I've always wanted a near-live satellite image for Google maps. If this takes off that'll be possible. I could find a parking spot from the sky. :)
So the government seeing your data is bad, but a private company filming your every move is good...
Project Loon
71–80 of 299 posts
Re: Project Loon
#72It's fascinating to see how well Google has branched out. It started as just a search engine competing with Lycos, AltaVista, & Yahoo and yet they didn't just stop, they kept going. They built all these new services & products around their core product (search) and it's paid off tremendously. It's definitely something to model future companies off of. When you win the race, don't stop, keep running.
Almost everything they're done is centered around ads and getting more data on their users to sell more ads. Even this project, in the end it's about getting more people online to look at their ads. (not sure how much ad revenue you can get from poor places, but whatever) EDIT: To those saying they're playing the long game; Playing the long game doesn't make sense. The long game is being fully wired. By the time poor…
The long game is being fully wired.
No, the long game is wireless communications (and renewable energy). One of the reasons for fast growth in some developing countries is the fact that they don't have to make the same investments in infrastructure that developed countries made in the past.
Re: Project Loon
#73It would be great if it didn't take a company project to overcome the fear of being harassed at 2:30 AM because someone misused my open WiFi.
Why would you be afraid of that? Is it a frequent occurrence where you live?
Re: Project Loon
#74It's fascinating to see how well Google has branched out. It started as just a search engine competing with Lycos, AltaVista, & Yahoo and yet they didn't just stop, they kept going. They built all these new services & products around their core product (search) and it's paid off tremendously. It's definitely something to model future companies off of. When you win the race, don't stop, keep running.
Almost everything they're done is centered around ads and getting more data on their users to sell more ads. Even this project, in the end it's about getting more people online to look at their ads. (not sure how much ad revenue you can get from poor places, but whatever) EDIT: To those saying they're playing the long game; Playing the long game doesn't make sense. The long game is being fully wired. By the time poor…
True. They aims to make Chrome OS more popular. It only makes sense if Internet access is available everywhere.
Re: Project Loon
#75All your data are belong to us. PRISM 2.0.
Re: Project Loon
#76I really enjoyed the subtle design / aspects of the loon landing page.
Starting with the darker background of the thermosphere and progressing into the twilight of the troposphere was a really nice touch. I also just noticed the small altimeter on the left of the page.
Also the whole phonetic wordplay with "loon" and "lunar" was cute. Coming from New Hampshire, I naturally immediately thought of the aquatic bird:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loon
But the "lunar" aspect wasn't lost on me.
Kudos, this type of subtle design is refreshing in the wake of the iOS7 release.
Re: Project Loon
#77So the balloons just float on the air channels 20km up and presumably circulate around world? I can imagine problems coming up with some countries objecting to these being over their airspace.
Re: Project Loon
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
Minor nitpick: AT&T has done a shit-ton of research: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bell_Labs edit: apparently a different beast than today's AT&T
Minor nitpick: The company now known as AT&T is essentially Cingular wireless; they bought the remnants of AT&Ts cell network and the rights to the name.
There's a lot more to it than the wireless piece. Today's AT&T was Southwestern Bell/SBC which as you said, acquired AT&T and switched names.
Re: Project Loon
#79Will these balloons also be feeding data to the NSA via PRISM?
Re: Project Loon
#80Wow....this is mind-blowing.
The potential impact of a globally connected internet is crazy. No longer can a country fully filter/control all internet traffic.
This could be a major boon to democracy.
I wonder if Google did this, partially to piss China off.
This seems like an awesome way to get around the 'Great Firewall'.