Enthuses Larry Page.
The link on Calico goes to:
We’re tackling aging, one of life’s greatest mysteries.Interesting word selection, Executing. This better not be the death panels sneaking in. Buzzphrases to watch out for: 1. controlling lifespan, 2. longer and healthier. You may look at "longer and healthier" and focus on longer, but I see longer linked to healthier and feel that there is some unknown algorithm wherein the desirability of length relates to a degree of healthiness.
Calico is a research and development company whose mission is to harness advanced technologies to increase our understanding of the biology that controls lifespan. We will use that knowledge to devise interventions that enable people to lead longer and healthier lives. Executing on this mission will require an unprecedented level of interdisciplinary effort and a long-term focus for which funding is already in place.
Don't let your enthusiasm outrun your skepticism.
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18 comments:
If I were a Google shareholder, I would be angered and/or just sell. You have these segments that can generate huge cash flows and you then take this cash pile and invest it in high-risk ventures that Brin and Page like. So just split the company in two. Those who just to own Google are happy with a bigger valuation and those who want "the future" can invest in it. No? It's not going to happen? Because the rest of the Alphabet would be a cash sucking loser with little investor enthusiasm. They are forcing Google shareholders to invest in their crap in order to have a piece of the real prize.
I'm still waiting for my Invisiray gun that makes what you shoot invisible. It was being sold in the back of a comic book I read 40 years ago.
Calico cats are all female.
Is there a company for internet porn, is the question.
Former Google spokesman Melissa Mayer was doing the radio interview rounds hawking features of Google search, probably a response to Bing. Armstrong and Getty (San Francisco) took a little of the boilerplate about variations on search requests before telling her that they'd just tried Melissa Mayer nude and came up with no results.
There followed an angry email from Google, A&G reported in the next segment. Don't be a boring interview, was their answer.
Reorganizing is the traditional move of a failing company.
Another is opening a "Center of Excellence." Watch for it.
As for shareholders, they're buying the management to direct the cash into productive places, or to dividends if there aren't productive places.
lgv,
I'm a Google shareholder, and I'm not going to sell even a fraction of a share. I guess we view their model and their future quite differently.
Reorganizing is good. The rebranding is odd and likely a mistake.
It's also a pun, that gives a clue to the purpose of the reorganization. Alphabet is a "bet on alpha" (in the financial sense of the word).
"features of Google search, probably a response to Bing."
I've long since gone to Bing. I can't even remember when or why. I just like it and trust it better.
Larry Page is spouting a lot of standard bland corporate blah-blah, and the New York Times is playing along.
I think they siloed their business operations under the aegis of a new corporation with an unfamiliar name for only one reason: To protect the Google brand. They are getting into more speculative businesses, and they don't want any failure (such as their Motorola mobile handset business, which they sold to Lenovo) to be known as "a Google failure." They want that goose to continue laying golden eggs, and they will do everything they can to keep it healthy.
I hate to see such an useful word trademarked...
rhhardin said...
Calico cats are all female.
Or I suppose they could be Kleinfelter Kats.
If enthusiasm did not outrun skepticism, we'd all be living in dark cold caves.
Or maybe under bushes, because there were bears in the caves.
Somebody had to be the first to run a bear out of a cave.
That took enthusiasm waaaaayyyy beyond skepticism.
@Scott,
Yep, agree with every word you said.
And the Google failures are starting to pile up, aren't they?
Here's what I'm curious about: under the Google aegis, all this risky ventures can be financed internally by simply moving the "profits" from one operation to the other more speculative operation. Thus, they become tax write-offs as "losses" for Google. If the speculative ventures are external, the profits must be declared, taxed, & then the money invested. It's a lot more public & thus more under the watchful eye of the tax man. I guess, for whatever reasons, Google management decided it was better to preserve brand integrity rather than have a ready-cash cow for the more speculative ventures under the Google aegis.
Alphabet is an intentionally bad name for the company formerly known as Google.
My skepticism has a 10-year head start.
This is fucking idiotic.
What's interesting is how often this fails. Mergers and name changed don't have a good track record. Name changes in particular, are often a sign that a company is hiding some serious trouble.
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