
Why Google Doesn’t Have a Research Lab - sherjilozair
http://www.technologyreview.com/news/525506/why-google-doesnt-have-a-research-lab/
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awalton
Google doesn't need a designated "lab space" because Google _is_ a laboratory.

It might be different if Google were a chemical engineering company, but it's
not. It's a software engineering company. Anywhere they've got computer
scientists, whiteboards and computers is a lab. And that's basically every
building at Google.

~~~
pavanky
You can not say that is always true. Microsoft is a software engineering
company as well, but they do have a dedicated R&D team and offices.

~~~
yeukhon
Just because MS has a separated division doesn't mean Google has to follow. A
lot of the google come out as both product and paper. That's already a
research lab. Why do we bother to discuss this in the first place? I really
don't see any difference in having a dedicated research lab and a place where
research and products are mixed together, true a lot of employees at google
don't publish papers and they do boring works like fixing bugs.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
MS didn't start that trend. Many companies used to have research divisions,
large ones even...HP, Xerox, DEC, intel, Sun, IBM, even Apple had something.
That is almost gone or rapidly shrinking...

~~~
yeukhon
I don't mean to disrespect these companies, but they are much older than
Google. It seems like from the sart Google didn't care about the division.
They knew they always have some "research" going on. Maybe founders'
background was the founding culture.

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marincounty
Working at Google sounds like a Fun time, where you can explore your inner
child--and learn how to make money on ads. I know all the Google employees are
geniuses, but a genius without the right guidance(Scientitists--who could care
less about advertising, just the scientific method) might end up just doing
what Google rewards them for--making money. I applaud Google for letting us
use their API's, but I feel restrictions are coming, along with fees. I'm not
a huge fan of google for one reason; they ruined my Privacy. By the way, you
can get off Google street view by telling them you have security concerns--at
least for now. The minute DuckDuckGo gets a little better--bye to my back
stabbing friend--Google. And yes those Google glasses will make some people
angry(in kid's speak--you just might get a drink thrown at you, and no--even
if they start to make them look like EMO Glasses, some people don't like their
picture taken without their permission.)

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laumars
Sadly the days of asking for permission are long gone. Every day we're
recorded on dozens of CCTV camera, car dash-cams (and similar worn by bikers /
cyclists), traffic cams, police severance cameras (in larger urban towns /
cities) and so on. You can't walk into a single shop nor office without being
recorded. you can't even talk a walk outside, nor a drive, without the chance
of being recorded.

I'm not saying it's right, but that is how it is these days.

~~~
lsiebert
You can blur your face with LEDS if cameras are your major concern. Someone
should make some stylish hats.

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mathattack
This is a big strategic question. Do you want researchers closer to the
market, paid by the person whose P&L they could impact? Or further away, so
they can think longer term?

Other companies go through this a lot. Procter & Gamble used to have
centralized research. To improve time to market, they decentralized research,
and had them report to business unit heads. This was great for singles, but
when they wanted more home runs and cross-category innovation, they
decentralized again.

One can look at Xerox PARC as the penultimate example of the dangers of
isolated innovation labs. They created the technology that everyone else
monetized. AT&T struggled with this somewhat too.

~~~
dwc
Xerox PARC was not dangerous. The danger for Xerox was the different between
seeing an opportunity for the future or a threat to their current business
model. If PARC had never existed, the same things with minor differences would
have happened some years later.

~~~
Retric
The danger was not the invention it was wasting money without realizing the
benefits.

~~~
mathattack
Exactly. They invested in a future that other realized instead of them.

Would it have happened anyways? Who knows, probably.

Who was harmed? Their shareholders, and all the employees who eventually lost
their jobs.

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josefresco
This is purely semantics: "Google’s research boss, Alfred Spector, has a small
core team and no department or building to call his own."

So no department but he has a "small core team" and presumably Alred and his
"small core team" have offices? This is such a non-story...just PR fluff to
make Google appear unique and more "integrated".

Are we actually supposed to believe the "labs" at other tech giants are some
sort of ivory tower that they never leave?

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d3gamer
There is one, it is right above Blaze cafe (1225 Charleston Rd). There's a
huge sign by the visitor's area: "Google Research & Development".

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scott_s
A more in-depth look from the Communications of the ACM, by Alfred Spector,
Peter Norvig and Slav Petrov, "Google's Hybrid Approach to Research":
[http://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2012/7/151226-googles-
hybrid-a...](http://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2012/7/151226-googles-hybrid-
approach-to-research/fulltext)

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jestinjoy1
Then why they have this:
[http://research.google.com/](http://research.google.com/)

``Research at Google is unique. Because so much of what we do hasn't been done
before, the lines between research and development are often very blurred. ''

~~~
SideburnsOfDoom
> Research at Google is unique. Because so much of what we do hasn't been done
> before...

How is that any different from regular research?

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NamTaf
What's Google X if not a research lab?

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hendzen
A playground for extremely smart people they don't want their competitors to
hire.

~~~
nostrademons
X is still very much run by Sergey. On the more experimental projects (i.e.
not Glass or self-driving cars) you have a fair amount of freedom to
experiment, but if Sergey wants something to happen a certain way, it happens
that way.

(For that matter, the rest of the company isn't all that different: you have a
fair amount of freedom to experiment, but if Larry wants something to happen a
certain way, it happens that way.)

~~~
yuhong
BTW, I sent you an email about meeting Larry/Sergey a while ago. I just added
rachelbythebay to the list too.

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z3phyr
Off topic: Can anyone list ongoing software based research projects, that are
critically interesting, preferably in the sphere of compiler design, low level
system software or high performance computing?

~~~
yeukhon
Off topic: Rust from Mozilla is provably the first thing I think of outside of
Google that matches the compiler part.

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romanrage
Well, I think Google should have to make his research lab..Google’s research
lab, Alfred Spector, has a small core team and no department or building to
call his own,according to MIT Technology Review.

