Great post about what Google is up to by Rich Skrenta. He argues that Google is building a huge computer with a custom operating system that everyone on earth can have an account on. His last few paragraphs are so much more perceptive than anything that’s been written about Google by anyone; Skrenta nails the company exactly.
I really think googles always been after more than just a search engine. A complete distributed computing platform, totally redundant, totally fail-safe (barring catastrophe). I work for a major telcom, and I just drool at replacing some of the legecy systems with a Google type platform.
“I predict Google will be the biggest and most important company in the world in 5-8 years.”
This is a bold claim. It might have been a bit more appropriate to add a quantifier like ” in IT”.
That said I love some of the stuff that Google comes up with. They have got something that a lot of other companies seem to miss which is simplicity. Their web page is 1.24KB (not including images). It has 11 links on it.
The ease of use and lack on crap all over the page is, to me, what makes Google better than the other search engines.
marshall, I agree. Somehow I don’t see Citigroup, AIG, GE being marginalized.
And what of companies like PetroChina which might become superbig in the next 5-8 years.
I’m no IT guru, but his analysis of Google’s plans is not so dissimilar to my own architecture.
Linux servers, commodity hardware, distributed applications, replicated data…
I don’t do backups, just make sure that all my data is replicated between data centres in different continents.
My servers monitor each other and notify me if one goes down. Users are re-directed to the other servers.
I’m expanding into new offices and have been designing the systme to run identical os images, and to network boot.. The only thing I still haven’t (yet) reconciled is how I’m going to replicate their data. I was even thinking this week if I could distribute their spare cpu cycles… I hope to find Linux solutions to both.
I could never understand why anyone did it any differently. Maybe I am just lazy.
I’m surprised that Google hasn’t yet bought up Opera. If you want to be a real web dominator, you need to control the browser. And Opera and Google already have a working relationship — Opera’s unregistered browser displays Google text ads based on the pages recently browsed (a la GMail).
> If you want to be a real web dominator, you need to control the browser.
There is no such thing as THE browser.
Hi
They can easily intergrate themselves with open and free browser like firefox instead of meddling around with opera. why should they buy opera. makes no sense to me
>> If you want to be a real web dominator, you need to >>control the browser.
>There is no such thing as THE browser.
I knew it! This was just my old plain pctools 1.0 acting funny!
Google has much more than 1k of computers (numbers i hear are 30k to 100k) You have less than a hunderd computers. There is no way in hell that you use the same methodes as google to handle computers
I think Google doesn’t need to buy Internet Explorer or any other browser. The free (as in free speech) browsers like Opera, Mozilla, and Firefox already have Google search boxes or a shortcut to search Google. Regarding IE, you can install the Google toolbar. Google has the money to develop their *OWN* web browser! I imagine the best features of all others, looking like an IE without flaws.
To be continued on Google…!
plans to become the next microsoft (remember hailstorm?)!
they seem to have the necessary technology plus (at least currently) the necessary good public image.
their current domination of the web is comparable to msft’s monopoly at the os side – it’s a bit frightened!
so therefore it’s good that they will get under increased prssure from yahoo and microsoft, which means 3 engines ~controlling the internet instead of just one.
however, of course i still would like to see an open-source non-profit searchengine which – similar to linux – might get sponsored by companies like ibm etc. which certainly have no interest to let the internet get dominated by the mentioned 3 companies.
yes, currently ibm, sun etc. and searchengines might not seem related much, but if google, msft will provide more and more services (the line between web and os gets more and more blurred), they will also threaten the business of many it companies (like msft does currently anyways), setting the standards, providing services cheaper, locking other companies out and customers in.
i guess something like an oss-s.e. might happen, or those companies might go the easier route to buy stakes or completely take over yahoo, google…
i just hope the industry knows what’s going on and isn’t sleeping.
let’s see what comes out of all this…
http://www.google-watch.org/
If you can conceive of a time when Google will be as big as the author suggests, you should visit the above link.
could an oss-s.e. not follow the model of seti@home or filesharing networks like kazaa, gnutella etc., means everyone interested installs a small program running in the background, and searchrequests get distributed among them (maybe with the help of some dedicated “supernodes” or servers)?
this way, cotst could get kept ot minimum (no big initial investment hurdle to overcome), and the resulting network (some millions, and at least some 100.000 always concurrently online) would simply dwarf google, msft, yahoo etc.
just an idea though – i don’t know much about this stuff from a technical standpoint, and if this would be possible.
Should Google handle regular expressions, it might be of some worth. As it stands it’s to search engines as burger flippers are to chefs.
Oh, before flaming, do tell – how do you do a regexp search with Goolge? Ya don’t. That almost works for English because it’s mostly an isolating language, but it’s quite a limitation once you leave that niche.
Keep dreaming, and learn some modesty!
No you’ve really hit the nail on the head here, that must be why Google is doing so badly! Geez.
What in the world does free speech have to do with browsers? The open/closed source software argument is hardly a freedom of speech issue, it’s ultimately a freedom of choice issue. Whether or not an OEM is forced to license Windows or prevented from customizing installations of such (which very much limits consumer choice), the fact is that this does not limit your right to free expression. And in case you hadn’t noticed: Opera is NOT free. Opera is a business that releases a browser based on open standards, but it is a money making enterprise nonetheless. If you choose to use Opera, you either use an ad supported version or you pay to license an ad-free version, but neither option is free as such.
i think its obvious google already has its own operating system for its super computers, but will they release it? that’s the question. if they release it talk about a blow to microsoft and alot of the linux distros.
Yes, K_P, your post is flamebait. Since you asked.
Also take a look at
http://www.google-watch-watch.org/
It is a nice analysis of the guy behind the “Google-watch” site.
Well, Google is nice, but let’s hope that this googlephoria doesn’t turn out into something like Microsoft’s almost reached monopol!!
Success darkens clear mind and common sense at times.
The free (as in free speech) browsers like Opera, Mozilla, and Firefox already have Google search boxes or a shortcut to search Google.
Opera is only free as in beer (with ads), not as in speech…
Engmar mentions http://www.google-watch.org but who is watching Google-Watch. I found that the following website was very interesting and brings up some good points about why Google-Watch.org was created. http://www.google-watch-watch.org/
If they do come out with an OS I hope they change the name. Something about saying “GooOS” doesn’t sound right. Plus any operating system with OS in it probably won’t fair well in the market.
Maybe something with an L? It’s working well for others.
Mac OS X ?
GoogleOS that does distributed computing and distributed memory system … and every one in the world can have an account on it .. and … and … it takes over the server world?
Nice dream, but I will believe it when I see it.
Jeez, and me without my tinfoil hat….somebody should have said by now that Google is the anti-christ, that Google is secretly run by Jimmy Hoffa, that Google kidnapped Elvis and sent him to Alpha Centauri system, etc.
Keep up the good work Google! Your catalog search engine alone has saved me a lot of time (and wasted paper) 🙂
Opera is not a free browser as in “free speech”, and it’s not a free browser as in “free beer” either (you either pay money, or pay by seeing ads that bring them revenue).
Mozilla is the free browser, along with KHTML (Konqueror & Safari) and a few smaller players (lynx?).
I’m trying to develop a client that is a filesharing/distributed computing client together, and I think GoogleOS is only optimized for fast connections (i.e. a lan of min speed 100mbps) as most distributed computing systems list that as a minimum (maybe viable on internet2 (search google:)). This would mean it would only be viable for the public if their server did all the processing, wasting the public resources. GoogleOS would be really neat if it was opensource, but that would make them lose their compeditive advantage, so similar things should be developed in the opensource world. I hope my plans for a distributed computer (globness) will overcome the network speed problem problem by splitting data packets into manageable chunks determined by the semi-intelligent network which should keep tabs on connection speeds and free processing power. At the moment though my projects pretty much hot air as I got to keep up with school, and try to learn C++ network stuff and python and gui’s so first release will be a long time yet (8-12 months).