The Google I/O 2024 keynote is over, and for those who’re excited about new methods Google can inject AI into its merchandise, you most likely suppose you need to see it for those who missed it. Actually, you do not.
The cool new options and merchandise are there. The issue is they’re buried below probably the most boring and technical I/O keynote presentation ever. Until you are a developer who makes use of Google merchandise and the Google ecosystem, it simply wasn’t for you.
Usually, I’d be the primary to level out that Google I/O is a developer convention that’s meant for builders to find out about improvement. That is true, and for those who match this description, it’s best to discover a technique to expertise it at the very least as soon as. On that entrance, Google I/O is wonderful.
However this was the keynote presentation. The a part of the week that’s alleged to get the “common Joe and Jane” excited in regards to the future in order that they need to make use of the cool new merchandise builders could make utilizing all the brand new stuff.
Mix that with the truth that numerous individuals attending are there as press or influencers, and it makes the entire thing look actually bizarre this time. Members of the tech press are there to inform you about cool new telephones and the way Google is making issues higher, not clarify the variations between Gemini 7b and Gemini 2b.
In the event you slogged via it, you probably did see some cool, even futuristic stuff. Privateness issues apart, Google can now combine into your life in methods it could not earlier than and even be helpful. An instance is Google’s Venture Astra remembering the place a pair of glasses had been sitting. The times of a misplaced distant management are over as soon as this goes stay.
For each good instance, although, we heard a phrase salad of issues that “regular” individuals simply do not care about. Telling builders about multimodal inputs or that they’ve entry to 2 million tokens is ok. Telling everybody about it’s foolish as a result of nearly no person cares, or most may not even perceive what it means.
Common individuals, and doubtless shareholders, too, aren’t excited about how the fudge is made. We solely care in regards to the outcomes, whether or not they’re helpful enhancements, new merchandise, or new income streams for Google itself. In my previous life, I spent manner an excessive amount of time attempting to get computer systems and cameras to acknowledge the issues they had been seeing, and having this degree of tech would have been wonderful. However even I ended being about 20 minutes into this system.
The present began proper, with Pichai telling individuals how Google has spent billions of {dollars} and over 10 years engaged on AI and its infrastructure. Google is competing with firms like OpenAI and will remind us that Google has an enormous benefit in the case of expertise and scale. It is how Google will “win” the AI race as soon as all of the mud settles.
It additionally ended proper. Understanding about how Google is managing the dangers that include AI and what its rules are. That is extra necessary than the merchandise themselves and Google has to guide by instance as a result of it’s about to dump AI on everybody who makes use of Google Search.
All the things in between was developer-focused. I do know I do know, developer convention, however the keynote can be alleged to get everybody enthusiastic about what’s coming. Google helped create this example the place a developer convention has morphed right into a press occasion. Abandoning the concept appears short-sighted.
That is not going to occur, and you are going to have to attend to see how any of these things issues in the case of you.
