You might think that after a solid decade of search-market dominance, Google could show some relaxation. After all, it commands a 65 percent market share and is still the only company whose name is synonymous with the verb search.
However, just as Google is not ready to rest on its founders, its competitors are not ready to accept defeat. For years, the Silicon Valley monolith has used its mysterious, seemingly omniscient algorithm to, as its mission statement puts it, “organize the world’s information.” But over the past five years, a slew of companies have challenged Google’s central premise: that a single search engine, through technological wizardry and constant refinement, can satisfy any possible query.
Facebook launched an early attack with its implication that some people would rather get information from their friends than from an anonymous formula. Twitter’s ability to parse its constant stream of updates introduced the concept of real-time search, a way of tapping into the latest chatter and conversation as it unfolds. Yelp helps people find restaurants, dry cleaners, and babysitters by crowdsourcing the ratings. None of these upstarts individually presents much of a threat, but together they hint at a wide-open, messier future of search — one that is not dominated by a single engine but rather incorporates a grab bag of services.
Chanwoo's Weekly Tech 