term recipe for success. Google is so young it might not have realised that. And that means those $700 shares will tumble some time in the future.

Labels: social networking

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