Google CEO Larry Page said he's 'sad' that rivals have taken a zero sum approach to Web technologies. (Jonathan Hall/Forbes)
“I think we’re all here because we share a deep sense of optimism about the potential of technology to improve people’s lives and the world,” Page said to the more than 6,000 developers gathered in San Francisco for the company’s three-day technology fest.
“Despite the faster change we have in the industry, we’re still moving slow relative to the opportunities that we have,” Page said. “And some of that I think is due to the negativity. Every story I read about Google, it’s kind of us versus some other company, or some stupid thing, and I just don’t find that very interesting. We should be building great things that don’t exist. Being negative is not how we make progress. The most important things are not zero sum. There’s a lot of opportunity out there.”
Page spoke for about 10 minutes to share his thoughts about technology in general and some of the innovations that Google is working on specifically – including a new version of its popular Google Maps unveiled today — before fielding questions from the audience for about 30 minutes. His appearance was a surprise because he hasn’t appeared in public in a year. Yesterday, he said that was due to a rare problem with his vocal cords that required surgery. In a Google+ posting, Page talked about his voice issue and said that they won’t interfere with his ability to do his job. Google co-founder Sergey Brin told him “I’m probably a better CEO because I choose my words more carefully.”
At least some of those words today were directed at his rivals, with Page calling out Microsoft and Oracle when asked about how he views progress in Web technologies and open standards.
“We’re really excited about the web obviously being birthed from it as a company, and we’ve invested a lot personally in the open standards behind all that,” Page said. “I’ve personally been quite sad at the industry’s behavior around all these things. If you just take something as simple as instant messaging, we’ve kind of had an offer forever that will interoperate on instant messaging. I think just this week Microsoft took advantage of that by interoperating with us but not doing the reverse, which is really sad, right? That’s not the way to make progress. You need to actually have interoperation not just people milking off one company for their own benefit. Google has always stood for that. I’ve been sad that the industry hasn’t been able to advance those things generally because of a focus on negativity and on zero sum games.”
“I’m sad that the Web is probably not advancing as fast as we should be,” he added. “We struggle with people like Microsoft.”
As for Oracle, Page, responding to acrimony and a long-running court battle between the companies over Google’s use of Oracle’s Java technology in the Android mobile operating system, Page said Oracle had rebuffed its efforts to make peace. “We’d like to have a cooperative relationship with them but it doesn’t seem possible. Money seems more important to them,” Page said, before adding that the companies would work through their problems.
Google executives used the 3.5-hour keynote event today to announce new features in the Android mobile operating system and Chrome desktop operating system and browser. Daniel Graf, a director of Google Maps, took a not-so-subtle crack at mobile rival Apple when he announced new features and described Google’s map application as simple, sleek and “let’s not forget, accurate.” Apple, which unveiled a rival Maps App in September, had to apologize to iPhone users after they complained about numerous inaccuracies in the maps information.
Google also used the opening of the three-day event to announce a new subscription based music service called Google Play Music All Access, updates to its Google Play store, Google Cloud Messaging Service, and Google+ social networking service, and a new mobile app of its Hangouts video conferencing technology that will run on Android and Apple iOS-based smartphones and tablets. Next month, it will it sell a version of Samsung’s new Galaxy S smartphone that features the interface from the Google Nexus tablet for $649.
And of course, it also announced numerous new features and tools for developers, including help finding translation services for their apps and tools that allow developers to better track the revenue earned from apps distributed through the Google Play store. There was also a lot of talk about advancements in Google’s voice recognition technology, which powers its Google Now notification service and new conversational voice technology that will power its desktop search service in the future.
As always, Google also announced a product giveaway to attendees: a Google Chromebook Pixel notebook, which has a retail value of $1,200.
There were brief mentions of Google Glass, the smart eyewear it introduced with much fanfare at last year’s I/O, but no new news about the device. When asked by a conference goer if Google would continue to create more devices like Glass, Page said Brin is working on exploring new uses beyond Glass and the driverless cars the company already has in development.
“Technology should do the hard work so that people can get on with doing the things that make them happiest in life,” Page said.
Below is a play-by-play of the opening keynote.
