Google Finance is tight--but will they get into the content business? ( look for Yahoo to increase content offering)

Google has been working on Google Finance for a while now and today the wrapper came off and it's great. They Google Mapped the charts, as we all expected, and they are even leveraging some Flash (still trying to figure out why Flash is getting beaten by AJAX--cost? ease of use?)

JBAT makes note that they will have paid moderators, which he sees as the first sign that Google is getting into the editorial business. Google, of course, has taken a hard line from inception that they are not in competition with their content providers who run Google Adsense. However, Google Finance will certainly give pause to finance partners who run Adsense. Those partners have to now ask themselves "by running adsense are we supporting our competitor?"

This will of course push Yahoo more in the content business--look for Yahoo Finance to keep increasing their origional content offering. Yahoo has backed off claims they are not in the origional content business over the past year, and it's pretty obvious they are moments away from taking on Marketwatch, ThStreet.com, and WSJ: http://finance.yahoo.com/columnist/allbios

Om Malik thinks it's OK at best.

I have to say the charts are very impressive, in the same way GMAIL and Google Maps were impressive when they came out, but I'm sure everyone will update their charts in the next three to six months to catch up. For me the best part is that Google has included a Blog Posts section (image right)--wow, blogs as an information source for finance informtion--that's kind of bold, I wonder if Yahoo will do the same?

Update: They have a Weblogs, Inc. profile... neat. I wonder who put this together?

Update2: Jeff points out the Google, for the first time, has licensed content--something is happening here, and we all know what it is.

Tags: battelle, charts, google, google finance, GoogleFinance, malik, om, om malik, OmMalik, stock charts, StockCharts, stocks, yahoo, yahoo finance, YahooFinance

Mar 21st 2006 11:52AM
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1. How come your picture is of Harvey Pekar?

Posted at 1:02PM on Mar 21st 2006 by Nick Halloway

2. Technically, I don't know that this would represent Google's first venture into licensed content. The content supporting their mapping product (arial imagery, etc.) is surely licensed, and not something they simply aggregate.

Posted at 1:15PM on Mar 21st 2006 by Jeff

3. an interesting site, but I don't think it means Google is in the content business. Their goal is harvesting information but recently they've been targetting niches; check out Google's music results. Its just another way to make Google a one-stop-shop for information sources.

AFAIK the company information is from Hoovers, which is where Yahoo gets it's company profiles from.

The blog post link is the most interesting aspect; what is the point of it? is it there to show potential investors the opinion of 'the blogosphere' on the company/product? a rumour/news source supposed quicker than the news outlets?

* I apologise for saying blogosphere, I promise to limit that and all other buzzwords in future comments.

Posted at 5:06PM on Mar 21st 2006 by Adam

4. looks like the private company information is from Hoover's:

http://hoovers.com/weblogs/--ID__136566--/free-co-factsheet.xhtml

Our Google Finance "TheLadders.com" entry is exactly the same as our Hoovers entry.

Posted at 5:23PM on Mar 21st 2006 by marc

5. On the Flash vs AJAX question, I'd say Flash is the obvious choice for this type of dynamic charting. I doubt AJAX was ever even in consideration. Dynamic charting is really the sort of problem vector graphics tools like Flash were made for. When (if ever?) the SVG standard becomes widely supported and stable, then that would be the right "standards-based" tool to use to build this sort of thing.

Posted at 5:58PM on Mar 21st 2006 by Ara Anjargolian

6. Hasn't anyone else noticed that the news links on Google Finance have the nofollow attribute? What's that supposed to mean?

See my post on it: http://www.merodeando.com/blog/archivos/2006/03/22-google-entra-en-el-campo-de-los-contenidos-con-go.php

Posted at 3:40AM on Mar 22nd 2006 by Julio Alonso

7. In fairness--Google's been licensing content for the past 2 years. Notice the NAVTEQ copyright statement at the bottom of all those maps (i.e. Content) on Google Maps.

Posted at 10:49AM on Mar 22nd 2006 by Kyle Bunch

8. Interview on this matter with Dominic Jones, investor relations specialist:

http://irwebreport.blogsome.com/2006/03/22/qa-on-google-finances-impact-on-investor-relations/

Original interview on my site (with some french intro text):
http://www.michaelcarpentier.com/archives/2006/03/entrevue_avec_d.html

Posted at 10:53AM on Mar 22nd 2006 by Michael Carpentier

9. There is a way for Google to beat the competion with their Google Finance service...

Posted at 12:08PM on Mar 22nd 2006 by virtual_entrepreneur

10. There is definetely a learning curve aspect to the Flash/ajax debate. Ajax is a natural step for coders that have been pushing out JS/DHTML code for the last 10 years where as flash has always had a significant first step and was used mostly by advertisers, animators and hard core enthusiasts(2advance.com). With the proliferation of plug&play ajax libraries many people are able to quickly add a little touch of Ajax here and there.

Actually, now that I think of it, perhaps it is incorrect to say that Ajax is beating out flash. When was the last time you visited a non "web2.0" site that didn't have a single flash element on it?

Perhaps, as Ara mentioned, it is simply a matter of using the right tool for the right job. Macromedia(Adobe) have tried to push tools to create flash based web apps but they, at least to me, always seemed like overkill when all I needed was a simple form sitting on a db.

As well, you should never forget that AJAX R0XRS!!!

Ahem... sorry. It has become abundantly clear that hype goes a hell of a long way on this dear internet of ours. This seems especially true in this little web2.0 thing.

Posted at 8:06AM on Mar 23rd 2006 by Eric Lussier

11. I just wanted to add one of my all time favourite Flash sites: http://www.megacar.com/

This site has been up since the late 90s relatively unchaged.

And you say the art of flash is dead...

Posted at 8:10AM on Mar 23rd 2006 by Eric Lussier

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