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Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

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Re: Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

#301

Post by bngybmgrglflps »

_2d30 wrote: post #297
scubbo wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you honestly believe that the person you are replying to was under the mistaken impression that humans photosynthesize, or were you instead choosing to willfully misinterpret their shorthand phrase standing in for "engaging in agriculture"?

Obviously the entire point of this thread is to disparage humanity and not come to meaningful conclusions. For your own sanity, just leave the anti-humanists to their own devices.

There are people who would blot out the sun, and take satisfaction in it.

They don't bother me nearly as much as the taboo against speaking frankly about them.

Re: Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

#302

Post by [deleted] »

nate_meurer wrote: post #291
DoreenMichele wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Somewhere, some overlord in a galaxy far, far away is looking at us through a faster-than-light telescope and going "Yeppers. They are about to hit critical mass. Either a population crash is imminent or they start colonizing their solar system. Schedule a diplomatic mission for their corner of their galaxy to invite them to the intergalactic council should they survive this completely normal, though adolescently awk…

The eternal optimist in me hopes their spies on Earth tell them that humans are entering a third industrial revolution which has a chance of making future growth sustainable, or at least much more so.

[deleted]

Re: Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

#303

Post by jayd16 »

goldenchrome wrote: post #298
joeberon wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's standard Google practise to abandon old projects and move onto fresh new ones. It's due to how the internal promotion system works. Everyone should be aware of this by now..

Technology enthusiasts (read: HN users) may not like it, but it's a business practice that's working as intended. Sometimes Google may seem shortsighted but often times they're just measuring the market correctly. I worked on AR/VR at Google and the projects have mostly paused because there's no visible financial benefit. No one in the real world cares enough about VR to justify it as a business. We prototyped hundre…

You can say that but Microsoft just landed a $21B AR contract, the Quest2 has sold 2-3 million units and Apple is poised to enter the wearable market.

I'm not surprised when Google walks away from things, but this seems premature and short sighted.

Re: Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

#306

Post by Nicholas_C »

splonk wrote: post #243
WhompingWindows wrote: post #116

Google Earth may be one of the most wondrous things ever created. When else in human history can you zoom in on the entire geography of the Earth, and now the timelapsed geography of the Earth? Can you imagine what someone like Socrates, Newton, Galileo, or Darwin would say using this tool?

The two biggest "wow" reactions I ever heard at Google's company wide meetings were from the Keyhole/Google Earth demo right after they were acquired, and the first Google Maps demo with scrollable maps. IIRC the Keyhole demo started with the full planet view from space and then did a smooth continuous scroll into the Grand Canyon. Pretty mindblowing back in 2005 or thereabouts.

Interesting to think: What demos are happening now that elicit a similar response?

Re: Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

#308

Post by jayd16 »

ehsankia wrote: post #129
jayd16 wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Google has bailed on VR apps Yeah, whats up with that? Unless its all under wraps, Google is letting what lead they had whither away. Its silly to think they had working inside out tracking (Tango) in 2014.

"Bailed" is a bit over the top. I would characterize it more as being at a stand still. Earth VR and Tilt Brush are still around, and as mentioned about, Tilt Brush is even open sourced. They just haven't had as much interest making new stuff. VR didn't pick up the way most hoped it would, and at this point there isn't really much to do until we get another wave of innovation that pushes the boundary forward. Also Ta…

>Also Tango was more AR than VR. I don't think they ever had any lead in VR.

They had inside out headsets before Oculus. Check out their partnership with Lenovo and the Mirage Solo headset. Despite working well for 6dof tracking it had the same terrible Daydream controller.

A year later Oculus released the quest with a better industrial design, camera array and 6dof controllers to much more success. The chip was a generation newer but arguably the success came from things that could have happened a year sooner.

Re: Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

#309

Post by exporectomy »

FabiansMustDie wrote: post #246
gbrown wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd be more interested in what you think it "should" look like for an "advanced" species besides optimal? In a word, sustainable. An advanced civilization should be able to develop in a coordinated and self sustaining way, rather than as a grand experiment in tragedy of the commons. Microbes don’t coordinate their growth, and therefore fall into boom-bust cycles that dominate and exhaust their local environment. Hu…

I think deferring to reason is a nouveau fad among men of letters -- as if it's some truth machine; wherein one inputs one's observations and, by the grace of reason, out pops "what should be done." This ignores the very basest of truths that all men's* reason is self-centered, generating only courses of action that benefit him -- no matter how indirectly (ex. donating to a charity does help others, but it also helps…

An answer to your problem is isolated countries with strong local cultures and nationalism. Each country's population has a shared set of beliefs about what-should-be-done so they can implement it locally and the winners can impose their superior culture on their less successful neighbors. Hopefully not exterminating all different cultures and optimizing for short term gain though. We've always been doing this and still are. Islamic culture has some commonly agreed upon ideas of what-should-be-done and those countries implement it without being watered down by individualism. So does western culture but we've already done it and take it for granted so it's hard to notice. For instance, you don't see western politicians fighting to deny women the right to vote because we do have a common what-should-be-done idea about that.

Re: Time flies in Google Earth’s biggest update in years

#310

Post by the-rc »

ehsankia wrote: post #132
saurik wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google Search does let you limit the results to old sites (though I realize this isn't quite equivalent).

At the very least, I wish they would update the UI for that. Every time I want to use it, it's like 4-5 clicks and very hard to use. I wish they could just give a nice timeline and let you slide across a given range, and maybe also see a graph of the activity (basically like Google Trends)

There's a good chance that the additional clicks are deliberate. Certain queries are a lot more resource-intensive than the average and it's not very difficult to turn Google Search into a money losing business, even with the ads.
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