Today's New York Times nominates Google as the Zen Master of the Anywhere Internet era because it is using network effects like Microsoft did during the PC revolution. Personally, I like Google's chief economist's reason better: the company focuses on learning from experience:
Google, it seems, is the emerging dominant company in the Internet era, much as Microsoft was in the PC era. The study of networked businesses, market competition and antitrust law is being reconsidered in a new context, shaped by Google. Google’s explanation for its large share of the Internet search market — more than 60 percent — is simply that it is a finely honed learning machine. Its scientists constantly improve the relevance of search results for users and the efficiency of its advertising system for advertisers and publishers. “The source of Google’s competitive advantage is learning by doing,” said Hal R. Varian, Google’s chief economist.But this isn't your father's learning by a few trials and errors. Google learns from what is rapidly becoming a new and powerful trend: organizing and learning from the petabytes of data it collects.
