Yahoo! Admits Defeat, Capitulates to Google

By Michael Santo
Contributing Writer, RealTechNews

Yahoo!’s thrown in the towel, at least as far as Internet search goes.

“We don’t think it’s reasonable to assume we’re going to gain a lot of share from Google,” Chief Financial Officer Susan Decker said in an interview. “It’s not our goal to be No. 1 in Internet search. We would be very happy to maintain our market share.”

“It kind of makes you wonder about how serious they are about search,” said Danny Sullivan, editor of London-based SearchEngineWatch.com, which tracks the search industry. “It really ought to be their goal” to be No. 1, he said. “Whether it’s realistic or not.” Source: SeattlePI

According to Web tracker ComScore Networks Inc., Yahoo! had 19% of searches in November, while Google had 60%.

We Say: I’m trying to remember the last time I used Yahoo! for a search. My browser toolbar defaults to Google, and even my second choice isn’t Yahoo! (or Microsoft). One thing to keep in mind is that Yahoo! is only talking about search. This is more a message about focus than anything else. They will continue to work on other areas of their business.

Still, I agree they shouldn’t announce they are “giving in”, even if the reality is that getting any market share back from Google is probably futile in the long-term, more for how the message is bound to be received than for what it really means.