Slashdot Mirror
Google Exec Hints At Future Open Platform
rsmiller510 writes "At the recent Web 2.0 Summit, Dave Girouard, who is president of Google's enterprise division, stated that his company's long-term goal is to open up the Google development stack to outside developers. If this is true, then it could have some serious long-term implications for developers who could use Google services in new and interesting ways."
I read the entire article. Can I have my five minutes back please?
Summary of article:
Google Exec: We're going to open.... The box! ...
People: Open what?
Google Exec: The box! With... the wires, and blinky lights, and stuff in it!
People: What's in the box?
Google Exec: New and interesting things!
People: O RLY?
Google Exec: YA RLY!
People:
Google Exec: Oh look, pretty shiny...
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
he means they'll track all my personal information and use it to their advantage... then count me in!
Allowing everyone to help out with Google's product development is a smart strategy because of how difficult it is becoming to keep up with software enthusiasts who like to collaborate on open source projects. It will be interesting to see how Google will be able to harness the power of collaborative development in their core products.
And i expect to soon hear about a"The GOOOGLE Store"... ...
Previously: "Linux... Toward the Sunrise..." Now: "Linux... Toward the-- No, now, part of Every Sunrise"
There's a danger with the word "open", as it carries such good connotations for us here. However, just because we like "open" doesn't mean that whatever is coming from Google is going to match our expectations, let alone our desires.
You have to remember that Google is a very different beast to RedHat for example. Google's business M.O. is like that of no other corporation, so it's hard to draw comparisons, but nobody would ever suggest that they are "an open source company" (not even close), despite the many open source projects that they host, promote, support, and of course use. At best, they are a "somewhat open source friendly" company, and undoubtedly they also know that being open is becoming increasingly important, so they're responding to that.
Note that Google's main products are all closed, and most of them possess a few annoying "features" that would have been fixed by now if they were an open source company --- I'm sure that we can all point to some "feature/bugs" that irritate us personally. :-) In fact they're not even very good at responding to popular feature requests (almost apathetic), so true wide-scale openness is really a long way off for Google.
Given the above, I think that some caution is required when interpreting highly non-specific words spoken by Google execs. While we would like them to become massively more open, their openness may not come in a form that the FOSS community would find particularly attractive. In particular, any thought that Google is going to cede huge amounts of control over to open source developers is almost certainly sheer fantasy.
"The question of whether machines can think is no more interesting than [] whether submarines can swim" - Dijkstra
Since when has the Mafia been a secret cabal?
1. Study Balmerian philosophy (AKA how NOT to deal with open source questions)
2. Open response with standard Open Sourcian Defense Strategy: LTGD (Long Term Goal Deflection).
3. CONTINUE PROFIT$$$
I record my sleeptalking
Isn't the reason Google's child care costs are doubling is because they switched to a really insanely expensive childcare service(37k/year/kid!) after one of the VP's had a kid?
They should have made the VP get her kid a grad student or something, it would've been cheaper.
Or the employees could've showed some sanity and found an off-campus daycare that is on their commute...
In my opinion this is an interesting article through which i gathered a lot of information. ================ Taylor Your SEO
Isn't the reason Google's child care costs are doubling is because they switched to a really insanely expensive childcare service(37k/year/kid!) after one of the VP's had a kid?
Sounds plausible. Wouldn't surprise me, but I honestly don't know enough about their reasons. Just that it was a jackass of a thing to do and it _could_ mean the difference between staying or going if I were a Google employee. Would depend on the whole package of course, but if I had felt any loyalty that'd be enough to shatter it.
Or the employees could've showed some sanity and found an off-campus daycare that is on their commute...
Depends on what's available and what the waiting lists are like. Perhaps those prices are pretty standard in which case their subsidised child care was a part of their employment package that just got yanked without any compensation.
Where I live (Sydney Australia), child care's VERY expensive and waiting lists are long. (What's worse is we just had a major child care chain go bust). I have friends whose partners find it not worthwhile to go back to work while the kids aren't yet at school age. That's going to be us in a couple of years.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Google's new york offices have been cutting back on the perks (like free soda, food, etc).
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
Android was supposed to be an open mobile phone OS. But now it seems that it's "open" for reading, not writing or executing. That is, you can look at the source code, but you can't write any changes to your phone. The firmware locks out any OS software that doesn't match the checksum or something. That lockout gives Google control of the Android OS, which means the phones are not open, and Google can even lock out apps it doesn't like, or keep features like remote shutdown (by Google, not by you), even if you want to delete that "feature".
How about Google just opens the Android platform, by allowing the phones to run even altered Android OS versions? Then I'll start believing Google when it claims to "open" some other platform even more likely to stay closed, because it runs on their own hardware, not mine.
--
make install -not war
Google has been opening up their platform already; App Engine gives developers (some) access to GFS, BigTable, auto-scaling magic, etc.
Well, it's not the OS's fault when the hardware (aka the phone) won't accept altered versions.
Note that in the mobile phone business software locks are the norm - and for a reason: branding. Without the ability to brand phones many network providers won't sell the phone for a subsidised price. Branding if course needs to be sufficiently complicated to remove. And shall consist of more the a start-up screen. Orange for example likes to remove the ability to use mp3 as ring tone - so you need to buy ring toned from - you guessed it - orange.
So Google is between the devil and the deep blue see here. Without software lock down no subsidised phones which in case of a smart phone means a â1000 price tag. Which in turn means: very few customers.
Of course I can see a way out of it: Developers edition phone for everyone who is prepared to pay the unsubsidised price to get total freedom and end user edition with the needed lock downs.
Usually developers editions (at least for Windows Mobile, Symbian etc. pp.) are only available to those you can prove that they are full time mobile phone developers and sign NDA's on top of it.
Martin
If whatever they are going to open up (didn't RTFA) is as open as Android, it will only be open to you if you are a large company that has the money to manufacture . To the rest of us, it will be as open as an iPhone.
After Android, I don't hold my breath when Google promise anything open. I'll believe them again when they open-source Google Earth or something.
google never opened nothing and never will.
search api? good luck finding usefull places using it with the daily limits they impose. all they do is open up spots on their apps so you could run some widgets.
microsoft came from a time when everyone was locked in IBM mainframes. they were the salviours because they let you use personal computers. now that's freedom! personal computers!
now, everyone is locked in microsoft applications. and google came to the rescue. you can run a widget inside their email and callendar app. now that's freedom!
And what about the little code they open source? that java framework to spit out unreadable javascript... geez. I'm on YUI side on this one.
Yah, I can understand the waiting list problem(which I believe prompted the first price increase). But for 37k/kid they could practically hire individual caregivers even in California.
Around here, that'd get at least 1 caregiver per child plus facilities/consumables costs, but prices around here are much cheaper.
I think whatever "regular" childcare certification you can get around here earns half that and probably has at least a 1 to 5 kid ratio.
I fully agree with you. Of course I quote â while you quote $ and the price difference is more then just exchange rate. Apart from that: yes - yes, would be great.
Ahmm - I quoted EUR 1000 - prices are different here. Basically we get ripped off.
True many telcos don't use SIM-locks here - at least for contracts. The do use SIM lock for prepaid. And they might still disable mp3 ring tones.
The later being a real pain - SIM-locks are easily hacked - and must be removed upon request (for a small fee that is.).
Martin
it's actually 57K/year/child. The new child care facility has around 230 sq ft per child available (far larger than the space I got as a kid in day care). The setup was introduced by Sergey Brin's sister-in-law, Susan Wojcicki. And the upset employees are indeed taking their children elsewhere, according to this article.
I wish Google realizes this difference.
I'd like to buy homeland for our 10 million people. http://twitter.com/mahadiga