Google Reader is a simple example: Googl had by far the most popular RSS reader, and they just threw it away. A single intern could have kept the whole thing running, and Google has literal billions, but they couldn't see the value in it.
I mean, it's not like being able to see what a good portion of America is reading every day could have any value for an AI company, right?
Google has always been terrible about turning tech into (viable, maintained) products.
See also: any programming thread and Rust.
Therefore we now have “Vinkel’s Law”
Reader had to be killed because it [was seen as] a suboptimal ad monetization engine. Page views were superior.
Was Google going to support minimizing ads in any way?
https://www.wsj.com/finance/jeffrey-epstein-advised-sergey-b...
On a similar topic, it is worth mentioning the entrepreneurs that are forced into sex (or let’s say, very pushed) by VCs.
For those who feel safe or taking it as a joke, this affects women AND men.
Some people are going to be disappointed about their heroes.
On the positive side, if you don’t care, you may see it as a good trade.
I always thought they deliberately tried to contain the genie in the bottle as long as they could
I think they were worried that releasing a product like ChatGPT only had downside risks for them, because it might mess up their money printing operation over in advertising by doing slurs and swears. Those sweet summer children: little did they know they could run an operation with a seig-heiling CEO who uses LLMs to manufacture and distribute CSAM worldwide, and it wouldn't make above-the-fold news.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LaMDA#Sentience_claims
[2] https://research.google/blog/lamda-towards-safe-grounded-and...