Comment by ryandvm
1 year ago
I don't know. Google is always building lots of stuff and most of it gets shelved before it ever sees the light of day, and 75% of what does get released gets shuttered within 5 years.
The reality is if it isn't ads or ads adjacent, Google will lose interest. And based on their historical revenue I suppose they ought to continue with this model.
Google needs a widely used platform for AI integration into every computing task, based on interactions with and data on that device. Their best bet is to expand the reach of Android into traditional desktop tasks.
Android already made lots of progress on multi screens and adaptive layouts, and there is now a new developer center with guides for what they call productivity apps.
Not to mention, more people than we realize are on their phones. For those of us who use both a phone and computer, it is VERY easy to overlook.
For example, my wife, she is primarily on her phone as a computing device. Only recently after buying a Mac Mini and a Cricut is she back to using a standard computer. She might borrow my laptop for online shopping just so she can open 50 windows and 80 tabs to consume all available memory on my Macbook Air, but that's probably because Safari on iOS has sane tab caps.
I also know that games predominantly for PC / Web have become predominantly mobile over the years. There's a reason Roblox plays on your phone and tablet. You might not have the specs for a gaming machine, but your iPhone / iPad / Android definitely do.
that's not their best bet, their best bet is Gemini integration with all Google Workspace apps and Gemini eating Google search progressively
I feel you on what you're saying, but Google's Chromebook business is _big_ (11.5 Billion in revenue 2024) and this seems like a way to pull together that with their Android development.
I wish they'd open-source what they're shuttering. Would be a win-win as far as I can tell.
How is it a win for Google to release something open-source that had potentially cost them lots of money? Even if they don't need and pursue it anymore, why would they just give it to the competition? It's always easily said to "just open-source" it but Google is a business and owes outside software developers nothing.
How can another company compete with a product Google no longer offers? There is no competition because Google quit competing.
If Google spins up a project and then abandons it, how could they possibly be harmed by someone else offering a comparable product? Google has already accepted a total loss on the product, there's really nothing for them to lose here.
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It's a win, because people will not fear Google shuttering their experiments, and thus will be more likely to use them. It's also a win, in that it furthers a common good: if Google abandons a venture, why would they be upset if someone picks it up and succeeds? It's also a win, in that it boosts the open-source community (or industry, whatever you want to call it), which is also a win-win. If you want to by cynical, it would also be a win in that you could spin a narrative about how Google's monopoly-fueled profits trickle-down via open-source projects and thus unregulated capitalism works.
If they did it would probably have to be rewritten as it probably depends on a ton of internal google systems.
You're right. I guess this illustrates a downside of closed-source and walled-gardens.
> The reality is if it isn't ads or ads adjacent, Google will lose interest.
Or unless it is a tool they need, like Gerrit.