Microsoft is still dramatically successful today. The problem is that people perceive differences in success, not absolute numbers. So if you were wildly successful ten years ago and you're still wildly successful, what the hell have you been doing? Why haven't you improved?
The problem Microsoft is facing is that they basically accomplished their mission statement. "A computer on every desk, all running Microsoft software." That is an accurate description of the world circa 2000. What the hell do they do now?
Google is likely to face a similar problem in the next few years. "Organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful." For all the flack they're getting lately, they've done a remarkably good job at it. People expect to have whatever information they need at their fingertips, and they get mad when they don't. You wouldn't see the vitriol toward bad search results that you do now if the Internet was like it was in 1998, because nobody really had an expectation that they'd be able to find what they were looking for then.
I think you may be underestimating the potential reach of Google's ambitions in the search space. Think of improvements in search in specific areas of knowledge. How about searching for flights? Well, they bought ITA software for that, probably because they wanted to get into that space. How about organizing books? Right, Google Books? Scientific papers, law information. The extent that searches and organizing information in various disciplines is virtually limitless. Then there are things like the semantic web. I would go as far as saying that almost any kind of problem solving humans do involves a form of 'search', and as these processes take advantage of the ever increasing information on the web, they will benefit from improved search techniques.
To conclude and restate again, Google's objectives, IMHO, are extremely far-reaching.
The problem Microsoft is facing is that they basically accomplished their mission statement. "A computer on every desk, all running Microsoft software." That is an accurate description of the world circa 2000. What the hell do they do now?
Google is likely to face a similar problem in the next few years. "Organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful." For all the flack they're getting lately, they've done a remarkably good job at it. People expect to have whatever information they need at their fingertips, and they get mad when they don't. You wouldn't see the vitriol toward bad search results that you do now if the Internet was like it was in 1998, because nobody really had an expectation that they'd be able to find what they were looking for then.