“In a ‘fireside chat’ with leading venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin discuss everything from the moment they nearly sold the company to why they are cautious about moving into health technology,” Ben Lovejoy reports for 9to5Mac. “One interesting angle for Apple fans was how the two contrasted their approach to that of Apple.”
“Brin, who runs Google X, said that the experimental wing of the company was about making a number of bets and hoping that some of them paid off,” Lovejoy reports. “Page contrasted this approach with Apple, which focuses on a very small number of products: ‘I would always have this debate, actually, with Steve Jobs. He’d be like, ‘You guys are doing too much stuff.’ And I’d be like, ‘Yeah that’s true.’ And he was right, in some sense. But I think the answer to that – which I only came to recently, as we were talking about this stuff – is that if you’re doing things that are highly interrelated […] at some point, they have to get integrated.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Disciplined focus beats Our Lady of Perpetual Beta every day of the week, including Sunday – and the bottom line proves it billions of times over.
Translation: We need more stuff to copy!
My first thought, too!!! 🙂
Google sounds like Oliver Twist.
Google, “Please Sir, I want some more!”,
Steve Jobs, ” WHAT! MOOORE?!!!
Just saying…………..
And Google needs to actually SHIP more products.
You mean actually SELL more.
Should have said SHIP & SELL yeah. Short & sweet sometimes just sounds better.
My point of course being Google saying Apple should develop more stuff and then they themselves are just developing but aren’t market anything useful out of all that development. Who’s to say how much stuff is being developed under Apple’s hood just because they don’t brandish it around like Google does? Larry Page just doesn’t know without the Schmidt mole on Apple’s Board.
👍👍👍👍👍
“…“Brin, who runs Google X, said that the experimental wing of the company was about making a number of bets and hoping that some of them paid off,” …”
Translation: “We toss shit out there and see what attracts the most flies.”
What should Apple do, jam out all kinds of garbage, milk it for a year, ignore it for another year or two or three, and finally cancel it?
Then they would have to change their name to Google.
Aperture?
Aperture has been around for nearly 10 years–hardly a beta project.
These two doesn’t give a rats butt if they release buggy beta forever. They have plenty if idiots that uses Google Junk because it’s FREE to experiment in.
These clueless users are willing to sell their private lives because it’s FREE STUFF and they are too stupid to realize the real reason why Google Junk is FREE.
Apple probably does a lot more “experimenting,” but it’s done in secret. Google releases its experiments for public consumption. Apple eventually says “no” to most of its experiments, and the ones that get the rare “yes” are refined for years until they are ready to see daylight.
EXACTLY…
As if apple would even mention how many projects they are actually working on…
I.E… the 64-bit chip surprised people…
Then the METAL ‘G.L.’ and Swift on the software side…
Google is from googol, meaning too many to count!
Then they’re living up to their name.
Of course! Apple should get into sponsored search and web advertising, the current market leader there is prime for disruption, don’t you agree Larry?
So many products and yet when ad revenues drop Google goes running to milk their users for yet more data or screw artists and copyright holders for their hard work.
If you look closely they really just have only have one thing.
Yep. They are peddlers of really shitty “free” stuff that is really poorly disguised advertising-ware. That is IT. Unfortunately, the masses are cheap and stupid, so they eat it up.
Luckily, for those who are not stupid or cheap, there is Apple. I hope Apple someday makes a search engine or buys one (DDG). Then google can wallow in their sea of mediocrity just like the other shit peddler Microsoft.
The ‘gentlemen’ doth protest too much, methinks. Bill S.
Does Larry Page have any brothers or sisters? Steve said do a few things and it well. Larry’s parents must of had many children
I am amazed that western civilization manages to stumble along with symptoms like these two buffoons being regarded as tech leaders.
And yet how many of Google’s “experimentations” actually make it into consumer products? And how many of those ever lose the “beta” label?
Yeah – it’s called focus.
Just because Apple releases a “limited” number of real PRODUCTs, sure as hell does not mean they are trying a tonne of stuff.
Not holding my breath for any cardboard iPhone appliances from Cupertino.
From the header of this title you’d think that L.P. & S.B. were saying something negative about Apple but they were only explaining their business model & future.
Are they seriously pitting Page against Jobs in the ‘vision of technology’ arena? Page isn’t even in the same league!
Plus page is obsessed about Steve jobs.
Stupid glassholes! Who cares what they think?!!
“…the experimental wing of the company was about making a number of bets and hoping that some of them paid off.”
Hope is not a strategy.
(And Google is obviously doing way too many products.)
Quantity * Quality is NOT constant
How did the Moto X and the rest of Motorola’s phone do?
The “Q”, the Google TV, Glass, Nest smoke alarms…..
Google only has ONE real product: Evil… er, I mean Search; which is only made profitable through ridiculous advertising. Everything else from Gmail to Android, Google gives away for free proving that if you aren’t paying for a product, then of course… you are their product. Without its cobblestone, Google is irrelevant. Its search engine is already degrading, as people are slowly waking up to Google’s disrespect for end users privacy. Android will begin to stumble as market vendors like Samsung follow Apple and switch to their own proprietary device operating systems. Gadgets like Google’s watches and the laughing stock that is Google Glass, will go down in history as WTF technology blunders we’ll read about 20 years from now.
…if you’re doing things that are highly interrelated […] at some point, they have to get integrated
Yes. So HOW does this equate to ‘Apple is doing too few products’? It doesn’t. Brin is actually capitulating to Steve Jobs’ comment that Google has been ‘doing too much stuff’ and pointing out that circling the wagons around a core theme is critical.
I haven’t watched the video yet, but I see no critical comments about Apple or any ‘too few products’ rubbish. So HUH? What’s with the incorrect headline here at MDN? Please tell me it’s not click-bait.
I agree. Time to build a search engine.
Glassholes.
Companies that excel only make and supply afew products.
Case in point : Coca Cola – the biggest brand in the world only makes a handful of drinks products.
I run a creative consultancy that only does 3 things. And we do those 3 things exceptionally well and make loads of money.
Apple is a specialist, and the more you specialise the more valuable your brand is.
My previous company failed excuses we thought we could do everything, my new company has been trading 7 years, we offer less services but are more focused on our specific target market and hence make loads of money.
Google is throwing mud at the wall and sees what sticks – this is a common practice of a business that doesn’t know what it is.
In doing so google is wasting billions in cash looking for who they are.
Apple on the other hand know exactly who they are and more importantly who their specific customers are and how to make and sell products to those specific customers.
Haha – there’s a report about Apple how it changed under Tim
Cook (saw it on AppleInsider) and there various people voice their concern that Apple may actually do TOO MUCH.
Google has one thing they do well and that is the search engine – the rest most people could live without and is not worth much talking about.
Their logic would only make sense if they’d ended up having vastly more massive successes than Apple, but they haven’t. Instead they have just spent a load of money on stuff that tends to get cancelled or endlessly rebadged before being cancelled.
Porsche makes too few models. But they seem to be doing ok.
Ferrari makes a few models too. But they too seem to be doing ok.
I could go on, but you get the point.
Read MDN’s take and to be honest says everything I wanted to say. You need balance Apple has been conservative in that regard but now is expanding in a controlled way and is doing so to great the tools for others to add to the ecosystem while still keeping the platform consistent and within its control. Looks good to me, Google far less so as history has generally proved. Conglomerates usually fail or stagnate as they lose focus.
Google is clearly an example of quantity over quality. The exception is search, where they have been the best for a long time.
The difference between Apple and Google is that Google has always seemed to be about money first and product quality second. The Steve Jobs Apple has always seen the money as a byproduct of delivering the best product. The dark years at Apple only happened because people like Gil Amelio focused on the money.
So, they favor the approach of creating tons of products and trusting that they will magically become integrated someday because they are kinda sorta similar vs designing products from day one to be integrated. I understand Google has a different approach to thing, but that fails the “explain it to my 3 year old” test.