Facebook's got over 500,000,000 users. None of Google's social efforts so far have been particularly successful and some have been disastrous. So even though I agree Facebook's over-hyped and the valuations are optimistic, I still think Google's losing in social.

At stake for Google is the question of whether it can achieve an additional 'generation' of growth, not survival. It's easy to imagine that it should have been able to get this growth, watching Facebook, and I think this is tantalizing, both to investors and people inside Google.

If it can't, it will go the way of Microsoft. What is that way? That way is the way of IBM. What is that way? Billions of dollars in earnings, dominant market positions carved out, buy over build technology decisions.

So, yes, it's nice (for some) to imagine Google doing it 'again', but they don't have to do it again, I wouldn't say. Just like Microsoft getting crushed by Google really just ended in Microsoft's growth slowing, and their earnings increasing, Google getting crushed by FB, or some new wunderkind is unlikely to evaporate all those billions of dollars in cash, assets and projects.

Google should stop caring about 'social' so much. It's not in their DNA. They should focus on the types of problems more suited to the company DNA.

Theres a big difference between losing in social and losing.

Remember when MS was losing the internet?

Edit: Fixed the loosing typos. Not a native speaker here - so I'll blame the spellchecker :)

Aaaargh. Lose. The misused "loose" has come out of nowhere in the last 5 years, and for some reason really annoys me.

This, this, and again this.

and a decade later, Google's been making billions of dollars each year, and despite massive investment Microsoft is barely breaking even.

so true, MS still has the Windows, Office, SQL/Excahnge, and XBox businesses. but its failures in the internet mean that it's not seen as a leader, and its stock price is justifiably suffering.

Yes and it was hit hard and to make matters worse - it only have itself to blame.

However they are still far from where one would write them off completely.