"running Google’s $115 billion advertising arm, why our model of search is broken and how he’s fixing it."

"Google started with an insight that there was going to be too much information on the internet, and that if we thought about quality differently- it would be a huge boost. This was the insight that created the fabled PageRank, and in some ways was the start of the journey to create a better product."

"It’s equally important to remember that Google became a meaningful, substantial and then dominant player not just on the back of having a great product, but because of a whole set of incredibly shrewd business moves that the company made- everything from powering search for Yahoo!, to their early deal with AOL (which brought a very influential community of users to Google) and smart deals with PC manufacturers such as the Dells and Compaqs of this world which made Google the default search engine for many users."

"It’s a model that favours larger businesses as the network effects are incredibly strong. As Google got stronger in search, it was able to attract more advertisers to optimise for Adwords. It was able to get more publishers to focus on making sure their content was well-indexed, and my team added the features to Adwords to define how search advertising should work and thus- how to optimise search and advertising to work well for each other."

"For the longest time, the RPM gap, the amount (on average) of money made on queries on Google versus Bing showed that there was a huge difference [in Google’s favour] giving a market-leader effect, further widening the gap, and creating a positive feedback loop."

"I also felt strongly that search- as a product- was just going to continue to face more and more revenue pressure, forcing us to show more and more ads, and inevitably making the product worse over time. Fundamentally I realised that the advertising model simply was not right, and that we needed a better product with respect to search."

"When a user makes a search query, the ad supported model relies on the physical scanning order and differential attention."

"you are forced to scan through the ads before you get to the results – and herein lies the conflict, do you serve the user who wants to get to the results? Or the advertiser who wants to get to the user?"

"The core principle of Neeva is that we want to be a customer first product and being ad-free and private are two important, but independent ways of achieving that."

"We think the predictable subscription model will also be a powerful attractor for investors. The predictability of revenue also gives scale economics differently to the ad model."

"You pay nothing, but the benefits of reaching larger and larger portions of humanity accrue to the provider, not to you."

"Google spends roughly the same amount of money on search as it did a decade ago but makes vastly more returns on that investment. Those returns however don’t’ come to you and me."

"Technology and scale helping customers in this very direct way is what fuels our model. As we get scale, we will either add more features to search, or lower the cost. All the economic innovation we take for granted- the computer, the microwave- all started off as things that only rich people could afford and got cheaper over time."

"Ultimately, we have to deliver more value. That value has to be more than just being ad-free – we have to deliver personalisation… we have to put the customer in control."

"Relatively soon, we want to make sure that we have a publisher revenue share mechanism. Search is powerful because it’s one of the few natural aggregation points. Search is a supernatural aggregation point of intent because literally anything in your head is typed straight in."

"If we put a snippet from your site (for example, a great blog) into our search results because it creates a better user experience, we think it’s our duty to share a portion of revenue with you as a content creator."

"Of course the big players such as the New York Times and Guardian will have their own subscriptions, but I think we should move to a world in which there’s one aggregation point that can feed the long tail of quality content plus subscriptions for where we feel we want to make a real commitment."

"Long-term, we think of search as a different way of funding content."

"We obviously need to be careful about who we associate with – but this allows us to support local newspapers, fund original content and more. It’s something we care passionately about."

"the fact is that Adsense- in an anonymous world, essentially devalued content so much that you can’t actually tell what original, great content is any more."

"I tell my team that we don’t hire jerks. If you are brilliant but not a nice person, you will not get hired. I also tell my team that we need to be excellent."

"To me, taking risk and understanding that you might not have any impact is a humbling experience that makes you grow."

"if I could be thought of as somebody that thought differently around one of the most important functions in our life (finding information) and if I could create a product and business around that? I could wish for no more… I think that would be incredibly powerful."

"I feel very fortunate that I even have the opportunity to think this big about a foundational problem of humanity."