
Fake Steve Jobs on Chrome OS - gabrielroth
http://fakesteve.blogspot.com/2009/07/lets-all-take-deep-breath-and-get-some.html
======
enomar
"Because Chrome is shit. Just utter, utter shit. I mean they've got all these
big brains at Google and you'd think they could make a decent fucking browser.
Jesus, the freetards at Mozilla can do it. But not Google. Nope. They gave it
their big best effort and what did they come up with? Chrome. It's a joke."

Seriously? Maybe I'm missing the satire or hyperbole here, but I really don't
see it that way. Chrome on Windows is one of the fastest, most stable browsers
I've ever used. And minus plug-in support, it's getting better on the Mac
every week (I haven't tried the Linux version). When add-on support is added,
I see no argument at all for calling it shit or a joke.

~~~
trezor
I'll just assume the whole SF thing applies to you too on that one. Just like
most people don't give a shit about what OS they use, most people don't really
care about browsers either.

I have never had issues with Firefox, I don't care one bit about Javascript
speed and honestly Chrome is underfeatured to the point where I think I'm
using NCSA Mosaic. I gave it a shot. I was back to Firefox before lunch.

I see there is a hype there, but I just don't get it. The post is clearly
hyperbole and overly sarcastic, but to _me_ and stuff which matters to me,
Chrome actually is shit. I'm not buying it, even though it's free. I might
even go for MSIE before Chrome.

For the same reason, a OS where Chrome is the only browser* would be 100% DOA
on my hardware.

* Rumour has it that Google wants to ditch X. If that is the case, no other GUIed *nix software will run without a rewrite.

~~~
phillmv
All of those criticisms apply to Safari 4, tho.

~~~
cglee
...which is why Safari is also not very popular in the mainstream.*

* [http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/05/since-march-internet-ex...](http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/05/since-march-internet-explorer-lost-114-percent-share-to-firefox-safari-and-chrome/)

------
concretecode
It always amazes me how the best social commentary comes from those who have
the least to lose. Without the artificial constraint of professionalism (or, I
guess, the need to be factually accurate), Lyons somehow manages to be more
honest and credible, not less.

Take his Fake Steve piece on the Microsoft-Yahoo merger:
[http://fakesteve.blogspot.com/2008/02/ballmer-im-
completely-...](http://fakesteve.blogspot.com/2008/02/ballmer-im-completely-
out-of-ideas.html) which I felt was the most succinct and insightful piece on
the subject from any journalist.

~~~
nir
Exactly. If you don't let the style distract you, Fake Steve is actually the
most sensible and sharp tech journalism around. This is the first non-
hyperbole analysis of Google's announcement I've seen today.

My bet is that Chrome OS will have similar impact to the Chrome browser -
encourage everyone to step up their game, but not dominate the market. Google
has a lot of money and a lot of bright people, and it acts just like a bright
person with little financial concerns: It toys with a lot of ideas, many of
them brilliant, but rarely bothers to execute them fully. An OS takes years of
frustrating, boring work to mature, I doubt Google has the focus for that.

~~~
roc
They put years of frustrating, boring work into Google search, Maps, Mail,
Chat, Calendar, Reader, etc.

Why should we doubt their ability to stick with a Linux Windowing and
Usability project? This 'Google is unfocused. Google doesn't follow through.
Google leaves projects to rot' meme is particularly annoying, because there is
so little evidence that it happens to anything on a significant scale.

Several of their large acquisitions have appeared to be neglected, but each
and every time that I can recall, it's been a seeming public neglect followed
by the introduction of the 2.0 successor.

Case in point: if you think their social networking acquisitions are being
left to rot, vs their energy being focused on new services that integrate with
WAVE, I've got a bridge to sell you.

~~~
nir
There's also Froogle, Google Notebook, Blog search, Google Video and there's
still no way to delete a GAE app... My view is that, unlike what much of the
media seems to assume, Google and other huge companies aren't executing some
secret Harry Seldon-like plans to conquer the universe - they just do a lot of
stuff, sometimes it works and sometimes not. (Eg: Sun paying $1b for MySQL.
Conde Nast paying actual money for Reddit's "Crowd wisdom". Bebo acquisition
and most everything else AOL does.)

As for their social networking acquisitions vs WAVE, I'm completely ignorant
on both (and expect to remain so, along with most of humanity).

But my main point isn't Google, but FSJ's tech coverage. Between Techcrunch &
co hysteria and The Register's empty cynicism, I think FSJ's piece remains the
best analysis of the Chrome OS announcement yet.

~~~
roc
Froogle's been continually updated, even if it's not very good it appears to
be as good as comparable products. And blog search is largely integrated now.
(One wonders if it's worthwhile to maintain the distinction at all, now that
Google's algorithm has a better 'understanding' of blog-style posts and
links.)

Google Video and Notebook are good examples of projects that seem to linger
and rot, but are in fact just having their energy devoted to their successors.
Google Video development is being channeled into Youtube updates and Notebook
into WAVE-based document creation.

And the only reason I didn't respond to your comment about FSJ's analysis is I
agree with you 100% on that. Lyons' is without a doubt the most insightful and
interesting commentary thus far.

I just think the 'Google is unfocused/fickle/etc' meme needs to be approached
critically and put out to pasture if it's found wanting. (which i believe it
is)

------
cnlwsu
"nobody uses Chrome" [http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser-ww-
daily-20090708-2009070...](http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser-ww-
daily-20090708-20090708-bar) losing to safari by .05? I understand its a
joke... I just didn't laugh. They also say they are planing on starting with
netbooks, not only targeting netbooks. I do think its a good niche market to
target first though since there isn't as much of a dominance and since
netbooks target low prices, removing the windows cost might make it a better
seller.

All and all I think google and apple use different marketing strategies, so
perhaps Jobs wouldn't understand googles strategies. Is interesting that
although google makes 60% the total revenue (2008) their gross profit is very
close.

~~~
access_denied
The joke is to portray Steve Jobs as someone who doesn't respect Adsense as a
product.

------
jodrellblank
Microsoft is shipping Windows 7 without a web browser in the EU, after several
years of legal fuss largely because they bundled a browser with their OS.

I wonder if Google will consider shipping Chrome OS without a web browser in
the EU?

~~~
Andys
I seriously doubt Google will be charging any money for Chrome.

~~~
brentb
So? Microsoft has never charged for any version of IE.

~~~
Andys
I meant Chrome OS.

If MS Windows is given away for free on new laptops, by filling the OS with
banner ads and then bribing manufacturers to bundle it, would the EU still
require IE to be removed?

------
mingyeow
For people who hate this article, can you please share why you hate it instead
of just saying it sucks?

It was meant to stir things up obviously, but I thought that the various
points brought up were really valid.

~~~
akkartik
The biggest point in my mind:

"You also may not have noticed, but nobody uses Chrome. I mean think about it.
Do you know anyone who uses Chrome? Really?"

Aside from the stat-based argument
(<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=694756>): I've been repeatedly surprised
by the non-technical people around me who are on Chrome. My girlfriend
downloaded it literally the day it came out, when I had read just a blog post
or two about it. My parents, various friends' parents, the list just goes on
and on, and none of them are nerds. It's startling how effortlessly Chrome has
permeated public consciousness.

I don't hate the article, but I think fake steve jobs has jumped the shark.

~~~
redcap
It still has a pretty mediocre takeup rate, regardless of the people around
you that are using it. The latest stats I've seen (posted on HN) have been
that Chrome is less used than Safari. FF seems to be the bigger winner at the
cost of IE.

~~~
akkartik
Dude, how long has each been around to grab marketshare? Chrome is absolutely
meteoric when you divide by time.

------
zandorg
This is very well written (which is defined as not quitting after the first 3
paragraphs) and the first FSJ post I've read.

------
teamonkey
I'm firm in my belief that at least one of the main reasons for Chrome was to
kick things up in the browser market, rather than a serious attempt to grab
browser market share. "Look, you're doing it all wrong, just give it here a
moment... ok, you can have it back now." And it worked - Apple, Microsoft and
Mozilla all scrambled to include some, if not all of the features that
identified Chrome, which were the features that made it use Google's services
more effectively.

I'm fairly sure that a part of this (and, to a lesser extent, Android) is a
similar deal.

~~~
zmimon
I would have agreed with you once, but I changed my mind since Google started
advertising Chrome like crazy. You can hardly use a Google service these days
without having Chrome suggested to you somewhere prominently. It seems like
Google is really pushing Chrome to the mainstream. Whatever their reasons,
they _really_ do want to capture a significant portion of the market for it.

~~~
dgreensp
It's a long way to "capturing a significant portion of the market".

What they _can_ do is reach some of the Internet users in dire need of an
upgrade, like IE 6 users who trust the Google name, and get them to use a
reasonable browser.

Not that that explains why Google had to invent their own browser. But their
target market was average Internet users, so they might as well try to get
them to run it.

------
dannyr
I wasn't sure if this is article should be taken seriously.

He pointed out that Google is targeting netbooks. He himself stated 11 million
netbooks were sold last year and will be 39 million this year. The netbook
category is a growing market that it would probably account to a substantial
share in a few years.

Another is that "Chrome is shit." He probably has never used Chrome. I used
the browser exclusively now unless I have a need to use Firebug in which I use
Firefox instead.

I guess he's trying to be funny but he fell way short.

~~~
jcl
It was written so that the reader can take any given point and either embrace
it as brilliant insight or disregard it as satirical Fake Steve humor.

I mean, the end of the piece entirely contradicts the earlier points... If
Chrome OS is pointless and ineffectual -- occupying market niches that Apple
isn't even interested in -- why should Fake Steve feel so threatened by it?

(BTW, he claims the 39 million netbook figure in the article is for the next
_four_ years, not next year, implying that the netbook market is minuscule
compared to desktops, laptops, and phones.)

------
omnipresent1
some of it actually makes sense. how is google going to make money from this?

~~~
blhack
I know that I'm probably wrong.

Sergey Brin and Larry Page are _neeeerdddssss_ , not business school kids that
decided to make a web app.

There is a good chance that they're doing this just because it's really really
cool, and because they can. I imagine that if I ever had the sort of cash that
they have, I would be doing the same thing that I do on the weekends NOW, but
on a larger scale: geekery.

Building a linux distro is geekery of the highest order. Good for them. Google
makes billions and billions of dollars from their other projects. This is one
that they can figure out later. :). (or I can figure it out for them now:
adsense, lots of it.)

I understand that google is a publicly traded company; they have shareholders
to answer to, but I imagine that all they have to do is point at their
earnings and go "trust us, guys...trust us".

If anything, this will drive more traffic to their moneymakers.

~~~
Raphael_Amiard
There is probably some truth in what you say, albeit i wouldn't go so far to
say that they're just nerds. They're business nerds, or they wouldn't be where
they are today.

Also, i'd really appreciate if people would stop calling it a "linux distro".
It makes as much sense than to call OS X a "BSD Distro"

------
robotron
Guess I'm the only one that finds this not very funny.

~~~
seiji
Maybe one is not enlightened enough to fully understand its brilliance?

"Ours started out 20 years ago, at NeXT. You could say it goes back to 1977,
with the BSD guys. Heck, you could even say it goes back to 1969 with Dennis
Thompson and Lionel Ritchie."

~~~
robotron
I "get" it, but the delivery falls flat like a stand-up comedian that makes
the audience uncomfortable because no one is laughing. At least that's how it
is in my head.

------
RK
I know that Google says that GCOS is "aimed at Netbooks", but I'm sure that
that's supposed to be just the _initial_ target platform. So I think that the
criticism that the netbook market is so small as to be meaningless will turn
out to be moot.

Also, the precedent for this is probably the SplashTop and the (upcoming)
Crunchpad.

------
freetard
> Linus Tordalv started working on Linux back in 1991 when he was a high
> school student in his native Denmark. That's nearly twenty years ago, and
> the shit still doesn't run right

That's kind of ironic when you that his own blog on blogspot runs on linux.

~~~
mingyeow
he probably means as a desktop OS. UI for a complex system like the OS is
incredibly hard to nail

------
raheemm
Google's approach vs. MS or Apple's approach to product development offer an
interesting contrast - feature rich apps vs. feature-poor but
faster/stabler/simpler apps. Betting on a faster/stables/simpler OS is a
worthy and possibly successful endeavor. Atleast it offers another
alternative.

------
DomesticMouse
The thing that is bothering me about the Fake Steve Jobs piece is that Google
aren't creating a new operating system. It's Linux, tuned for the tablet
environment. If anyone knows about tuning Linux, it's the Google engineers,
they tune Linux for millions of machines.

------
DomesticMouse
Why is everyone assuming that this is supposed to be a full computer? It
isn't. It's an internet portal tablet. It is optimised for a purpose - getting
the browser on the screen with the smallest amount of intermediate steps as
possible.

------
chaostheory
If chrome OS takes away another 1 or 2% of IE usage, that's a big enough of a
win for google and everyone else

------
rjurney
I love Fake Steve. I'm so glad he's back. If only the real Steve were so
forthcoming.

------
geirfreysson
Fake Steve: "First of all, nobody seems to appreciate how goddamn hard it is
to make an operating system."

From the Google blog: "[GOS is Chrome running] within a new windowing system
on top of a Linux kernel"

So they're not building an OS from scratch. Did Fake Steve even read the post?

------
webwright
That is, quite literally, one of the better things on the Internet.

------
johng
I made a rebuttal to the Fake Steve Jobs on my Chrome OS blog here...

[http://www.chrome-os-blog.com/fake-steve-jobs-on-googles-
chr...](http://www.chrome-os-blog.com/fake-steve-jobs-on-googles-chrome-
os-73/)

