A top-secret lab called Google X is tackling a list of 100 “shoot-for-the-stars” ideas, including an elevator to outer space, a refrigerator connected to the Internet that orders groceries as they run out, and robots that serve a variety of tasks.
A Google worker familiar with the project likened it to how the CIA is mysteriously run. “In interviews, a dozen people discussed the list; some work at the lab or elsewhere at Google, and some have been briefed on the project,” reports The New York Times. “But none would speak for attribution because Google is so secretive about the effort that many employees do not even know the lab exists.”
Most of the ideas are only conceptual at this point, but others may eventually see the light of day. One idea that may reach the public involves driverless cars. It would not only provide a new business for Google, but promote the company’s navigation or information technology for cars as well as location-based ads.
Additional ideas in development include ways of connecting objects to the Internet, such as a garden planter that could be watered remotely, a coffee pot set to brew from another location, or a light bulb that could communicate wirelessly with Android devices.
Facebook launched its Open Compute Project as an effort to open-source the technology of its 147,000-square-foot data center that opened in Oregon in April.
“It published blueprints for everything from the power supplies of its computers to the super-efficient cooling system of the building,” reports MIT’s Technology Review. “Other companies are now cherry-picking ideas from those designs to cut the costs of building similar facilities for cloud computing.”
Although the concept of sharing designs and allowing other companies to build similar cloud-computing facilities at a lower cost may seem altruistic, it also serves as “an attempt to manipulate the market for large-scale computing infrastructure in Facebook’s favor,” suggests the article.
“The company hopes to encourage hardware suppliers to adopt its designs widely, which could in turn drive down the cost of the server computers that deal with the growing mountain of photos and messages posted by its 750 million users,” explains Technology Review. “Just six months after the project’s debut, there are signs that the strategy is working and that it will lower the costs of building — and hence using — cloud computing infrastructure for other businesses, too.”
Frank Frankovsky, Facebook’s technical operations director and a founding member of the Open Compute Project, notes that the project opens the flow of ideas necessary to improve cloud technology. He is encouraging others to contribute new ideas and improvements to the current designs.