5 ms·

>> "And they are focusing on moonshot projects for exactly the same reason that article claims is Google's problem - being complacent." MS Research has been do

>> "And they are focusing on moonshot projects for exactly the same reason that article claims is Google's problem - being complacent." MS Research has been doing this kind of thing for years. Most of the projects never go anywhere. Google isn't the first company to do R&D - they're just really public about it to try and improve their public image.

blinkingled 12y ago
Google is trying and delivering a whole lot more than MS Research ( did MS ever have a public prototype for anything?) - Glass, Self Driving Cars, Google Now are all tangible things that show concrete effort to make entirely new products and also make existing products better. They may not all be instant consumer hits but the point was about complacency - and this isn't complacency, it's the exact opposite. Microsoft became complacent with WinMO, even few office releases were meh. Windows stagnated until security blunders forced them to react. Google on the other hand isn't being complacent with GMail (Inbox), Android (Lollipop), Chrome (v41) or Search (Google Now).
- icki 12y ago
  Microsoft famously launched the Surface tabletop computer :)
- k-mcgrady 12y ago
  >> "Google is trying and delivering a whole lot more than MS Research ( did MS ever have a public prototype for anything?) - Glass, Self Driving Cars, Google Now are all tangible things that show concrete effort to make entirely new products and also make existing products better." Glass flopped. Self-driving cars haven't been released and there are plenty of people working on that (Google just makes a big PR thing out of it) and Google Now is great (although hardly one of their moonshots?). >> "Google on the other hand isn't being complacent with GMail (Inbox), Android (Lollipop), Chrome (v41) or Search (Google Now)." Inbox is certainly interesting but most people I know don't like it. I did like it but moved away due to rising features. Lollipop killed my battery life and slowed my device to a crawl. Chrome has become sluggish and bloated. Like I said Google Now is great but only if I give Google all my data and give up all my privacy (search history, location history).
  - engendered 12y ago
    Lollipop killed my battery life and slowed my device to a crawl. Given how profound you seem to think most everything of Google sucks (seen in a multitude of posts of yours throughout this thread), I'm curious what device you have that Lollipop "killed"? I'm going to call bullshit HN has seen a HUGE influx of Microsoft shills, and it's getting disconcerting. And an almost immediate karma punishing (-11 in less than a minute), despite this story sitting on the second page. Does Microsoft give an extra bonus if you sign up for HN? The astroturfing PR efforts have gotten quite a bit more pronounced. It feels like the glorious Slashdot days of old.
    - wrongc0ntinent 12y ago
      No love for MS here. Nexus 5, Nexus 7. Battery and speed. The 7+lollipop was a bummer for me, I used to be kinda proud of it. Now it needs ongoing maintenance (cache clearing).
      - engendered 12y ago
        All complex software has bugs, and Android has become enormous (I tried to update AOSP earlier this month and gave up after about 40GB of repo deltas. This enormous activity, itself, completely invalidates the garbage linked post). This post and a large percentage of the comments, and the moderation, is essentially a "shit on Google" post, somehow trying to make Microsoft look better in some relative sense. It is terrible fanboy noise. And the gent I responded to just picked up someone else's grievances. I would wager good money they have no Android device "ruined" by Lollipop. They just want to legitimize their walls of anti-Google screeds. EDIT: I've really riled up some astorturfers. Any post I make is almost immediately attacked.
        aceperry 12y ago
        Well, for what it's worth, your posts are quite reasonable and balanced. And I think your observations are accurate, I've noticed the same things.
    - 12y ago
- theatraine 12y ago
  Most recently I can think of HoloLens (http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us) and the Surface Hub (http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-surface-hub/en-us http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-surface-hub/en-us). Kinect was also a research project. Cortana also uses a lot of MSR tech. So do the Surface tablets, especially with handwriting recognition.
  - minthd 12y ago
    I agree with your point, but looking at the projects,there's a clear difference between the companies: most of MS's projects(maybe except hololens) have large business value risk, on top of the technical risk. On the other hand, most of Google's projects don't have much of a business value risk. If they'll work well, most likely they'll make good deal of money(unless the competition wins - but i believe Google also thinks hard on making projects hard to copy , or some other substitute challenges the market - but hey what can you do?)
- angersock 12y ago
  There's a lot of weird language and engineering research that they do that then propagates back into the developer ecosystem--I think you aren't giving near enough credit there.
  - swatow 12y ago
    I only just realized the Simon Peyton Jones (of GHC fame) works at Microsoft Research.
minthd 12y ago
Microsoft research vs Google is an interesting case, especially considering that Google's glucose sensing contact lens project originaly started at microsot research, but Novartis is licensing them from Google.
at-fates-hands 12y ago
>> Most of the projects never go anywhere. Just in case you needed some backup for this point: Google X started sometime in 2009-2010. In the time its been around only one project - the project around "Engineered Architecture" was successful and the team was able to form a company called Flux (https://www.flux.io https://www.flux.io). Funny, they're being sued now by the architect they brought in with the idea for the program: http://www.fastcodesign.com/3039930/fast-feed/architect-sues-google-for-allegedly-stealing-eco-friendly-building-technology http://www.fastcodesign.com/3039930/fast-feed/architect-sues...

blinkingled 12y ago

Google is trying and delivering a whole lot more than MS Research ( did MS ever have a public prototype for anything?) - Glass, Self Driving Cars, Google Now are all tangible things that show concrete effort to make entirely new products and also make existing products better. They may not all be instant consumer hits but the point was about complacency - and this isn't complacency, it's the exact opposite. Microsoft became complacent with WinMO, even few office releases were meh. Windows stagnated until security blunders forced them to react. Google on the other hand isn't being complacent with GMail (Inbox), Android (Lollipop), Chrome (v41) or Search (Google Now).

icki 12y ago
Microsoft famously launched the Surface tabletop computer :)
k-mcgrady 12y ago
>> "Google is trying and delivering a whole lot more than MS Research ( did MS ever have a public prototype for anything?) - Glass, Self Driving Cars, Google Now are all tangible things that show concrete effort to make entirely new products and also make existing products better." Glass flopped. Self-driving cars haven't been released and there are plenty of people working on that (Google just makes a big PR thing out of it) and Google Now is great (although hardly one of their moonshots?). >> "Google on the other hand isn't being complacent with GMail (Inbox), Android (Lollipop), Chrome (v41) or Search (Google Now)." Inbox is certainly interesting but most people I know don't like it. I did like it but moved away due to rising features. Lollipop killed my battery life and slowed my device to a crawl. Chrome has become sluggish and bloated. Like I said Google Now is great but only if I give Google all my data and give up all my privacy (search history, location history).
- engendered 12y ago
  Lollipop killed my battery life and slowed my device to a crawl. Given how profound you seem to think most everything of Google sucks (seen in a multitude of posts of yours throughout this thread), I'm curious what device you have that Lollipop "killed"? I'm going to call bullshit HN has seen a HUGE influx of Microsoft shills, and it's getting disconcerting. And an almost immediate karma punishing (-11 in less than a minute), despite this story sitting on the second page. Does Microsoft give an extra bonus if you sign up for HN? The astroturfing PR efforts have gotten quite a bit more pronounced. It feels like the glorious Slashdot days of old.
  - wrongc0ntinent 12y ago
    No love for MS here. Nexus 5, Nexus 7. Battery and speed. The 7+lollipop was a bummer for me, I used to be kinda proud of it. Now it needs ongoing maintenance (cache clearing).
    - engendered 12y ago
      All complex software has bugs, and Android has become enormous (I tried to update AOSP earlier this month and gave up after about 40GB of repo deltas. This enormous activity, itself, completely invalidates the garbage linked post). This post and a large percentage of the comments, and the moderation, is essentially a "shit on Google" post, somehow trying to make Microsoft look better in some relative sense. It is terrible fanboy noise. And the gent I responded to just picked up someone else's grievances. I would wager good money they have no Android device "ruined" by Lollipop. They just want to legitimize their walls of anti-Google screeds. EDIT: I've really riled up some astorturfers. Any post I make is almost immediately attacked.
      - aceperry 12y ago
        Well, for what it's worth, your posts are quite reasonable and balanced. And I think your observations are accurate, I've noticed the same things.
  - 12y ago
theatraine 12y ago
Most recently I can think of HoloLens (http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us) and the Surface Hub (http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-surface-hub/en-us http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-surface-hub/en-us). Kinect was also a research project. Cortana also uses a lot of MSR tech. So do the Surface tablets, especially with handwriting recognition.
- minthd 12y ago
  I agree with your point, but looking at the projects,there's a clear difference between the companies: most of MS's projects(maybe except hololens) have large business value risk, on top of the technical risk. On the other hand, most of Google's projects don't have much of a business value risk. If they'll work well, most likely they'll make good deal of money(unless the competition wins - but i believe Google also thinks hard on making projects hard to copy , or some other substitute challenges the market - but hey what can you do?)
angersock 12y ago
There's a lot of weird language and engineering research that they do that then propagates back into the developer ecosystem--I think you aren't giving near enough credit there.
- swatow 12y ago
  I only just realized the Simon Peyton Jones (of GHC fame) works at Microsoft Research.

minthd 12y ago

Microsoft research vs Google is an interesting case, especially considering that Google's glucose sensing contact lens project originaly started at microsot research, but Novartis is licensing them from Google.

at-fates-hands 12y ago

>> Most of the projects never go anywhere. Just in case you needed some backup for this point: Google X started sometime in 2009-2010. In the time its been around only one project - the project around "Engineered Architecture" was successful and the team was able to form a company called Flux (https://www.flux.io https://www.flux.io). Funny, they're being sued now by the architect they brought in with the idea for the program: http://www.fastcodesign.com/3039930/fast-feed/architect-sues-google-for-allegedly-stealing-eco-friendly-building-technology http://www.fastcodesign.com/3039930/fast-feed/architect-sues...