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Friday, January 06, 2006

Waiting for Google Cube (or a PC Like It)

The rumored "Google PC" announcement has not materialized, but the time for a networked computer with an alternative operating system is right. Here’s why.

By Eric Hellweg
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Earlier this week, the buzz at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was that Larry Page, Google’s cofounder and president of products, would be unveiling a low-cost, Google-branded, networked PC. The device even had a nickname: the “Google Cube.”

The rumor, first circulated by pundit Robert X. Cringely, and expounded upon by the L.A. Times this week, centered around a computer running a nonMicrosoft operating system and featuring only a minimum of native, or desktop-based applications, relying instead on applications available on the Internet. Most of the intelligence and applications for the unit (word processing, spreadsheets, Internet, etc.) would reside online.

Google quashed those rumors yesterday, though, and reports in the Wall Street Journal and elsewhere now indicate that the company will instead announce a downloadable video service and "Google Pack" -- a handful of media-centric applications.

But, despite its recent no-show, many people believe a device like "Google Cube" will arrive someday, from Google or another company. And despite conventional wisdom that launching a low-cost, commodity-like PC is a fool’s errand, there’s a lot that makes sense about a cheap, network-centric computer, whether it’s a Google product or not.

Certainly, the strategy of selling low-cost -- or no-cost -- PCs to jumpstart interest in more lucrative programs is not new. Nor has it been particularly successful. Larry Ellison’s mid-1990s Net PC was one of the first mainstream efforts to put the intelligence in the network and return to an era of “dumb terminals.” Later, in the late 1990s, Internet service providers such as Empire.net gave away PCs in exchange for lengthy memberships. In 1999, Free-PC, a company launched by dot-com incubator IdeaLab, gave away PCs in exchange for user's agreeing to have the margins of the computer screen occupied by banner ads. None of these attempts survived the dot-com implosion.

When asked in 2002 by Wired News to name his biggest mistake of the bubble-era, Bill Gross, the erstwhile CEO of IdeaLab, responded: “FreePC was one of my worst ideas.” But showing prescience even in the depth of the post-bubble fallout, Gross went on to envision "some point where there is a device that will give you some access but will be advertising-supported.”

That time might well be now. Recent advances in software, combined with a resurgence in online advertising and widespread adoption of broadband access, make it so. The most lucrative advertising online today, on a pure cost-per-thousand basis (the basic unit of determining how much a single online ad costs), is the ads surrounding video snippets. This form factor wasn’t viable in the late 1990s -- broadband connections didn’t reach enough homes. And until around three years ago, the online ad market was still struggling to reach its pre-bubble highs.
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Comments

  • And why? Because the world needs this!
    Guest (Mike Lisanke) on 01/06/2006 at 10:31 AM
    Posts:
    1
    I have been arguing this point around the office. A network computer does not have to be cheap. It only needs to be completely secure (i.e. un-infectable) while still allowing its user to retain their own non-network data. When it does this, it will sell like hotcakes to all the network paranoids like myself who still absolutely need the Internet.
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • And why? Because the world needs this!
    Guest (Mike Lisanke) on 01/06/2006 at 10:31 AM
    Posts:
    1
    I have been arguing this point around the office. A network computer does not have to be cheap. It only needs to be completely secure (i.e. un-infectable) while still allowing its user to retain their own non-network data. When it does this, it will sell like hotcakes to all the network paranoids like myself who still absolutely need the Internet.
    Rate this comment: 12345
    • completely secure?
      Guest (Eric Hellweg) on 01/06/2006 at 11:00 AM
      Posts:
      1
      Im not sure its possible to have a networked-computer thats &quotcompletely secure&quot, but certainly, offering open-source and non-MS software is a way to offer better security.
      Rate this comment: 12345
      • Check Out Sun Ray
        Guest (Paul Nauman) on 01/06/2006 at 11:56 AM
        Posts:
        1
        Several large service providers have been looking at Suns ultra-thin clients, called Sun Rays (http://www.sun.com/desktop/index.jsp?tab=1), as potential consumer devices. They are secure, zero-maintenance and cheap. Maybe their time has come.
        Rate this comment: 12345
      • Google works on 100$ laptop
        Guest (Charbax) on 01/06/2006 at 12:56 PM
        Posts:
        1
        Which will not only ship to hundreds of millions of children in developping countries, it will see for 200$ in developped countries, and will probably exist with larger screen for 300€ and as a desktop computer for 200€. 3ghz power stations and Windows vista fancy animated interfaces is not needed for the average internet user, for some profetionnals maybe, but average just need a simple thus fast computer experience.
        Rate this comment: 12345
      • Check Out Sun Ray
        Guest (Paul Nauman) on 01/06/2006 at 11:56 AM
        Posts:
        1
        Several large service providers have been looking at Suns ultra-thin clients, called Sun Rays (http://www.sun.com/desktop/index.jsp?tab=1), as potential consumer devices. They are secure, zero-maintenance and cheap. Maybe their time has come.
        Rate this comment: 12345
      • Google works on 100$ laptop
        Guest (Charbax) on 01/06/2006 at 12:56 PM
        Posts:
        1
        Which will not only ship to hundreds of millions of children in developping countries, it will see for 200$ in developped countries, and will probably exist with larger screen for 300€ and as a desktop computer for 200€. 3ghz power stations and Windows vista fancy animated interfaces is not needed for the average internet user, for some profetionnals maybe, but average just need a simple thus fast computer experience.
        Rate this comment: 12345
    • completely secure?
      Guest (Eric Hellweg) on 01/06/2006 at 11:00 AM
      Posts:
      1
      Im not sure its possible to have a networked-computer thats &quotcompletely secure&quot, but certainly, offering open-source and non-MS software is a way to offer better security.
      Rate this comment: 12345
  • A paradigm shift is desktop computing!
    Guest (Mahalie) on 01/06/2006 at 3:23 PM
    Posts:
    1
    What is really exciting about this possibility for me, (aside from the widespread-availability of a positive first-time computing experience for new users, no more software upgrade installs, less hardware reliance in general, hopefully the end of the blue screens of death!?), is how a Googlish OS would behave.  Could this be the end of the hierarchical filesystem?
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • Bring on the google cube!
    Guest (edsbee) on 01/06/2006 at 4:55 PM
    Posts:
    1
    as one of the lucky 10,000 who recd a freepc.com
    i would welcome a portable device
    for email, directions,movie start times etc...
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • Google Cube
    Guest (saas) on 01/08/2006 at 1:58 AM
    Posts:
    1
    The industry beens stretching for this shift for about 8 years, any other companies planning to execute or make good on the anticipated paradigm shift?
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • Dumb terminals on the street
    Guest (The P-man) on 01/08/2006 at 8:18 PM
    Posts:
    1
    Not many would choose a dumb terminal over a PC for their home but theres one place where a disabled internet terminal surrounded and funded by local targeted advertising would be of enormous use and thats on street corners. How many times you been late with no phone number or forgot directions and had to search for the nearest internet cafe and pay for 30 minutes to check 1 email that takes 20 seconds? Until we all have PDAs with internet access I wish these were more common. Just a thought.
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • And why? Because the world needs this!
    Guest (Mike Lisanke) on 01/06/2006 at 10:31 AM
    Posts:
    1
    I have been arguing this point around the office. A network computer does not have to be cheap. It only needs to be completely secure (i.e. un-infectable) while still allowing its user to retain their own non-network data. When it does this, it will sell like hotcakes to all the network paranoids like myself who still absolutely need the Internet.
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • A paradigm shift is desktop computing!
    Guest (Mahalie) on 01/06/2006 at 3:23 PM
    Posts:
    1
    What is really exciting about this possibility for me, (aside from the widespread-availability of a positive first-time computing experience for new users, no more software upgrade installs, less hardware reliance in general, hopefully the end of the blue screens of death!?), is how a Googlish OS would behave.  Could this be the end of the hierarchical filesystem?
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • Bring on the google cube!
    Guest (edsbee) on 01/06/2006 at 4:55 PM
    Posts:
    1
    as one of the lucky 10,000 who recd a freepc.com
    i would welcome a portable device
    for email, directions,movie start times etc...
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • Google Cube
    Guest (saas) on 01/08/2006 at 1:58 AM
    Posts:
    1
    The industry beens stretching for this shift for about 8 years, any other companies planning to execute or make good on the anticipated paradigm shift?
    Rate this comment: 12345
  • Dumb terminals on the street
    Guest (The P-man) on 01/08/2006 at 8:18 PM
    Posts:
    1
    Not many would choose a dumb terminal over a PC for their home but theres one place where a disabled internet terminal surrounded and funded by local targeted advertising would be of enormous use and thats on street corners. How many times you been late with no phone number or forgot directions and had to search for the nearest internet cafe and pay for 30 minutes to check 1 email that takes 20 seconds? Until we all have PDAs with internet access I wish these were more common. Just a thought.
    Rate this comment: 12345
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