Google and the myth of an open net
The news that YouTube has pocketed $1.65bn (￡883m) in Google gold has stirred the technology industry and pushed yet another wave of computer savvy twenty-somethings to all-night madness in the race for the next cool thing. Business aspects of this exciting match - which would itself resemble a hook-up on a social networking site, were it not for the 10-digit transaction price - will offer financial analysts plenty of grist. But the public policy elements are perhaps even more profound, as they sail beneath the radar.
Google famously engineered the world's greatest search engine. Initially deployed on the computer networks of the Stanford University computer science department by two precocious graduate students, an exceptionally useful product was born at just the moment that the wise men of Silicon Valley determined that web search was uninteresting, simply a commodity.
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Out of the dust of the dotcom crash roared Google search, a locational tool so remarkably superior that it crushed rivals such as Inktomi and Overture, managing to produce $80bn in new market value while Microsoft shares (1998-2006) stood still. The company's advance is explained in two delightful tomes, David Vise's The Google Story and John Battelle's The Search.
The innovation that Google pioneered brought order to the web's universe by craftily ranking search responses. This was achieved by linking a better software idea - PageRank - to a brutally powerful computer network, incorporating more than 100,000 personal computers and a global fibre optic grid. The combination, which Mr Vise dubs "Googleware", answers search requests with lightning speed and impressive utility. Google turned a noun into a verb, revolutionising the online experience.
Then the entrepreneurs at Google took a stab at public policy. The company became the leading champion of the hottest topic in technology policy over the past year, asserting that if web innovation such as theirs was to be retained, new laws were warranted. The specific fear was that internet service providers delivering last-mile broadband would shift their pricing strategies, charging not only end users for their connections but application vendors (say, search engines) for access to their customers. Worse, they might move into content and then favour their own web products over those of competitors. "Network neutrality" rules were needed, Google argued, because the architecture of the internet demanded it. That structure relies on traffic flowing freely over a network that is "open, end to end".
Yet the capitalist engine that powers the internet demands something completely different, as Google's acquisition of YouTube makes clear. That strategy is to integrate Google's search and advertising sales with YouTube's users, which could potentially impede access to one of the hottest technologies by other service providers. Jeremy Schoemaker, a net economy expert, sees the deal as superb for Google, "merging to form the biggest video network" and winning a "land-grab for publisher space". Perhaps even better, it boxes out a rival: "This move is a total 'in your face' to Microsoft," which had made YouTube an offer for an advertising agreement.
The internet lurches forward in spasms of business model discovery, as when Google figured out how to auction off search-targeted advertising slots, leaving banner advertisements behind. Today, Google's absorption of its little video cousin is part of this jockeying for positions of competitive superiority. The internet really is not open - if, as Google hopes, it is doing it right.
Google has been doing it flawlessly - forging exclusive bargains nonpareil. Mr Vise declares the watershed business event in the company's history to have occurred on May 1 2002 when its search engine was licensed to AOL. "Web properties that connected more than 34m subscribers . . . had a small search box on every page that said, 'Search Powered by Google.'" To land this deal, Google extended to "AOL a very large financial guarantee", including stock options. An ISP getting paid to feature a favoured search engine? What net neutrality would presumably end is what helped launch Google.
The seven-year-old company serves about 50 per cent of online searches, twice the market share of its closest rival, Yahoo. That could raise an eyebrow or two among competition authorities evaluating the Google/YouTube merger. Surely, net neutrality arguments suggest a cause for concern.
Google's "Don't Be Evil" mantra has proved enormously profitable. The company is to be applauded for the social value it has created. But its detour into public policy advocacy ought to be squared with its own business model. Innovation on the web requires market transactions, including deals that integrate once-independent operations. That is the internet's DNA. You can call it "open", but YouTube just got bought. That gives Google something special that it will develop, to the exclusion of Yahoo, Microsoft, NewsCorp and other rivals. For investors, the game is rough and wild. But as a consumer, what's not to like?
The writer is professor of law and economics at George Mason University, where he is director of the Information Economy Project of the National Center for Technology and Law
谷歌与互联网中立的神话
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谷歌(Google)以16.5亿美元巨资将YouTube收归囊中的消息传来，技术行业轰动了；20多岁的电脑一族再度掀起了通宵达旦追求下一个炫酷对象的狂潮。若不考虑其10位数的交易价格，这一激动人心的配对本身就仿佛是社交网站上的一种快速交友。从商业层面来看，它将为金融分析师提供充足的研究素材。但从公共政策层面看也许更有意义，因为相关的公共政策目前还在人们的视线之外。
众所周知，谷歌创造了全球最伟大的搜索引擎。最初，谷歌是在美国斯坦福大学计算机科学系的电脑网络上诞生的，创始人是该校两位才智出众的研究生。当这种格外有用的产品诞生时，硅谷(Silicon Valley)的智者们却认为，网络搜索没什么意思，只是一种大众商品而已。
在互联网泡沫破裂后的废墟中，谷歌搜索引擎迅猛地脱颖而出。这种工具是如此的卓越不群，不仅击败了Inktomi和Overture等竞争对手，还创造了800亿美元的新市值，而与此同时，微软的股价（在1998至2006年期间）却裹足不前。该公司的发展历程，在两本轻松愉快的著作中得到了阐释：大卫?怀斯(David Vise)的《撬动地球的Google》(The Google Story)和约翰?巴特勒(John Battelle)的《搜索》(The Search)。
谷歌引领的改革创新，通过巧妙排列搜索结果，让网络空间变得秩序井然。它将名为“网页等级”(PageRank)的软件构思与极其强大的计算机网络联系起来，将超过10万台个人电脑和全球光纤网络整合在一起，从而实现了这一成果。这种结合被怀斯称为“Googleware”，它能以闪电般的速度回应搜索请求，效果极佳。谷歌从一个名词变成一个动词，为在线体验带来了一场革命。
随后，谷歌的创业者们开始瞄准公共政策。在过去一年中，该公司成了技术政策方面最热门话题的领军力量，并且断言称，如果想要保留像谷歌这样的网络创新，则必须通过新的法规。他们的一个明确担忧是：提供“最后一英里”宽带服务的互联网服务供应商(ISP)会改变定价策略，不仅向终端用户收取上网费用，而且向应用软件销售商（如搜索引擎）收取接触客户的费用。更糟的是，它们有可能转而进军内容业务，随后就会选用自己的网络产品，排斥竞争对手。谷歌认为，“网络中立”规则必不可少，因为这是互联网架构的要求。这种架构依赖于通信流量在一个“开放的、端到端”网络中自由流动。
然而，正如谷歌收购YouTube交易所清楚表现的那样，推动互联网发展的资本主义引擎，需要的是某些完全不同的东西。谷歌收购YouTube的策略是，将谷歌的搜索和广告销售业务与YouTube的用户整合起来，这有可能会阻止其它互联网服务供应商获得当今最热门的技术之一。网络经济专家杰里米?休梅克(Jeremy Schoemaker)认为这笔交易对谷歌极为有利，“通过合并，组建最大的视频网络”，并赢得一场“对用户开放空间的争夺战”。或许更重要的是，它击败了一个竞争对手：“此举完全是对微软的‘迎面一击’。”微软曾向YouTube提出过一项广告合作协议。
当互联网在探索商业模式的阵痛中蹒跚前行时，谷歌即已超越横幅广告模式，掌握了如何拍卖搜索内容定向广告块的诀窍。谷歌现在收购一家小型视频业务同行，就是其抢夺竞争优势策略的一部分。如果谷歌此举如它自己希望的那样是正确之举，那么，互联网就确实不是开放的。
谷歌一直在滴水不漏地做事――将独一无二的廉价品打造成高级产品。怀斯声称，在该公司历史上，具有分水岭意义的商业事件发生在2002年5月1日，当时，公司将其搜索引擎授权给美国在线(AOL)。“与3400多万订户相连的网络资产……每个网页上都有一个小小的搜索框，写着‘搜索服务由谷歌支持’。”为达成这笔交易，谷歌“向美国在线作出了数额非常庞大的财务保证”，其中包括股票期权。付钱让互联网服务提供商(ISP)使用一个备受青睐的搜索引擎？网络中立性可能终结的东西，正是帮助谷歌发展的东西。
这家成立7年之久的公司，占据了大约50%的在线搜索市场，市场份额是其最强劲竞争对手雅虎(Yahoo)的两倍。这可能会让评估谷歌/ YouTube合并交易的竞争监管机构有些担心。网络中立性问题正是人们担心的一个原因。
谷歌“不要作恶”(Don’t Be Evil)的信条，已经证明能带来巨大利润。它会因自己创立的社会价值而备受赞赏。但其转而鼓吹公共政策的举措，则应该与其自身的商业模式相符。网络创新需要市场交易，其中包括对曾经独立的业务进行整合的交易。这就是互联网的基因特性。你可以称之为“开放”，但YouTube被收购了。谷歌据此拥有了某种特别的、可以继续发展的东西，而雅虎、微软、新闻集团(News Corp)及其它竞争对手却没有。对于投资者而言，这场游戏残酷而又野蛮。但作为消费者，我们又何乐而不为呢？
作者是美国乔治梅森大学(George Mason University)法学和经济学教授，该校国家科技与法律中心(the National Center for Technology and Law)信息经济项目负责人。
