[deleted]
Google Labs no more
21–30 of 82 posts
Re: Google Labs no more
#22[deleted]
Re: Google Labs no more
#23I get the feeling that the bean counters are taking over Google and slashing off everything that doesn't have obvious monetization potential. I mean, I know great people who work there, but overall it seems like they're turning into Microsoft circa 2000 - they own the industry, they buy startups and kill the products made by about half of them. Some of their products are great, but a lot of it is just an obvious mono…
You would never seen something like "Labs" from Apple, and everyone applauds them for "focus".
Apple certainly does a lot of experimentation, but their approach differs greatly from Google's. The main reasoning behind Google Labs as far as I can determine is to expose projects to the broader world and determine which are best through some form of natural selection. A form of market research if you will.
Apple on the other hand has been very much against market research, preferring to experiment internally, killing of bad ideas before the world even hears about them and presenting a polished final product to the outside world when it's done and ready.
Both approaches certainly work, Google's works great for improving their existing suite of products whereas Apple's works better for incubating new products that consumers don't even realise they want yet.
Re: Google Labs no more
#24What is happening to Google? I almost feel like it's going through a transformation like Walter White.
They're getting ready to cook up some new projects ;)
Re: Google Labs no more
#25I honestly never used it, and am completely unaffected by this. What was the most successful product that emerged out of google labs?
Maps, reader, docs
Maps was bought (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Maps#History) and so was Writely, which became part of Docs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writely). Dunno about Reader.
Re: Google Labs no more
#26Does anything remotely like Bell Labs exist today? Is it simply not possible with everyone tightening their belts? If you're unfamiliar with what came out of Bell Labs, check out this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_labs#Discoveries_and_devel... Or is it the fate of software innovation that it is to be decentralized and happen in our spare time now?
Microsoft Research?
Re: Google Labs no more
#27Does anything remotely like Bell Labs exist today? Is it simply not possible with everyone tightening their belts? If you're unfamiliar with what came out of Bell Labs, check out this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_labs#Discoveries_and_devel... Or is it the fate of software innovation that it is to be decentralized and happen in our spare time now?
Bell Labs was a manufacturing line for science Nobel prizes. Google Labs was a project for showcasing Gmail bells and whistles. I guess it was kind of disingenuous for Google to call it "Labs" in the first place.
Re: Google Labs no more
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
You would never seen something like "Labs" from Apple, and everyone applauds them for "focus".
Apple did have "labs." One of the first thing Steve Jobs did when he returned was shut it down. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Technology_Group
That explanation misses a lot of context. It comes across as a criticism, as if Jobs just didn't see the benefit of research. That's not the case. He wanted to shrink the things they focused on, so they could put their 'A' team on every project (which required less projects). The end result was having a bunch of really talented guys focusing on things that drove business value.
Re: Google Labs no more
#29Does anything remotely like Bell Labs exist today? Is it simply not possible with everyone tightening their belts? If you're unfamiliar with what came out of Bell Labs, check out this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_labs#Discoveries_and_devel... Or is it the fate of software innovation that it is to be decentralized and happen in our spare time now?
Microsoft Research?
And it expands into many fields
Re: Google Labs no more
#30I can still access all code labs http://code.google.com/labs/