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Google Founders Buy Fighter Jet
Ponca City, We love you writes "The NY Times reports that H211 LLC, a company controlled by Google's top executives, including billionaire founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, appears to have added to its fleet a Dornier Alpha Jet, a light jet attack and advanced trainer aircraft manufactured by Dornier of Germany and Dassault-Breguet of France. The 1982 Alpha-Jet seats two and was originally used by European air forces, but is now being sold relatively cheaply to civilians. The jet has landing rights at Moffett Field, the NASA-operated airfield that is a stone's throw from the Google campus. It is not clear who exactly flies the fighter jet, although Google chief executive Eric Schmidt is an avid pilot. If the top Googlers indeed own the fighter jet, they would be following in the footsteps of Oracle chief executive Larry Ellison, who has owned several aircraft, including fighter jets."
of how many starving children in Africa they could have fed instead of buying a jet so they can show off.
Are these guys Yahoos??
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
Red Bull has one too. Does that make them evil?
I'd have one if I had that kind of money too.
In other news, Microsoft is installing anti-aircraft emplacements
I see you own a computer. Surely you could have sent your money to Africa instead?
> It is not clear who exactly flies the fighter jet,
Hint: The Google AI
When fighter jets, tanks, etc. are sold to civilians, most of the fun stuff is ripped out.
This is basically the rich fuck's version of buying a sports car when you're 50 to stroke your ego.
Companies will do battle in the sky to prove superiority.
This isn't a big deal, Bob Lutz (Vice Chairman of GM, Retired Marine Aviator) owned a MiG i think, and now flies around in a Czech fighter.
Jack Roush (NASCAR owner, head of Roush Industries) owns a bunch of WWII fighters.
The odd part is that the Google guys seem to have bought it through some company.
Android + Maps + Fighter Jet = Deadly Precision with real-time traffic!
The other AC said "Just think of how many starving children in Africa they could have fed instead of buying a jet so they can show off." That was very quickly modded -1, Flamebait.
...
It's flamebait but only because it's true. Quick, silence the AC with a -1! We can't be calling someone's character into question when their conspicuous consumption becomes a public spectacle! Why, if that were allowed, then something like a rejection of consumerist culture might emerge
Isn't it hard to live up to "do no evil" when you have a strike-capable air force? This is a slippery slope, indeed. I think the next time the Yahoo! talks escalate, things just might go a little differently.
Obviously this is a first step toward achieving air superiority in the skies above Google's new aquatic data centers. As the Google Navy continues to expand its influence the importance of protecting the fleet from airborne threats will increase.
Also, never underestimate the bandwidth of a fighter jet full of tapes screaming across the sky at Mach 3.
Awesome! Maybe they can challenge Dexter Holland of The Offspring to a dogfight:
- Alan Cross, Ongoing History of New Music, "100 weird things about new rock - part 9"
UTF-8: There and Back Again
This is beyond the realm of reality so cut me some slack...
Corporations (or their top execs) are starting to buy military hardware. Do you think we will ever see a corporation declare war on another corporation?
Gives a whole new meaning to hostile takeover...
So... Google has added an "airforce" to complement their navy...
Google Navy
It must be carrying pinatas full of candy and goodwill...
Fighter jet, which has been in "Beta" for years.
AA guns, with targeting system running Vista.
Ought to be a good show.
Didn't Michael Dorn (Worf of Star Trek: The Next Generation) buy a fighter or a trainer after he was done with TV?
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
They'll have to offer free rides to people who could never afford a plane of their own.
> In other news, Microsoft is installing anti-aircraft emplacements
So, Ballmer is buying more chairs?
luckily it's payload is light.
They can use these fighter jets to fend off the pirates attacking their oceanic data centers!
In all seriousness it sounds more like a , "Dude I own a fighter jet!" then a, "Let's defend our data centers from Microsoft and Pirates!"
OK, so a couple of rich guys buy an expensive toy, so what? They already own a boeing 757, and a 767 for chrissake, and you didn't post those aquisitions.
Its no Rocket Car...
Rocket Car
Eschew Obfuscation
There was a former Czech air force MIG-21 for sale on Ebay a couple weeks ago with a "buy it now" price of only $45K. The aircraft was located in Ohio and was in ready-to-fly restored condition, and is actively flown in air shows. While the purchase price was cheap, it is hideously expensive to operate a MIG-21. A half-hour flight consumes almost $2000 worth of Jet-A fuel. Also a MIG-21 can only carry about two hour's worth of fuel onboard anyway. The engine in it has to be overhauled at a cost of over $100K about every 250 hours of flight time too, since Russian jet engines are built with such loose mechanical tolerances in the moving parts.
It's an advanced trainer. It's a toy. (albeit a rich man's toy). What's the big deal -- he already owns several aircraft. This isn't even uncommon.
Now, if you told me he bought a couple of fully armed F22's, THAT would be news. (you may, of course, substitute your plane of choice for the F22)
Even some actors are into that.
I have to say that there's something fitting about Worf in a fighter jet
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.
...the first thing to come up is a wikipedia article?
The Collings Foundation owns an actual jet fighter, an F-4D Phantom II from the Vietnam War. They had to get all kinds of waivers from the Feds to be able to own and operate it. This is for display at airshows.
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Well they have the cheap geothermal power and the free cooling for the datacenters. The only hitch was how out of the way iceland is. But it does have an abandoned NATO airfield so now that the top execs can jet in and out in an hour or so at supersonic speeds goodbye Silicon Valley Hello Reykjavik. Solves all the turnover problem too as in "You want to leave Google and join Microsoft. Fine as soon as you get security clearance from the Icelandic government you can leave (never that is)" With Iceland being bankrupt they would sell their souls and change their national anthem to "Do no evil" if Google comes calling.
**Life is too short to be serious**
That'll help them in their quest to be carbon-neutral won't it?
GCHQ Quantum Insert installed. If only our tongues were made of glass, how much more careful we would be when we speak
This was the subject of some controvery in the aviation community.
Moffett Field is a Naval installation and as such civilians cannot use it unless it's a emergency and even then you can expect to spend some time answering questions posed by the Military Police.
I understand the nearest civilian airport that can accept jets is quite a ways away.
So how did the google guys obtain rights to use Moffet field when no other civilians can?
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Actually a WWII V1 Doodle Bug. It was found in the V2 production workshop in Germany just after WWII. He also has a super-rare, original Messerschmitt Me-262 jet fighter. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Allen
But I suspect is has to do with a large stack of paper with pictures of presidents on them. You'd be amazed out how well such things work when the stack is large enough. The key is to make sure that your get them into the right hands. Elected officials are particularly partial to them, and hold a great deal of sway over what is and what isn't allowed.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
"Here at Google, we're committed to helping build a clean energy future and reducing our carbon footprint."
Thanks to file sharing, I purchase more CDs
Thanks to the RIAA, I buy them used...
I bought a toothbrush and some new underwear. Really guys, is this stuff that matters?
tag: !news
while shipping container datacenters get all of the news today, google has realized that a shipping container just isn't very sexy
meanwhile, imagine a full rack of server hardware, effortlessly streaming youtube movies and search returns, all the while cruising at mach 1 above the rockies
now that's some seriously sexy IT hardware
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
They may want to avoid this thing that will soon operate from the same Moffet Field:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/19/BUVD13JIMG.DTL&hw=airship+ventures&sn=001&sc=1000
Airship Ventures is flying a Zeppelin NT airship (no Windows jokes here! ;) ), which is larger than the small blimps we often see over major public events like college and NFL football games.
Little known fact, but one of the brothers that own Fry's Electronics owns a stripped down F-14 (no weapons), last I heard it was located in Arizona. Not sure why there is so much news coverage on something this innocent. I mean if we found out that Larry Ellison was building a Death Star (he isn't is he?!), then I understand the hubbub.
I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own.
An airplane, a whole airplane, a German airplane? WooooooooooooooooooooW. I have a pair of shoes, look, look there, Susie down the street has a mailbox of her own....I must MUST get this on the news... who cares?
Google's founders have always seemed to show a philanthropic attitude. This is at odds with buying fighter jets. The obvious conclusion is that Google have finally worked up the guts to go after Microsoft's HQ directly. When MS is dead, and people in africa aren't being charged a month's wages for MS products, then clearly, Google's philanthropic arm will be satisfied with the purchase too.
Well, the more I hear about Google, the more they seem like everyone else. And I'm not saying it in a condemning way or anything. They're just human.
They too need some big expensive toy as suspicious consumption. They too would rape your privacy if it helps optimize 0.01% off their average search time, and thus make an extra buck. They too will sell some Chinese babbling about "democracy" to the authorities if that's the price to make a billion dollars in business in China. They too will expose your data occasionally if it's cheaper than hiring testers. And they too apparently aren't above making a backroom deal with Yahoo or using patents keep the competition out of their little monopoly field.
(According to at least one analysis, that's why MS wants to buy Yahoo. Some time ago Yahoo apparently bought a small company who had a blanket patent on matching ads to the text on the page. Yahoo licensed it to Google, but refuses to license it to MS or anyone else.)
In a nutshell, they're like any other corporation. Plus a funky meaningless motto, that some people mistake for some kind of final proof that Google is the digital-age Mother Theresa. Heh.
The thing is, no other corporation is "evil" in the sense of seeking to cause the maximum misery, pain and destruction possible. Even MS, I'd bet they never had a board meeting along the lines of, "how can we make more people miserable?" There are no super-villains cackling over doomsday device blueprints. And there are no altruistic super-heroes either. There are only greedy people trying to make a buck, and the difference is in how many corpses they feel they can get away with stepping over, on their way to the top.
At any rate, Google "doing no evil"... well, it's technically true, but only in as much as you could say with a straight face that MS does no evil. They don't sacrifice babies to Satan or anything. But from there, both have shown repeatedly that their goal is simply to make the most money, and both don't have much consideration for whoever might get to suffer for it. As is, indeed, expected of a corporation.
They're just human. They're just a corporation. That's it. It doesn't make them evil, it merely makes them the same as everyone else. One just has the funny motto.
Well, I think I'll make "36 inch penis" my motto. I'm sure some people will actually believe that I live up to that ;)
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Androids new AI will fly fighter jets.. that ought to sell a few G1's.
A company near me, ATAC, has a fleet of ex-fighter jets. Kfir, Hawker Hunter, and A-4 Skyhawk. They contract out to the USAF and Navy to fly intercept and fleet protection missions. Here are a couple of their jets on the ground.
The Kirlin family runs one of the world's the largest chains of Hallmark cards and gifts franchises (Kirlin's Hallmark stores, based out of Quincy, Illinois). Two sons of founder Dale Kirlin Sr. (Dale Jr. and Gary) went into the family business.
The other son, Don Kirlin, pursued an aviation career with the US Navy and Us Airways before he started Red Air which is a company also based out of Quincy, IL. Don has lived in Quincy, in Boulder, Colorado, and also in Kyrgyzstan while working on acquiring a former Soviet fighter.
Red Air operates a fleet of Mig, Alpha, and Vodochody fighter aircraft in training maneuvers with US and Canadian fighter groups. Their former USAF and US Navy flight instructors flying foreign-built fighters make for a much more realistic training scenario than simulators or flying US aircraft against other US aircraft.
If you have the cash, the licenses, and the desire then check out his foreign fighter and trainer sales business, Air USA. Weapons systems are not included, of course.
Don's also the man behind the World Free Fall Convention, which brought visitors from every state and 70 foreign countries to Quincy, IL and Rantoul, IL for 17 years and featured during that time over 600,000 jumps. Jump platforms included everything from a B-17 bomber to the Family Channel blimp. Even a Super Constellation and a Boeing 727 have been featured.
So if you really want to talk about privately held air power, Oracle and Google take a back seat to the black sheep son of a greeting card and gift store magnate.
And the Google Worship by Slashdot editors reaches, and I hardly thought it possible, a new low.
Why is this news to anyone?
Eric Shmidt? He can't fly a plane. He's a fucking pussy!
If I were a shareholder, I'd be furious. There is no defensible reason for spending corporate earnings on private aircraft, let alone a fighter jet. Let them pay for it out of their salary, not the profits.
Google's coming to get ya!
For some reason I suddenly had a flash of Google branching into Mercenary activities, or Private Military Contractors as they prefer to be called these days. Squads of Google Soldiers running around with a large Logo on their arm and unlimited bandwidth. Gives the terminology G-Men a new meaning.
The Long Now Foundation
They need the jet to compensate for size.
They were going to buy a Hummer, but the fighter jet gets better gas mileage.
Seriously, why is this news? They buy a plane that is available to the public if enough money is exchanged. Even the summary talks about a fleet implying it is not even the first plane they own.
So it is not news that they bought a plane, because they have some already. It is not news that they have a lot of money. It is not news one of the big shots has a pilot license. It is not even news for being the first to have such a plane.
It's not news. If anything it's gossip. About as interesting as knowing Tara Reid was drunk again. News? That is not news and it doesn't matter.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Apparently, they didn't agree with our decision or they would have gotten the Aircraft Carrier!
A neutral communications medium is essential. It is the basis of science, by which humankind should decide what is true.
Steve Appleton, founder of Micron has owned and flown a variety of military jets for over a decade. A MiG trainer, a Hawker Hunter supersonic British jet fighter, and he even wadded up a plane and collapsed a lung while shooting a corporate video.
...properly defined, as an aircraft designed to destroy other aircraft. It's a design optimized as an advanced trainer. It has a secondary purpose as a light attack aircraft.
As a former Navy pilot (S-3A Vikings, 20+ years ago) I have at least minimal standing to discus this. The Alpha jet was one competitor for the Navy contract for new training planes, way back in the 80s. One of them visited our base, some of the senior officers went up for a spin. Neat little plane. It lost out to the BAC Hawk, a variant of which (much if not mostly built by us subcontractors) as the T-45 Goshawk.
Do they have an "I'm feeling lucky" button in the cockpit? :)
The founder of Digex bought an ex-NATO warship when he cashed out.
I've been on it, it's pretty cool. Makes the other rich guys' yachts look very, um, flaccid.
If she stood up there in K-mart clothes people would have perceived her as less sophisticated.
And if a $150,000 investment in her mouth could have the same effect, the GOP would be much better off...
Damn that sounded dirty.
Boot Windows, Linux, and ESX over the network for free.
Google is on the way down, down, DOWN.
When billionaires begin acting arrogant, they soon lose all sight of reality. Examples? Gates and Ballmer. Okay, okay, they were never in touch with reality.
Not many people realize that an aircraft's initial cost is dwarfed by its yearly maintenance and fuel costs. Think about how my base does it- 200-odd maintainers each making between $25k and $65k plus benefits. In my shop alone it's not uncommon to see a daily throughput of up to $60k in parts (replacements, turn-ins, locally fabricated). Landing gear cracked? No repairs allowed, and a drag brace or main strut costs more than my house.
I will of course leave out the cost of the flightline and weapons personnel for now.
The point of flying an unstable, fast, small aircraft is that you can maneuver at high speed/high-G. Pilots play hell with the airframe, and you wouldn't believe what breaks under those conditions. I saw a loose rivet head in a sealed portion of a vertical stabilizer (F-15, not my base). No one knew when the rivet head got in there, but it had completely destroyed a static air line and an electrical cable. The inside of the compartment looked like pavement.
I would love to own my own fighter jet, but it's not something you can just save up for and go buy- you should set aside 4-5 times the cost of each aircraft in high-interest funds to help pay for maintenance. And remember that commodity military hardware like this will only depreciate in value, and you have what other posters have identified as a mid-life crisis cure.
If I had stock in Google and they were planning on paying for this with corporate money, I would be outraged.
-b
No offense, but I've stopped responding to AC's.
It is a good day to fly.
Perhaps spending $150,000 on her wardrobe makes apparent sense on the short term, but it is rather foolish if you think it over. After considering how much John Edwards was laughed at for his expensive haircut, it is hardly imaginable that any candidate would want to appear in the news with a shopping spree like this. Especially with a financial crisis being in full swing.
It would be stupid to assume that nobody will notice. (Even if it didn't have to be officially disclosed, somebody would leak the hockey mom's expensive taste.) Almost everything a candidate does, including buying shoes, is potentially a news story, and the candidates would be smart to act accordingly. In a case like this, you can be absolutely certain that the press will make a story of it.
Of course Conservatives do grumble that it is unfair for the press to put it in the headlines, but that's just silly. It's politics, people, and public scrutiny, even unfair scrutiny, is part of the game. TV channels and newspapers exist because people choose to read and watch them; it is called free press and a free market. Truman would have said: Get out of the kitchen.
I think the bottom line is: If Palin wasn't prepared to go on stage and tell the world "I just spent US$150,000 on clothes and I am proud of it", she shouldn't have done it at all.
More proof that Google is trying to take over the world.
Lackey: Hello
Sergei: Hello Lackey. Ellison was spouting crap about how he could kick my butt in a dogfight over poker last night. I need a plane.
Lackey: Um, OK, what do you want?
Sergei: Jet fighter, something in a pastel I think. You decide, just get it here.
Lackey: A jet fighter
Sergei: Yep, jet fighter.
Lackey: A pastel jet fighter
Sergei: What, you don't like pastels?
Lackey: No no, just checking. OK, um, do you know what you want to spend?
Sergei: (pause) You know how much I'm worth right?
Lackey: Right
Sergei: Do I care how much it costs?
Lackey: Um, no I guess not
Sergei: Get it Fed-Exed over night, I need this tomorrow. I'm sooo going to kick his ass
Perhaps this is the first step in the appearance of anarcho-capitalist security contractors that protect people against the crimes of the state. I know many people who would love to have insurance against imprisonment by tyrannical governments, such as those in the US and UK.
Read Hans-Hermann Hoppe's Democracy: The God that Failed, or refer to the writings of Murray Rothbard and Roderick Long, for more information on how this would work.
[ home ]
Until the Google Armed Forces has tanks and a navy too. Although they do already have the satellite surveillance in place.
Might not be a bad time for Microsoft to invest in bunkers, just in case.
They should go patent attack planes carrying data centers. It has natural cooling features, apart from the added security.
you are far too critical and valuable to be wasted in a plane crash.
Read radical news here
I hope they didn't remove the hard points. The fact that we can no longer defend our citizens from the military with simple muskets means citizens should have the right to own tanks and fighter jets.
'Cause I think the plane needs to be called Goo Fighter.
You, sir, win one thousend internets. LOLspect!
Remember, Paul Allen has his own air force already. It's even open for public viewing: http://www.flyingheritage.com/
One
Raging
Asshole
Called
Larry
Ellison
http://www.google.com/corporate/execs.html#alan
I'm 37 myself, and I remember "Jager-bombs" consisting of a shot of Jager dropped into a glass of BEER.
BTW, I've had a few of the ever-popular "Red Bull and Vodka" drinks before - but I don't care for 'em. That weird feeling you get when you mix a depressant with a stimulant doesn't do much for me.
Google can literally blow away the competition!
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.
Why do you think it was bought by a corporation and added to a fleet? My guess is tax reasons. I have no problem with the rich being rich, but at least do it honestly and pay for it like you should. The whole company is nothing more than a tax shelter. Despicable.
Steve Balmer has his chairs.... so google go and buy a fighter jet - wonder what good ol' Steve's going to get next? Stinger missiles hidden as a sofa?
--- Users are like bacteria -> Each one causing a thousand tiny crises until the host finally gives up and dies.
I've got a symbol in my driveway
I've got a hundred million-dollar friends
I've got you a brand new weapon, let's see
how destructive we could be
- jack johnson
I can only hope that the ejection seats are in good working order.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
STEVE ANSWER ME STEVE!!!
The first jet to build the Air Force to defend Google's floating data center.
Yawn. These surplus jets are cheap and common. I personally know several people who have L-29's, some of which actually fly once or twice a year.
I wouldn't give you $5 for any of them.
Might be interested in a CJ-6 or Yak-50 though.
Lazy journalists
The plane in the photo belongs to Qinetiq and flies from Boscombe Down in the UK, but at least it wasn't a raspberry ripple
Search for ZJ646
Comment removed based on user account deletion
you beat me to it, great post :)
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great post :)
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It's expensive to own and operate a fleet of personal 767, 757, and top-shelf business jets, not to mention a military aircraft. And when you are obscenely wealthy, you no longer need to conform to conventional ethics in the sense of say, paying for your own bloated ego.
Owning and operating the jets in a separate entity allows Google's top 3 to have the personal use of the jets, yet have Google lease them from a commercial entity so this benefit does not need to be reported as taxable, as well as shielding them from personal liability if the 767 goes into a primary school in Palo Alto some day.
I would guess that not a single of these flying toys is owned directly by their beneficiaries.
ok so what's the point of these assholes driving priuses like they give a shit about their carbon footprint if they're just going to fly private jets everywhere?
Perhaps one should first learn what AlphaJet really is before describing it as a fighter. Wikipedia may help.
Now their stock lottery money buys them the right to fly a jet over my house... ;^(
F*ck capitalism!!! F*ck GOOGLE!!! F*ck them all!!!
And then there is Thunder City, a company operating from the Cape Town International airport in Cape Town, South Africa. Quoting from Wikipedia:
Admittedly there are no "big boys" like Migs, but personally I don't think the Electric Lighting or the Buccaneer is anything to be sneezed at... :)
will these liberal communista who complain about corporate greed CEO's who so called waste monies complain or congratulate the Google boys?
-------- Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most. --Ozzy
Those are certainly no weekend sport planes. It'd be really cool to rescue, maintain, and fly anything of that sort. The Hawker Hunter they list is a nice plane, too. The paying passenger flights and air shows in these planes are a cool thing to do with them. They'd probably work pretty well in the role of combat training planes if Thunder City could get such a contract. As you said, they're no Migs, but additional or alternative plane configurations wouldn't be a bad training idea.