"Google Inc. and its wealthy founders are known in business circles for their fixation on fanciful vessels — from the self-driving car to hot air balloons that provide high altitude Internet connections. The founders even have their own private air force.
And now it looks like the company is launching its own navy.
Bobbing in the harbor of Portland, Maine, is a barge stacked four stories high with shipping containers that are being converted into a single floating building of some kind, the work done under an extraordinary cloak of secrecy that itself is a hallmark of Google’s many research projects." ~ Hiawatha Bray
This morning I stumbled upon an article in The Boston Globe about how Google is working on something in secrecy in the harbor of Portland, Maine. The project is drawing a lot of attention through the media, and I am very curious to what Google has to offer. The company has grown tremendously over the years, and is the clear arch-rival of Apple Inc. This could be a message to the world and especially Apple stating,"Hey, look at me, we are doing something extraordinary."
"In his new book titled “Dogfight,” about the ferocious competition between Google and Apple, author Fred Vogelstein writes that Google developed its Android mobile phone software under security so tight that the restrictions angered other Google employees. For example, Google built a cafeteria that for a time was open only to employees working on Android.
Some of Google’s tightlipped ways rival those of Apple, which is infamous for developing its new products under the tightest of secrecy." ~Hiawatha Bray
This quote I find the most intriguing in this piece, because it further establishes the sense of rivalry between these two company giants. Google is partaking in Apple's tight security motto, even going as far as building a cafeteria for a time only to employees working on Android, which I think is just crazy.
Also, reading through this article I was amazed to find out just what Google has been and plans to be working on in the near future:
1) Glass, which is in use by several thousand testers and software developers. The device sports a small glass cube above the right eye that is the computer’s screen, or monitor, with a tiny video camera adjacent. The eyeglass arm along the right temple acts as a slender trackpad, and Glass also responds to voice commands.
2) Project Loon, the proposal calls for a floating communications network made up of hot air balloons about 15 miles above portions of the Earth without reliable Internet connections, such as Africa.
3) Google Lunar XPrize, a competition with awards in the millions of dollars to teams that develop robots and vehicles that can travel on the moon, as well as pursuits in ocean- and land-based exploration and transportation.
4) “Space elevator.” Just as it sounds, this involves a tethered vehicle that can ferry people and freight to and from outer space, and it has long captured the imagination of fantasists and futurists.
This article was really insightful, and it brought my attention to just how technology is evolving. Big companies like Google, are continuing to strive to make the "next big thing", and with ideas like vehicles that can travel on the moon, in the ocean and a "space elevator" is just unbelievable. The questions is, what is Apple going to do?
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