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Google's internet monopoly is certainly something to be
envied. In the words of Ben Elowitz at TechCrunch, Google "had
the most impressive dataset the world had ever seen; the most
sophisticated algorithm to make sense of it; an audience of a
billion users expressing their interest; and more than a million
advertisers bidding furiously to reach those consumers at just
the right moment." But is its crucial search feature vulnerable
to Face book?
According to Elowitz, yes. Google is vulnerable precisely
because its dataset is, as he puts it, "dead." Its search algorithm
analyzes the pages and links that users have left behind, but it
has almost no first-hand knowledge of any of the users who
created this content. The users are all anonymous. Face book,
on the other hand, "has created a platform that knows more
than 600 million people, complete with identity, interests, and
activities online." Writes Elowitz:
If Google͛s business has been built on choosing which Web
pages, out of all those in the universe, are most likely to appeal
to any given (but anonymous) query string, think about this:
Facebook already knows, for the most part, which pages appeal
to whomͶspecifically and directly.
And, even more powerfully, Facebook knows each of our
individual and collective behavior patterns well enough to
predict what we͛ll like even without us expressing our intent.

In Elowitz's estimation, this key difference could give Facebook

a tremendous advantage in search "when it eventually decides
to move in that direction."
But Matt Rosoff at Business Insider calls this idea "completely
nuts." For one, he argues, a search function is "absurdly
expensive." Moreover, Facebook already has a huge
uncapitalized upside, as it only collects about $2 to $3 per user
per year (though with 700 million users). But further than that,
that is just not the way things go in the tech industry. Google
will lose to Facebook, but not through a search function.
A single dominant player emerges -- Microsoft in operating
systems, Google in search, Amazon in e-commerce, Facebook in
social networking. Once that happens, it's extremely hard for
another player to beat the incumbent by doing the same thing
better... The way to win is to do something new and different
that makes the old incumbent's business less relevant...
And that's the real threat of Facebook and other social
companies to Google. Eventually, users will realize they can get
a lot of of the information they need -- particularly shopping
recommendations -- without ever conducting a search.
At Beyond Search, Stephen Arnold agrees with the premise that
"search" is no longer where the action is.
Google is the past, rooted firmly in AltaVista.com-type
methods. Facebook is, like it or not, the future of information
access: gated, incomplete, social, and essentially cut loose from
precision and recall unless intermediated through ͞friends.͟
Facebook may not need search, but nonetheless, Arnold points
out that it has its problems cut out for it.
Google is anchored in brute force solutions, and Facebook
operates on a membership basis. Country club members put up
with craziness from management in order to golf, have a place
to park fancy cars, and eat dinner with people who are
members.
For Facebook, the company seems to be on a collision course
with management, design and usability, performance, and legal
issues related to personal information