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Can you provide some context about why this is relevant to the article, which posits that Google is uniquely positioned to win the AI space and hence the future

Can you provide some context about why this is relevant to the article, which posits that Google is uniquely positioned to win the AI space and hence the future of computing? The potential payoff, though, is astronomical: a world with Pixie everywhere means a world where Google makes real money from selling hardware, in addition to services for enterprises and schools, and cloud services that leverage Google’s infrastructure to provide the same capabilities to businesses. Moreover, it’s a world where Google is truly integrated: the company already makes the chips, in both its phones and its data centers, it makes the models, and it does it all with the largest collection of data in the world.

andrewstuart 3y ago
Because Google has burned it’s good will by cancelling so many projects. Yet another new Google project is simply met with “ok, but when will it be canceled”.
HarHarVeryFunny 3y ago
But it doesn't seem to be true - there's more of a moat around search than AI it seems, and the recent trend is people replacing the Google search app on their phones with Perplexity.ai. You currently still need search too, for AI's to access data newer than their training set, but I wonder how that's going to evolve over time ... Could see AI's being updated increasingly frequently and tapping direct into news sources (not via search) for news/sports/etc.
frankgrimesjr 3y ago
I don't know enough about the AI space to comment on it specifically. But this distinctly reminds me about articles around about the time of the first iPhone release which posited that Microsoft was in a unique position to ultimately win the smartphone market. After all it was dominant on the desktop and Windows Mobile already had a decent (albeit not dominant) marketshare in smartphones at the time.
- kccqzy 3y ago
  The theory wasn't wrong and still isn't wrong. The problem is in the execution.
  - renewiltord 3y ago
    The two things are related. That's the insight of The Innovator's Dilemma. They cannot do it.
ur-whale 3y ago
> which posits that Google is uniquely positioned to win the AI space and hence the future of computing? They have been "uniquely positioned" as you put it to win the AI race for the past 15 years now. And they have done exactly zilch (other than produce an OpenAI-wannabe fake video with Gemini a couple of weeks back). I see no reason why that will change in any way. Astronomical payoffs is not something Google is culturally capable of anymore, because they require risk taking, and strictly no one has any incentive to take any kind of risks at Google anymore.

andrewstuart 3y ago

Because Google has burned it’s good will by cancelling so many projects. Yet another new Google project is simply met with “ok, but when will it be canceled”.

HarHarVeryFunny 3y ago

But it doesn't seem to be true - there's more of a moat around search than AI it seems, and the recent trend is people replacing the Google search app on their phones with Perplexity.ai. You currently still need search too, for AI's to access data newer than their training set, but I wonder how that's going to evolve over time ... Could see AI's being updated increasingly frequently and tapping direct into news sources (not via search) for news/sports/etc.

frankgrimesjr 3y ago

I don't know enough about the AI space to comment on it specifically. But this distinctly reminds me about articles around about the time of the first iPhone release which posited that Microsoft was in a unique position to ultimately win the smartphone market. After all it was dominant on the desktop and Windows Mobile already had a decent (albeit not dominant) marketshare in smartphones at the time.

kccqzy 3y ago
The theory wasn't wrong and still isn't wrong. The problem is in the execution.
- renewiltord 3y ago
  The two things are related. That's the insight of The Innovator's Dilemma. They cannot do it.

ur-whale 3y ago

> which posits that Google is uniquely positioned to win the AI space and hence the future of computing? They have been "uniquely positioned" as you put it to win the AI race for the past 15 years now. And they have done exactly zilch (other than produce an OpenAI-wannabe fake video with Gemini a couple of weeks back). I see no reason why that will change in any way. Astronomical payoffs is not something Google is culturally capable of anymore, because they require risk taking, and strictly no one has any incentive to take any kind of risks at Google anymore.