Is Google missing something?

The eye-candy of today's www (world wide web, How many of you still remeber that :) ) Google definitely seems indestructible and unstoppable today. Just go to google Labs and you would be amazed.

However, i've found two flaws about Google which might be a sore throat for it in the long run. One is lack of Google's integration of its social services network and more than it, keeping most of its project in the Beta phase. Orkut is still not open to everyone as against MySpace, which anyone can join. Its blogging portal, blogger doesn't provides features such as control on Who can view your blog posts, as in case of Yahoo 360. Part of Being a social Service provider means that one should have access over one's accessories. Some major points have been raised in the following post.

My other contention is related with google's promotion of firefox over Internet Explorer. It is obvious as IE is a Microsoft's product. However, in the case of firefox, one of the most used features of Firefox is its tabs feature. You want to open a window, you just open a new tab and start surfing. The problem with this is that no homepage opens on your Screen.

Companies like google, yahoo and microsoft spend millions of dollar on tie-ups with browser developers and softwares firms such as Adobe so that their webpage would be the first preferred portal for users. Presently, Google is the first choice world over when it comes to numbers, regarding the most preferred search engine. However, if a time comes when Google starts losing in numbers behind other firms then its strategy of promoting firefox might backfire. Because the first page that the user would see would no longer be Google, instead it would be his own preferred portal such as microsoft, yahoo or any other webpage accessed directly and not after viewing Google as homepage of Firefox (or any other browser).

Perhaps, that's why Microsoft is yet to release a version of Internet Explorer with tabbed browsing facility. I would like to know reader views on this.