Fox Business landed an interview with Bill Gates and Warren Buffet this morning. Near the end (skip to the 6:10 mark) Fox’s Liz Claman talks about Buffett’s love of Google, quoting him: “Their moat of competitiveness is so wide and what they do is so tough to compare and to compete with that in that moat are sharks and crocodiles that no one can get near.” (Apparently Buffett doesn’t yet know about Google’s last line of defense, the Goats).
Gates fires back, saying that Microsoft is undeterred: “Well, technology companies do for a period get in these wonderful positions and, you know, it’s great that there’s somebody willing to attack those moats. Microsoft is undeterred. We look at each one of those crocodiles and we say charge!”
Buffet responds “No shark wants to come up against him,” and Gates ends with “So, it is, it is a daunting thing, but consumers benefit when somebody’s willing to take that on and say, hey, we can do a better search product.”
For the record, we agree. Google needs competition in the search space, and only Microsoft can compete on that scale. Whether they win or not, the Internet is healthier with more than one search provider.
The full clip is below:
My god, what a terrible video player.
yeah. and that’s after i fixed the embed code.
Companies with 20% and 10% market share are double indexing the huge web, which is also done by 60% market holder.
Goog should invest enough to avoid yhoo and msft search product merge.
for a laugh, try clicking on full screen.
I did, and I apologize for leaving an irrelevant comment…but honestly.
On topic: I thought Bill and Buffet did a nice job not taking the bait on the question regarding Obama’s donation proposal, with Bill even giving specifics on the actual % it’d limit it to.
Also Bill first pumping is hilarious.
WOW, What a Full Screen Player… I m impressed
/.sarcasm
hahahahaha
Unrelated question: How do you post a link in the comments here on techcrunch (yes, so that I can spam sometimes)?
Bill makes much more sense than Warren, Warren looks like an arrogant asshole. IMHO
Bill’s secret desire is to win the nobel peace prize and finally one up Ellison and Jobs. If he saves 1mm lives he may win it.
You’re wrong, dude. I’ve met Buffett several times & he’s as authentic as they come – in fact, I saw him just this morning in his driveway. If he was arrogant, maybe he’d have bought a bigger house by now, or perhaps he’d own a yacht like some many other millionaires – or billionaires? I could go on & on. You couldn’t be more incorrect.
I felt the opposite, Warren seems to have more general overall knowledge.
Google is so ass cake. Day old ass cake.
Twitter is the now fillet mignon. Viva la Twitterati~
???? What kind of profits did Twitter pull in last quarter?
MSFT needs to come to grips with the fact that they are not good running a dot.com business. Look what they did to hotmail for instance.
They should focus all energy on cloud based Outlook/Exchange….cloud based Great Plains, etc.
Thanks for posting. This is a very interesting exchange and you are dead right about the competition question. As a search advertiser it really blows to have such huge concentration. And as a consumer it would be nice to have someone figure out how to give decent, non-spam infested SERPs.
Perhaps you need to pay a consultant to teach you how to use the interwebz? Can you tell the difference between sponsored and organic? How can people say this crap? Why is my experience so much different?
Instant classic.
Who else thinks that Zucky and Gates sound alike?
I love the billionaire laughter, The money seems to be choking them:)
By the way, the worst video player EVER!!
actually bill is right, google was successful and cute company but not anymore. now its just next microsoft, which is a next ibm
OK can everyone please stop watching Google? As poster above says, they’re soon to become second rate and their position replaced by something cute (and successful, unlike Google), perhaps Twitter. They got a birdie mascot.
I want to hang out with Bill and Warren. Those guy act so awesomely cool about everything. I’m jealous. Maybe when I make 40 billion, I can hang out with them too.
“For the record, we agree. Google needs competition in the search space, and only Microsoft can compete on that scale. Whether they win or not, the Internet is healthier with more than one search provider.”
…Amen! =P
Is this Bizarro TC???? Promoting competition instead of monopolies??? Maybe the scotch is working to well. What is next? Bring back Jerry and keep Yahoo independent? (should I be buying lottery tickets or updating my life insurance?)
Yea.. we need competition in the search market.. right..
So lets have MS in here also.. and take over google – then they will have monopoly in Office, Operating systems, and browser what a great idea!!
Maybe we need competition in the search/internet area, but what about the rest and much more critical and old monopolies.. that I personally is being obstructed by every day. I cannot just choose to use an other browser, OS or Office pack even if I wanted to, because they all have dependencies..
Internet search however I can switch as often as I like in a sec.
there were about three full minutes of wasted time in this interview, at least. the view from the great wall of china? when talking to two of the wealthiest mean in the world at a time of historic economic turbulence? what about how china owns us right now, what about that? good god, what a missed opportunity.
Shhhhh It’s a secret!!!!
Who needs nukes when you have their economy. Meaning China has bought roughly $1Billion of our debt… and could dump the ol’ mighty USA in the garage if they were so motivated. (hope not since it would cripple the world economy)
Go Microsoft. I love bill gates’ ruthlessness.
Seriously, what do you guys think the next wave in the search space that’ll be daunting for Google?
Well, I would guess the real-time search. Google hasn’t yet gotten there and it could be the space where Microsoft can play really good. MS should look in to companies like http://www.boilingpage.com, one of the best real-time search engines, and do something like that. Go Microsoft!
People-Powered Search
twitter
wolfram alpha
It is going to be more of a question and answer kind of search engine. I don’t think realtime is not that important to regular users. Question and answer, like “Why is the weather cloudy today?” answer is “Becaue there is a storm system coming” kind of thing.
Unlikely in a while – Google has a team of pHD’s working internally on “google killers” themselves. It’s not like Google is stupid.
I mean, unless some super brilliant scientist who is just lightyears and paradigm-shifting brilliant comes out, I doubt there will be a TRUE google killer that does to google what google did to Yahoo, in a while.
Wolfram Alpha doesn’t (directly) compete with Google’s market space, this has been established already. Don’t know why people are still tooting its horn as a “google killer”
Google and Facebook are quite possibly the two best companies in existence. Sorry, Bill, but Microsoft is dead money. No more growth, and losing the online wars. http://iamned.com/blog/ no more recession. keep buying stocks.
I wouldn’t underestimate microsoft, especially Bill Gates. He is very smart and google will be challenged a long time. On the other hand, google might need to diversify its revenue stream or they are dead by advertising going down.
Google is a Web Based Search Company – period.
Microsoft is a Software Company that produces PC based Software for Windows and Office Applications.
After that it produces X-Box, Zune and Surface Products, alongside a Web Browser – Internet Explorer, and a Web Portal – MSN.
It too has a Search Engine. Originally called Microsoft Search, then Windows Live Search and now just plain Live Search.
But very soon they plan to launch a new Search Engine with an entirely new Brand Name.
Microsoft will never ever rival Google in the Search Sector as they have no real Web Based Roadmap in place.
Its only until they let go of all their other side tracked Products or Services, will Microsoft finally cut to the chase and be a real force on the Web.
how quaint…
you guys are interesting..
but in my opinion, you have it wrong.. as a business, you want to find customers who are looking for something that you might be able to provide the customer with. either because it’s an exact match, or because you can sell them something close enough to what they want.
you don’t give a rat’s azz that someone is searching for a picture of a goat… but you do care if someone is looking for airplanes to florida, because you might be able to rent them a car…
so what you want to do is somehow figure out how to make this link between the customer (potential customer) and the business. add dome magic sauce to this, and you’ve got a serious business.
look, you’re not going to replicate the data centers of a google.. and i’m arguing that you don’t need to…
attack your enemy where they are weak..
peace
What a strange twist of fate that M$ is slowly becoming the competitive force the Valley is looking for, while Google is slowly becoming the monopolizing giant.
Google employees can work 20% of their time on any innovative projects of their choice. That is how Google Maps, Street View and so many other applications are built.
Google is no longer just a search company. They are much more area of growth. It is not possible for any existing companies to compete with Google; perhaps a fresh one may challenge.
But the fact is nowadays, Google join hands with Cisco, Intel, Apple and even Microsoft and have a collaborative efforts.
Thanks
Bala,
Author. Web-On-The-Go
A Preview of The Way of Living in the Wireless Web World.
Can a 79 y-o man who never worked/studied in tech understand how solid is an Web company?
Warren Buffet calls Google “Sharks and Crocodiles” company “that no one can get near”. Frightening –> http://bit.ly/cwT4D
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