The spaghetti cannon continues to boom.
At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
21–30 of 98 posts
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#22I think what Google's best at is not so much innovation as taking existing innovations typically reserved for Dept. of Defense/B2B uses and bringing it to consumers for free. We already know the DoD already has tech that is years ahead. Google is one of the few companies who can not only afford to bring crazy breakthroughs like Google Street but to do so in a financially profitable or feasible manner.
> We already know the DoD already has tech that is years ahead.
You'd be amazed at the age of a lot of the tech involved in military technology.
Once a design gets approved there's very little opportunity to change it, and so years later people are having to try and source obsolete ICs or transistors. And if the designers are careless things get obsolete really quickly; I know a design that used a Bourns resistor network with a 1% tolerance. This package was once offered by Bourns, but the standard was 2% tolerance, and the 1% part was rare and thus very expensive. See the number of brokers offering new-old stock or obsolete components at expensive prices. (Obligatory "YOUR TAX DOLLARS AT WORK" quote here.)
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#23Awesome to see both Andrew Ng (ml-class.com) and Sebastian Thrun (ai-class.com) involved in these projects.
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#24"It’s a place where your refrigerator could be connected to the Internet, so it could order groceries when they ran low. Your dinner plate could post to a social network what you’re eating. [...] These are just a few of the dreams being chased at Google X, the clandestine lab where Google is tackling a list of 100 shoot-for-the-stars ideas. " Those are shoot-for-the-stars ideas? I hope those are at the lowest end of…
I've been hearing talk of self-restocking fridges for at least 10 years. It's the ultimate go-to cliche for the "connected devices" hype, that's now called the "internet of things." It's the modern-day version of the Honeywell H316 Kitchen Computer: http://jdh.oxfordjournals.org/content/23/2/163/F9.large.jpg
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#25There have been times in my life where I've thought that I've had a "genius" idea and every cell in my body has said "Don't tell anyone. Hoard it. Cultivate it. And you'll be a revolutionary!" And then I end up sharing. And there never ceases to be one or two or four perspectives shared that I never thought of before. And in the end, I think the idea flourishes because I was open and shared and iterated and shared th…
Big cognitive leaps? Judging by the first paragraph of the article: "the future is being imagined...It’s a place where your refrigerator could be connected to the Internet, so it could order groceries when they ran low."
the answer is "no". Of course that could just reflect a lack of imagination in NYT journalism, but really? I remember writing about that idea in early 1995 - about the same time that there was a fashion for universities to wire their Coke machines to the net, and about 5 years after Cambridge University frst wired its coffee pot to a network: http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/coffee/coffee.html
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#26"It’s a place where your refrigerator could be connected to the Internet, so it could order groceries when they ran low. Your dinner plate could post to a social network what you’re eating. [...] These are just a few of the dreams being chased at Google X, the clandestine lab where Google is tackling a list of 100 shoot-for-the-stars ideas. " Those are shoot-for-the-stars ideas? I hope those are at the lowest end of…
I think Google is perfect company to make those future products that have been 5 years away for the last 15 years. Intelligent fridge probably comes to mind first, but there are a lot. Some of those ideas just need clever people to work on it (check), resources for research (check) and ability to produce it in scalable way (check). Maybe we'll finally see an affordable house robot that helps more than disturbs.
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#27Here's a collection of quotes from the triumvirate about artificial intelligence.
http://ignoranceisfutile.wordpress.com/2008/09/13/google-fou...
(Except, ignore the Moffett field thing. That has nothing to do with AI research as far as I know.)
Anyway, any Googler will confirm that Sergey Brin, in particular, keeps returning to this idea: that Google's ultimate destiny is to realize Strong AI.
I'm not saying they've achieved anything. But I would not be surprised if they were putting substantial resources into it. It's even directly related to their bottom line. It doesn't have to end in HAL 9000. They may come up with some technology that is just more insightful about search queries. But even that would be worth billions and billions.
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#28I can't help but feel the article starts by missing the point. Connecting random devices to the internet is only a good thing when you get something neat out. Sticking a 3G modem in random devices & a bit of hardware is low-hanging fruit.
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#29Here's a collection of quotes from the triumvirate about artificial intelligence. http://ignoranceisfutile.wordpress.com/2008/09/13/google-fou... (Except, ignore the Moffett field thing. That has nothing to do with AI research as far as I know.) Anyway, any Googler will confirm that Sergey Brin, in particular, keeps returning to this idea: that Google's ultimate destiny is to realize Strong AI. I'm not saying they've…
You know, when you see all the quotes in one place like that, it does make their goals pretty obvious.
Re: At Google X, a Top-Secret Lab Dreaming Up the Future
#30Maybe it's somehow an important proof-of-concept AI challenge, but restocking my fridge does not make the list of things I desperately need better technology for.
The driverless cars are old news and space elevators are a niche at best. Whatever makes Google X interesting must truly be top secret.