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Google's X Files Vanish

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the and-then-what-did-google-do dept.

An anonymous reader writes "News.com reports that Google's latest technology experiment paid tribute to Apple Computer, but the Mac OS X-themed version of the search king's Web site was taken down a day after its debut. Though that particular page was taken down, there is a screenshot here displaying how the icons were magnified as the mouse hovered over them."

5 of 407 comments (clear)

  1. Before anyone jumps to conclusions... by daveschroeder · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...as others in many other forums today have, there is, at least at present, absolutely no proof that Apple legal necessarily did anything here. By all accounts, it was a project by an individual Google engineer that a manager liked enough to display publicly via Google Labs. The creator himself said it was the result of "a fun late-night coding jaunt to help me learn Javascript and DHTML." After other Google managers, executives, or legal staff saw it, there is a distinct possibility that Google itself pulled it because of anything from concerns over possible infringement, to the product not being approved by by the proper authorities before public consumption, to internal disagreement about the rollout process to Google Labs.

    To those who may be so inclined to immediately blame Apple, I would say: wait until any facts in this particular instance actually support that position.

    1. Re:Before anyone jumps to conclusions... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Umm... The script is post-processed. It's
      been removed of white space, and all functions
      renames to single or double var names--all to
      save space the speed loading.

      *Obviously* people don't code this way.

  2. Re:Variable names... by lukewarmfusion · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Not easy to read or manage, but it sure downloads fast. And if you're serving it to a few million visitors a day, those add up fast in bandwidth savings.

  3. He shouldn't have to keep his mouth shut by SweetAndSourJesus · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Some guy noodling around in his 20% time to profess his love for OS X hardly seems like something the legal department (or any damn department) should concern themselves with.

    Then again, I've had a few beers and can imagine the world, with a few minor tweaks, being perfect like that.

    --

    --
    the strongest word is still the word "free"
  4. Re:We all know why by cmallinson · · Score: 5, Insightful
    ...a famous law suit against a software product and it was decided that you cannot patent or copywrite the 'look and feel' of software.. .. only the code underneath

    Precedents aside, the look and feel of software is not always separate from the functionality. The function of a lot of software these days is to make hard things easy, and much of that has to do with the GUI.