News Community Founder Challenges Google

Writing by Nick Stamoulis Tweet

Rich Skrenta did so well with news portal Topix that he thinks he can topple Google from king of the search engine mountain. Now you can laugh.

Here’s a news flash for all you netpreneurs: Just because you were successful at building X doesn’t mean you’ll be successful at Y. Look at Microsoft. Off line – second only to God. Online, not even close. Third place in the search engine wars and not even gaining ground.

I wish Skrenta luck. I sympathize with those who think Google has too much clout. But haven’t they earned it? They gave searchers and advertisers what they wanted. That’s what markets do. Have they provided a perfect search service? No. Not by a long shot. But they’ve been better than the competition and that’s all that counts.

Google’s success can be chocked up to a large degree to search engine optimization professionals selling their services to people who desired a Google ranking. It’s where consumers focus that matter the most and if Skrenta is to take over Google’s prominence in the field then it will have to be because they provide something that searchers want. They’ll have to fix Google’s problems before Google does. Even then, there’s no guarantee.

Ask has been trying for a couple of years now. They haven’t gained a lot of ground. And before Skrenta or anyone else can even hope to get a glimpse of Google chasing the finish line they’ll have to overtake Ask, MSN Live, and Yahoo! along the way. Anything is possible, I suppose. But the honest answer is, fat chance.