Marc Andreessen doesn't fear Google -- even though the search giant unveiled a service that's poised to put the competitive squeeze on his startup, Ning.
Google Friend Connect, a service announced yesterday, lets webmasters add social networking features to otherwise plain-Jane sites. Ning, on the other hand, lets users start their own social networking sites.
"I'll support anything that creates interactivity or feeds into the whole [social networking] phenomenon," said Andreessen, speaking at a ThinkPanmure investment conference in Half Moon Bay, Calif. "That said, I think a lot of companies have what I call 'strategitis.' Instead of launching a product, which would apparently make too much sense, they come up with a 'strategy.' There's a strong temptation for companies that don't have strong social networking franchises to roll out social networking 'features' instead of products, and in reality, consumers like to have products."
Asked whether Google has an "unassailable monopoly" in search, Andreessen also brushed off concerns.
"Let me start by saying I'm a huge [Google] fan," he said. "But it's not clear to me that there's any benefit to having everyone on the same search network, unlike operating systems. The next search engine is a click away, so it puts the burden on competitors to really innovate . . . I think there are some smart people working on [search] and there's tremendous opportunity there."
Photo: Flickr/mathoov
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