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Instagram should thank Steve Jobs for their astronomical acquisition

Instagram‘s sale to facebook for $1 Billion – that’s $ 1000 000 000. Folks that’s a looooooot of money!

While countless people have given countless reasons for the astronomical price of a seemingly simple app – an app that applies filters to photos before sharing with others, I am not going to give mine. I may agree that Facebook may have felt threatened that their core element that engages and binds their users together, photos, may soon be hosted and owned by another company.

Ironically  what made Instagram popular are facebook users. People sharing photos on facebook using their smart phone cameras and Instagram app. What if the smart phones had a built-in app to share photos with facebook? iPhone decided to integrate twitter and it killed many and any such apps for twitter but it did not integrate facebook and Instagram filled that void with amazing grace.

If smart phones had integrated facebook with their system, I don’t think facebook would have bought Instagram for $1 Billion or bought it at all!

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Google’s foray into Online Survey Business

Google has been trying to make an entry in the online survey/research market for sometime. They launched Google Survey as a package of Google docs.  That was a sub-standard software that barely did anything beyond providing the ability to ask few simple questions and forget any insightful report.

But it seems Google is now serious. They recently launched Google Consumer Survey that gives the impressions of a serious intent to enter the booming market of online research. Tag that along with a strong panel (read you and me who are constantly updating and telling Google who we are and Google’s ability to put surveys in front of you without being in your face) gives them a great leverage over others who rely on panels or provide panels for research.

As the market heats up and as SurveyMonkey and Zoomerang try to dominate the online research market, there’s still no clear winner in site. I feel strongly that Google will buy D&B – Dun and Bradstreet Inc or one of these “People Inc” businesses to get close and direct access to corporations – the growth engine behind the research market.

However, there’s a player in this space that stands out like a diamond in the rough. SoGo Survey is miles ahead from first generation survey tool provided by SurveyMonkey, Zoomerang, Survey Gizmo, Qualtrics which I have used all. It’s the company to watch as they capture more and more market space and roll out amazingly powerful features for serious online researchers like me and Fortune 1000 clients I have worked with.