Secret of Googlenomics: Data-Fueled Recipe Brews Profitability

Google does it again, with its new Google Latitude offering. Latitude lets you automatically share your location with friends, and let them share theirs with you. By using your phone or Web browser, you can simply look at a Latitude Google Maps mash-up, and see where everybody is.
Like many Google offerings, Latitude is cool, easy, functional, useful, appealing and free.
Why do they do it? Why does Google invest so heavily in great products, then just give them away?
There’s only one way to understand Google’s business model, which is to understand that Google’s services are not products. In fact, Google has only one product. And that product is you. Or, rather, us — all of us. That sounds like an extreme position, but I mean it literally.
Google makes billions of dollars in revenue each fiscal quarter. That money comes about by the same process that all companies use: They sell a product to their customers. Their customers pay money for that product.
Who’s Google’s customer? You? Really? When’s the last time you paid Google foranything?


