An interesting idea floated by Charles Arthur. The idea that we might have reached peak Google: the point at which we get no more growth from the company.And from CNBC:
Plus, the places where people are now going online just don’t pay as much. The mature economies are tapped out. After years where Google’s revenue growth is slowing down; “Peak Google” might be in sight.To understand the point you’ve got to understand Google: in a business sense, not a technical or technological sense. Yes, there’s all sorts of fun stuff being done, driverless cars, the search engine is pretty darn good, there’s the attempt to digitise the world’s books and so on. But at heart, from a business point of view, Google is an advertising broking company. And in terms of revenue or profit, really not a great deal else.
Certainly, some analysts think we’ve hit peak search – at least on the desktop. Ben Schachter from Macquarie Securities noted that in September, desktop search volume fell in the US for the first time ever.
If we’re honest, search doesn’t matter all that much either. Sure, being the leading search engine brings the traffic to which ads can be shown: but as long as they can keep showing the ads it doesn’t matter if no single person ever does a search again....MORE
Here's Why Google Could Disappear in Five Years
Google may be on its way out as the dominant player in search, according to one analyst — and could even "disappear" in as little as five to eight years if the competitive pressures that ultimately claimed other search giants start to take root....MUCH MORE
In the wake of a surprisingly weak earnings report, Eric Jackson, Ironfire capital founder and managing member, said Google Google could easily find itself fending off the woes that eventually took hold at embattled Yahoo! . "They could disappear in five to eight years and disappear in the sense that Yahoo used to be the king of search. Now, for all intents and purposes, Yahoo has disappeared," Jackson said Thursday on CNBC's "Squawk on the Street"...
