The era of search engines seems to have come to an end and Google is overturning its flagship product that gave it 20 years of monopoly. Is this the beginning of the end?
The AI search feature on WhatsApp is being rolled out, indicated by a neat little circle in a fixed overlay at the bottom right of the app. This means that millions of users—not just the very young, who seem to have already shifted en masse to searching via ChatGPT—will begin conducting a significant portion of their searches through chats on WhatsApp.
Moreover, after an initial test, we found that the results provided by this service are genuinely valid and relevant, based on the top results from a Google search, which are often included as a link in the response.
At the same time, Google’s reaction to this latest evolution of the internet (which might even be a revolution this time) doesn’t seem particularly smart: they’re copying those who threaten to replace them.
This is a pattern we’ve seen before when Google attempted to counter Facebook’s rise with the Google+ project, which failed spectacularly. Beyond that, during those years, Google also shut down Google Labs—a initiative that had spawned numerous products and innovations over time, helping Google maintain its unchallenged dominance of the online ecosystem for over a decade. This marked a significant shift in mindset: moving away from creatively developing new solutions to imitating those who appear to have nailed the latest emerging trend.
Although Google has been synonymous with "the internet" for an entire generation, it’s not the first time an unchallenged web giant has been toppled in short order. Nearly 20 years ago, Google itself ended Internet Explorer’s dominance as the most popular browser with the launch of Chrome.
Internet Explorer’s reign was brief. Introduced as a core component of Windows 95, it quickly became the go-to browser, overtaking Netscape Navigator by leveraging its pre-installed status on the near-monopolistic PC operating system.
Later, Google mirrored this strategy in the mobile market with Android, which comes with Chrome built-in—a market where Microsoft failed to establish its smartphones or Windows OS. This history bears striking similarities to what’s unfolding in the search market today.
Back to Internet Explorer: it hit an estimated market share of 90% to 95% in 2003, the peak of its relative dominance. Then Google stepped in, promoting an early rival browser, Mozilla Firefox (the newly launched Google AdSense program even offered a bonus for installing Firefox on PCs).
IE’s market share dropped to between 80% and 85% in 2004—still a commanding lead. Chrome debuted in 2008, and at that point, IE held onto leadership with an estimated 65% to 70% user base. From there, the decline was steep: 40% to 45% in 2012, below 30% in 2015, under 10% in 2018, and less than 5% in 2020.
In 2022, support for IE on Windows 10 ended, and Microsoft replaced it with Edge—a modest browser that simply fills a gap in Windows, which would have been unwise to leave open, especially since Microsoft also has Bing to promote among its products.
Why Google Is Following the Path of Internet Explorer
Google’s situation closely mirrors Microsoft’s at the start of the century: after two decades of unchallenged dominance in the IT sector, it was widely assumed they would also rule the internet era—but that didn’t happen. However, Microsoft didn’t collapse as a result. Instead, it shifted its focus to other product lines, establishing its commercial strength in the cloud sector with Microsoft Azure. Over the past decade, Microsoft’s stock has grown twice as much as Google’s in relative terms!
Yet, finding the right path hasn’t stopped Microsoft from also taking missteps—namely, by blatantly copying Google’s suite and model with Bing, email, and more. These investments have yielded pitiful returns and, above all, reflect a lack of original strategic vision.
The era when Google was the guiding light of the internet ended over a decade ago with the closure of Google Labs. Since then, the company has launched little innovation, instead piggybacking on trends and models it didn’t create and rolling out short-lived projects (like the AMP standard for web pages). Meanwhile, it has systematically degraded its flagship product—the search engine—which is now less effective at delivering the best web results and increasingly cluttered with ads. In its early years, Google’s motto was “don’t be evil,” and this user-first kindness set a standard of no more than two ads in search results. We all know what searching on Google feels like today. Data confirms that clicks on ads far outnumber those on “real,” organic results.
Google’s Final Misstep: AI Results
Google has long viewed AI as the “next big thing” and identified it as the top threat to its search engine business, which in 2023 still accounted for 57% of the company’s revenue. While the flawed responses AI can produce have surely been studied at an academic level—likely even at Stanford—Google’s reaction is a classic knee-jerk move destined to fail: “I’m the leader, I’ll do this too, and I’ll do it better, crushing the competition.”
Anyone who has tested various AIs knows that Gemini lags far behind the industry’s best. Google’s decision to start providing AI-generated results—a choice made without even considering alternatives—is leading to a product rollout with two major consequences.
First: Even Worse Results!
AI-powered searches (not just Google’s) are unreliable and can deliver incorrect information without prompting users to verify it. Take, for example, the death date of the poet Carducci.
This is even more absurd when you consider Big Tech’s years-long crusade against “disinformation,” only to now roll this out under the guise of innovation. Beyond that, by making this choice, Google stoops to the level of any web-accessible AI, ignoring the fact that it holds a superior, established product with enduring leadership and top-of-mind status among users who need to perform a genuine search.
Second: AI Responses Still Hurt Revenue
A recent study by Seer Interactive analyzed CTRs (clicks per 100 searches) on organic results and ads with and without AI-generated responses. The finding? Clicks on both ads and search results plummet dramatically!
This means Google will still lose money with this approach—and faster than if it had opted to defend its traditional position as an excellent search engine. There was room to scale back ads, revert to the older, more effective algorithms, and rebuild trust with users who’ve grown frustrated with the search engine’s evolution in recent years.
The Future of Google
With this in mind, will Google really die? As a search engine, a slow decline seems plausible—think of it as 2008 for Internet Explorer. That said, Google is more than just search today, and like Microsoft, it could evolve into a massively wealthy giant that might one day find the right move to spark growth and establish leadership in a new sector—perhaps through a successful acquisition (like YouTube in video publishing).
In the short term, however, Google’s missteps will likely trigger a crisis. Based on 2023 estimates, Google’s revenue breaks down as follows:
- Google Search and other advertising services: 55-60% of Alphabet’s total ($190-210 billion).
- YouTube Ads: 10% of the total ($35-40 billion).
- Google Network (ads on partner sites): 8-9% of the total ($30-35 billion).
- Subscriptions, platforms, and devices: 10-12% of the total ($35-45 billion).
The Google ecosystem as a whole accounts for just over half of Alphabet’s revenue, and the core business being undermined represents just over half of that subset. This suggests Alphabet will persist—and perhaps thrive—while Google’s search engine could fade into irrelevance. As we’ve seen, Google’s decision to reshape it according to current trends will only hasten this decline.
There’s also a scenario I personally believe in, though it remains unproven: staying true to its role as an excellent search engine—with balanced ad presence and top-notch results—might have given Google Search a second wind. After all, AI results are inherently flawed and prone to “hallucinations.” Once the novelty wears off, a growing number of users might return to a less “magical” but more dependable service. Who knows—perhaps this opportunity will be seized by more forward-thinking search engines in the years ahead.
Original article published on Money.it Italy 2025-03-28 10:39:46. Original title: Vi spiego perché Google farà la fine di Internet Explorer
