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221 Comments
- jayfarer, on 11/23/2007, -8/+703I never use the button.
- seether166, on 11/23/2007, -11/+278It's called "opportunity cost" and it's a pretty fundamental concept in economic theory. In fact, it's rather intuitive. You don't actually need to have something to lose it, if that makes any sense.
- inactive, on 11/23/2007, -46/+301How is this costing them money? Technically, it's money that they could get but aren't. It's not like they're losing money over it. I know there are fancy economic terms for this so someone help me out.
- inactive, on 11/23/2007, -46/+278Just like how I lost $20 million dollars last night because I picked all the wrong numbers on the lottery ticket.
- topperstone, on 11/23/2007, -6/+164Because caring for your users is the best investment
- Racerx52, on 11/23/2007, -1/+127I really hated using it the two times i remember actually doing so.
The whole point of searching (At least to me) Is to get multiple sources. - inactive, on 11/23/2007, -12/+136That's a pretty dumb comparison. You don't have control over picking the right numbers but google has control on removing the button or keeping it. Hence the opportunity cost.
- tuxidomasx, on 11/23/2007, -2/+101its a feature. who's to say that they wouldn't lose 1% of their users if they took it away?
and its kinda misleading. thats like saying "Google is losing xxx million a year because they show the first 10 search results by default. they could display more ads if they showed 9 results per page instead." - houndeyex, on 11/23/2007, -1/+62I think typing whatever you want to find in the Firefox URL bar is essentially the same thing.
- purpmint008, on 11/23/2007, -3/+61So why does Google keep such a costly button around?
Because maybe, just maybe: they care about their product.
I use the button and I also use firefox's embedded Google feature that allows you to type say "digg" or "crooks and liars" or "reddit" or "amazon watches" into the address bar to instantly take you there without typing www or ".com" etc. - haasim, on 11/23/2007, -4/+58You don't have to be a moron to click on an ad. Google returns some fairly relevant ads that are often not found in the search result itself. I don't usually click on web ads, but when I do, it's usually served from Google.
- inactive, on 11/23/2007, -3/+49the fancy economic term is opportunity cost
- inactive, on 11/23/2007, -3/+41No, it's not. Google can remove that button anytime and start earning revenue. They also chose not to earn it by placing it there in the first place. You winning a lottery is completely random and not winning it wasn't a conscious choice that you made. It's a pretty simple concept that I'm kind of surprised is hard for you to understand.
- FurtThePirate, on 11/23/2007, -2/+40the only time I use that button is when I look up "failure"
Although it doesn't work any more. - lukas88, on 11/23/2007, -4/+36When you are talking about big enough numbers (and 1% of all google searches is a pretty big number), you can assume that a certain percentage are going to click on advertising instead, or at least view advertising, which in the internet business also translates to real money. So, in other words, you are talking about real money here. Whether it is as much as 110 million a year, that is a whole other issue.
- ChromaVita, on 11/23/2007, -1/+32You spelled God wrong.
- fLUx1337, on 11/23/2007, -1/+24I have a feeling 90% of the querys using the "I'm feeling Lucky" feature proberly come from the firefox location bar now...
Small price to pay to have your search box plastered on every copy of the fastest growing browser, eh? Never mind that we acctully all use it without really thinking! I never type "google.com" anymore, no point.... - zwaldowski, on 11/23/2007, -1/+22People only use the I'm Feeling Lucky button to make George Bush look like a failure or Stephen Colbert have iron balls.
- mattcoady, on 11/23/2007, -4/+25There's a bury in this post...
- timbro1, on 11/23/2007, -2/+21well i use it constantly. for example i just type digg in the address bar and it goes directly to digg.com thanks to google advertisement free.
- whatsgoodike, on 11/23/2007, -2/+20When i'm actually searching for a product to buy, like furniture, the ad's are usually the first place i click; that way, you have a better chance of getting a respectable company, instead of some rip-off site.
- CJHtxGeek, on 11/23/2007, -0/+18That's correct, firefox just spits whatever you typed up there into a google search string an uses "I'm Feeling Lucky." I use it countless times a day, and I'm sure many others do too without realizing that it's google.
- ckpcw, on 11/23/2007, -0/+16You guys aren't understanding what aqua is saying.. try typing "CNN" into firefox's address bar. It takes you to CNN.com, but through (I think..) a google lucky search.
- Tenlow, on 11/23/2007, -12/+28It's a little too close to the MAFIAA pricing scheme for me.
- Nougat, on 11/23/2007, -2/+17It's the same as when one political party accuses the other of "cutting" the budget of some public service or department, when what's actually being done is the percentage increase of that program's budget is being reduced from previous years, though not to zero or below.
Program regularly gets a 5% budget increase yearly. This year, it's only getting 4%. An opposing party claims that the program is being cut, when it's really the increase being cut, not the program. - nipterink, on 11/23/2007, -1/+16i remember reading somewhere that they kept it because people liked it being there. they did some tests and without that button people felt google wasn't the same. so they left it in.
or maybe i dreamed that. - EmileVictor, on 11/23/2007, -0/+14But if you're just looking for the official website of XYZ (and you don't know the URL) you don't want to have to load an intermediate page just to get there.
- adventflux, on 11/23/2007, -8/+22I've actually never used it. But $110 million a year isn't much when you're Google.
- inactive, on 11/23/2007, -1/+15I don't know... Maybe a few hundred million people a day?
- inactive, on 11/23/2007, -0/+14I'll take it.
- Typhoon2009, on 11/23/2007, -0/+13Or show off French military victories.
- djbon2112, on 11/23/2007, -4/+16That's my argument against the RIAA seeking "damaged" in piracy cases. But I digress.
- seanhive, on 11/23/2007, -5/+17right. it's just less revenue.
- inactive, on 11/23/2007, -3/+15It's the same reason that supermarkets "lose money" by issuing loyalty cards to their customers. They do it because the information they're collecting (search queries in this instance, purchasing habits in the other) is worth more for marketing than the amount of money they lose by offering a discount. If you look at what supermarkets give you for a loyalty card discount, Google is getting it dirt cheap.
- EnderMB, on 11/23/2007, -0/+12I've never heard such ***** in my entire life.
The only reason the button is there is because Google wants to be known as the best search engine. It takes you straight to the first result because it gives the impression that Google will find exactly what you want, rendering MSN Search and the others useless. Why go elsewhere when Google are so confident that they'll find your results?
The button costs Google nothing, and no way in hell would they make another $110M a year. I'd say less than 20% of Google users know what the button does, let alone uses it. Plus, Google works in more than search now. I bet they rake in tonnes from emails. - inactive, on 11/23/2007, -0/+12I love the I'm feeling lucky buttons for when i know exactly where I want to go. e.g. imdb Pulp Fiction takes you to the the Pulp Fiction imdb page, or gamespot pc BioShock takes you to the gamespot BioShock page.
- redDC143C, on 11/23/2007, -1/+13Unless you're that dude from Lost.
- Walker2323, on 11/23/2007, -1/+12"So why does Google keep such a costly button around?"
Because they could lose $110 million in the couch and not notice. Don't they make that every 4 seconds? - nospinhere, on 11/23/2007, -1/+11I've used that button maybe a total of 2 times in my life.
- s1nister, on 11/23/2007, -1/+11Except the majority of sites that that button takes you to also shows Google Adwords, so...
- insomniac8400, on 11/23/2007, -1/+10By this same logic they are losing half their revenue because they aren't doubling up the amount of ads they show.
- AMD64MM, on 11/23/2007, -2/+11It may be dumb, but I enjoyed it, yes I did.
- saifatlast, on 11/23/2007, -0/+9To provide a more complete definition, opportunity cost is the profit you lose when you pick one activity over another. An example is that the opportunity cost of doing homework on Friday night instead of going out is the fun I would have getting hammered with my friends on Friday. Similarly, google's opportunity cost by allowing people to bypass their ads and click "IFL" is apparently about $100 Million/year.
- markwilcox, on 11/23/2007, -2/+11I always type what I want in the wikipedia search box in the top right of firefox.
- DCstewieG, on 11/23/2007, -1/+9Or you could hit ctrl-enter and skip the wasteful request.
- ixtapalapaquetl, on 11/23/2007, -0/+7mmm, sweet sweet derivatives
- lukasmach, on 11/23/2007, -0/+7On the other hand, the "I'm feeling luck" button is great marketing device. It represents the fact that Google's search is soooo good that it is plausible to directly go with the first link it returns. So maybe the marketing value actually over weights those direct revenues.
- iamaelephant, on 11/23/2007, -0/+6I use it all the time... sort of. I use the Google toolbar to replace the default Firefox Google search bar, and when you make a search if you press Shift+Enter it does an I'm Feeling Lucky search. It's extremely handy for accessing popular pages like Wikipedia or Amazon, because you just type "wiki search term" and you get the Wikipedia page of whatever you're looking for. Works every time with most large sites. I probably use it more than regular search now.
- agbullet, on 11/23/2007, -4/+10IIRC it's also known as "implicit cost" - i.e. money never actually spent, but could well have been in your pocket had you gone for the alternative.
- dreadstar, on 11/23/2007, -0/+5So if my calculations are correct, they make 11 billion dollars a year on their search engine ads?
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