4 ms·

It's a valid point though. There's a difference between running a research lab and a product organization. I used to work in a research lab (Nokia Research). L

It's a valid point though. There's a difference between running a research lab and a product organization. I used to work in a research lab (Nokia Research). Lots of cool research. But product divisions routinely ignored what we were doing. Not invented here, not a priority, we're busy moving deck chairs around on our Titanic, etc. Very little industrial research translates into customer/product/share holder value. Facebook, like several other big companies, pays a lot to keep some very smart people on staff. They constantly come up with new stuff that they publish about and that also result in patents. That's not the issue. However, from there to product features is where it goes wrong. Most of Facebook's product portfolio hasn't changed substantially for quite some time. And they haven't really launched any noteworthy new stuff either. Publishing a paper doesn't really count. It's nice and it will no doubt help other companies to succeed where Facebook is clearly struggling to succeed.

loudmax 4y ago
That is my outsider impression of what's going on at Google. The ChatGPT interface that Microsoft is rolling out absolutely should have come from Google first. I'm sure they actually have the technology, and they've probably had it for years now. What Google lacks is any sort of leadership or discipline to turn a prototype into a marketable product.
- jillesvangurp 4y ago
  I didn't want to bring it up but, yes, Google is obviously struggling with the disconnect between what they are doing in terms of research and product as well. And they are pouring billions into the research. They even spun off alphabet as a company to do all the blue sky research. With so far not a stellar track record. Mostly their revenue is just Google running on autopilot and vacuuming up ad revenue wherever it can. Most large companies struggle with this. A lot of former industrial research labs have either disappeared entirely or became a shadow of their former selves. IBM, HP, etc. used to do lots of blue sky research. Xerox Parc was a big deal and they obviously failed to productize. But of course inspired Apple and quite a few others. It's a tough topic. I don't think many companies have figured this out. There are positive examples of course but mostly the return on investment for open ended research in a corporate setting is not as high as it should be considering the valid research that gets published and then fails to get monetized by the companies doing the research. OpenAI, is the smart counter move. Spin off a company, fund it, and then license back the technology. MS seems to have learned from it's past efforts in MS Research.

loudmax 4y ago

That is my outsider impression of what's going on at Google. The ChatGPT interface that Microsoft is rolling out absolutely should have come from Google first. I'm sure they actually have the technology, and they've probably had it for years now. What Google lacks is any sort of leadership or discipline to turn a prototype into a marketable product.

jillesvangurp 4y ago
I didn't want to bring it up but, yes, Google is obviously struggling with the disconnect between what they are doing in terms of research and product as well. And they are pouring billions into the research. They even spun off alphabet as a company to do all the blue sky research. With so far not a stellar track record. Mostly their revenue is just Google running on autopilot and vacuuming up ad revenue wherever it can. Most large companies struggle with this. A lot of former industrial research labs have either disappeared entirely or became a shadow of their former selves. IBM, HP, etc. used to do lots of blue sky research. Xerox Parc was a big deal and they obviously failed to productize. But of course inspired Apple and quite a few others. It's a tough topic. I don't think many companies have figured this out. There are positive examples of course but mostly the return on investment for open ended research in a corporate setting is not as high as it should be considering the valid research that gets published and then fails to get monetized by the companies doing the research. OpenAI, is the smart counter move. Spin off a company, fund it, and then license back the technology. MS seems to have learned from it's past efforts in MS Research.