Here’s an excerpt from Ken’s article in TheStreet.com:
What Google is doing here is nothing new for digital businesses. We’ve seen it time and again: Once an internet platform has enough users, it attempts to aggregate different functionalities and content to keep those users from spending time on other platforms for other purposes. Most recently, see Facebook (FB – Get Report) instant articles. The challenge in aggregating is maintaining that core identity that brought them users in the first place. Google is a master at this. While continually offering more valuable services over the years (like Gmail, Gchat, Google Maps and more), Google has maintained a home screen consisting of a logo, a search bar and two buttons.
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