So, check this out, guys. Google, one of the biggest tech giants ever, is turning 25 this month. Can you believe it? I mean, I’ve got a few more years on it, but still, that’s quite an achievement. Back in ’98, when Larry Page and Sergey Brin started this whole thing, Google was just a search engine. Yeah, imagine that. And get this, it actually lived in a freakin’ garage! Who would’ve thought it would become what it is today?
We all know how well that search engine worked out. I mean, it’s been 17 years since “Google” officially became a verb in the dictionary. I remember the BBC having a whole discussion about whether they should use it on-air because it could be seen as a free advert for the company. It’s crazy to think how much it has grown since then.
Now, this company, which is now called Alphabet, has got its hands in pretty much every area of tech you can think of. They’ve got email, smartphones, software, hardware, driverless cars, digital assistants, and of course, YouTube. They’ve even acquired a bunch of other companies and products along the way. But, hey, not everything has worked out for them. According to the Killed by Google website, they’ve retired a whopping 288 projects, including stuff like their gaming platform Stadia and that budget VR headset, Google Cardboard.
So, here’s the million-dollar question: can Google maintain its dominance in the world of artificial intelligence? Some folks have been saying that they’ve fallen behind. In fact, there was a leaked memo from a Google engineer who straight-up said that they had no “secret sauce” when it comes to AI and that they’re not in a position to win the race. Ouch.
But here’s the thing, guys. Have you heard of this AI chatbot called ChatGPT? It took the world by storm in 2022 and really impressed a lot of people. Created by OpenAI, this chatbot became known as the “Google killer” because it can answer your questions in one go, no need to scroll through search results. Microsoft even invested billions in OpenAI and is using it in their own products. But when Google tried to compete with their own AI called Bard, it just didn’t have the same impact. Talk about a missed opportunity.
Now, before Bard even came into the picture, there was this whole weird situation with another Google AI called Lamda. One of the engineers who worked on it claimed that it was actually sentient and shared real emotions and thoughts. Yeah, crazy stuff. But Google denied it, saying that Lamda was just doing what it was trained to do – generate human-like text. The engineer got fired, of course, but it caused quite a stir and made people even more worried about AI.
But here’s the thing, guys. Don’t count Google out just yet. Analysts believe that they still have a lot of potential in AI. They might have missed the boat in some areas, but there’s still room for them to shine. One analyst even said that they’re gearing up to lead in the “Generative AI economy.” And let’s not forget about Google’s cloud business. That could be their secret weapon. They’ve got access to massive networks of computers and processing power, which most companies can only dream of. So, even though they might be the smallest of the big cloud providers, they still pack a punch.
So, yeah, Google might have some competition in the AI game, but don’t underestimate them. If they can just get a fraction of their AI products to embed themselves in the market, they should be able to keep on rollin’.
