Google Announces Its Chromebook Successor: the Googlebook (theverge.com) 49
Google is teasing a new line of "Googlebook" laptops for this fall, powered by a new Android-and-ChromeOS-derived operating system that will run Chrome, Android apps, phone-connected apps and files, and deeply integrated Gemini features. The company says Chromebooks will continue "after the launch of Googlebook" and "...all Chromebooks will continue to receive support through their device's existing date commitment." The Verge reports: "We'll have more to share on the exact OS branding later this year," Peter Du of Google's global communications team tells The Verge. [...] Googlebooks will have a Magic Pointer feature that offers contextual suggestions whenever you shake your cursor and point it at something on the screen. Google's examples include setting up a meeting by pointing at a date in an email or selecting images of furniture and a living space to visualize them together. Beyond your mouse pointer, Googlebooks will also feature the custom AI-created widgets that Google is also debuting today for Android phones and Wear OS smartwatches. I don't know what kind of horrors people will be able to make into widgets, but Google gives the example of making one to organize your flights, hotel information, restaurant reservations, and another for creating a countdown timer for an upcoming family reunion. (It's always flights, hotels, and restaurants, isn't it?)
While there are many outstanding questions to be answered about Googlebooks, the biggest and most obvious ones are what will these laptops look like, what chips will be in them, and what will they cost? We've got none of that so far. Google only has some initial renders of a mysterious Googlebook and the promise that it's working with Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, and Lenovo to make the first models. There are no model names. No specs. Nada. Google isn't even saying if the laptop in its renders is made by a partner or a tease of some first-party Pixel-like Googlebook to come or is just a cool mockup. The one distinct hardware feature shown, the bar of glowing Google-colored light, will be a signature of all Googlebooks. (Sure, bring on the RGB. Why not?)
While there are many outstanding questions to be answered about Googlebooks, the biggest and most obvious ones are what will these laptops look like, what chips will be in them, and what will they cost? We've got none of that so far. Google only has some initial renders of a mysterious Googlebook and the promise that it's working with Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, and Lenovo to make the first models. There are no model names. No specs. Nada. Google isn't even saying if the laptop in its renders is made by a partner or a tease of some first-party Pixel-like Googlebook to come or is just a cool mockup. The one distinct hardware feature shown, the bar of glowing Google-colored light, will be a signature of all Googlebooks. (Sure, bring on the RGB. Why not?)
Terrible name (Score:3)
Let's call them "Gooboo"
Re: (Score:2)
It'll devolve down to Goobs or–
Yeah, Googlebooks is a bad name.
Re:Terrible name (Score:5, Funny)
... and we can call the users "Goobers".
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Terrible name (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Chromebooks are great. They just work, they are cheap, and they cover many people's needs easily. My mum is on her second one and went from monthly tech support issues with Windows to smooth sailing for years.
Re: (Score:3)
Maybe should have called it "Alphabook."
I saw the headline and thought "why not Metabook?" and then realized: wrong company.
Re: (Score:2)
And the name has already been taken [google.com]. By Google.
Re: (Score:2)
Let's call them "Gooboo"
Or, Gooble Box [fandom.com] and tell people they're recharged by stomping on them. :-)
Re: (Score:3)
Let's call them "Gooboo"
Put me down for "Gobbledygook"
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Boogergooks.
They've never met 7th Grade boys, have they?
Re: (Score:2)
Worst UX ever? (Score:5, Interesting)
"Googlebooks will have a Magic Pointer feature that offers contextual suggestions whenever you shake your cursor and point it at something on the screen. "
Seriously, that sounds awful right? In no way is shaking better than clicking, people will do it accidentally all the time to activate AI they likely don't even want.
It could be a three finger press, or clicking both buttons, or a right button double click. Literally anything would be better than that . . . right? It sounds like a joke or an ill conceived movie computer.
Re: (Score:3)
If you don't want AI, why would you but a GoogleBook?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
They are (replacing?) Chromebooks. Just one example, the next time my seventy-three-year-old mother destroys her Chromebook, she'll probably wind up getting a Googlebook.
And she'll be utterly baffled and probably angry thinking she "got hacked" every time she accidentally shakes the mouse.
Lots of people buy tech like this. They just need a cheap laptop. They're just using what they're school/job provides. Lots of people who use Chromebooks didn't buy them at all.
Re: (Score:2)
It could have been worse. They could have decided to use a camera to track your eye movement to move the mouse / focus, so when you want to activate the AI feature you look like you're having a seizure.
Re:Worst UX ever? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Worst UX ever? (Score:4, Insightful)
In no way is shaking better than clicking, people will do it accidentally all the time to activate AI they likely don't even want.
The AI will have to look at your screen to see what you are pointing at. So pretty much user-triggered Microsoft Recall that is automatically shipped off your machine to Google.
Re: (Score:2)
Android has had this for years. I'm not sure if it's the same on every phone, but on Pixel long press the bar at the bottom of the screen and it opens Google Lens or whatever it's called now. From there you circle what you are interested on screen, and it invokes Gemini AI on it. It can also do stuff like copy text or translate it for you, which is handy when you need to use an app in a language you don't read.
Re: (Score:2)
In no way is shaking better than clicking, people will do it accidentally all the time to activate AI they likely don't even want.
The AI will have to look at your screen to see what you are pointing at. So pretty much user-triggered Microsoft Recall that is automatically shipped off your machine to Google.
Don't be so sure about the "shipped off". Google is heavily investing in on-device AI that runs in a trusted enclave (e.g. TrustZone on ARM). I left the company in August of last year but I doubt this has changed since it's been a major area of focus for quite some time.
Re: Worst UX ever? (Score:1)
I suspect they wanted a universal gesture for the entire product line, but it has to be one which can be implemented on the cheapest dogshit hardware imaginable, which rules out chording (because there will be an "emerging markets edition" gooboo with a resistive touchpad to save a few cents).
Re: (Score:3)
"Googlebooks will have a Magic Pointer feature that offers contextual suggestions whenever you shake your cursor and point it at something on the screen. "
1997 called. They want their Clippy back.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah but this involves Minds that are Deep [deepmind.google], so it's totally different.
And I see someone has already made an open source version [reddit.com]...
Re:Worst UX ever? (Score:4)
No. Just... Hell no.
I hate this kind of "intuitive UI" shit. It constantly activates when you are trying to use the device and gets it the way of normal operation.
I don't want to do the "special new thing"... get off my screen!
[shakes fist at clouds] ...dammit! Now why is there a contextual pop-up menu in the sky?
Re: (Score:2)
You young'uns have it easy with your intuitive UI shit! In my day, we had intuitive WIMP shit! It constantly activated and moved the cursor when you were just trying to finger peck into a DOS terminal but your elbow touched the rolling box.
Point and Grunt interface, we called it, 'cause you pointed your finger at the number 0 on the numeric keypad, and your funny bone hit the box. And then you grunted.
Re: (Score:2)
"In no way is shaking better than clicking"
Shaking is better than clicking since clicking already has a different meaning.
" a three finger press"
Already has another meaning: screenshot.
"or clicking both buttons"
Already has another meaning: middle click
"or a right button double click."
Often has application-specific meaning.
Re: (Score:2)
smgh (Score:3)
Linux Desktop (Score:5, Funny)
"Year of Linux on the Desktop"
"NO, NOT LIKE THAT"
Re: (Score:2)
If it's "Aluminium" then it's Android for the desktop - merging the 'good' bits of ChromeOS into a Googlebook-flavoured Android.
yeah, awful name (Score:1)
"Chromebook" sounded kind of cool.
"GoogleBook" just sounds odd.
- Don't call it "Playstation" ... (Score:2)
... that's terrible. Aren't the team rioting already?
- You should've heard the noise when we called that cassette player "Walkman".
Discussion on the Sony Playstation 1 team, paraphrased.
Re: (Score:1)
Far cry from the CR-48 (Score:2)
I was one of the lucky ones to get a Google CR-48 prototype back in 2015, and at the time, it was simply amazing. Yes, it had its shortcomings, but damn, it was impressive. While today's Chromebooks/Googlebooks sometimes feel like a marketing team collectively threw up on them, they have come a long way. My hope is that there will be enough settings on the new devices to tweak it to my liking.
Yay! Prevasive tracking, now with AI. (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3)
I know people that still expose their lives to Google, but I am not one of them. Especially now, at the start of the age of AI where all information is used to profile you and used against you, from salary negotiation to loan applications, it is absolutely crazy to want any product at any price, including free, from Google.
Same...but the parents love it because they're cheap and easy to replace without data migration drama, and schools love 'em because of Google Classroom and Workspace functionality that Google gives to schools for peanuts while being checkbox compliant for bad-stuff-on-the-internet policies.
I'm grateful that I grew up learning to own my data...but I can appreciate that Google really made it seamless to not-worry about it.
"deeply integrated" Gemini features? (Score:2)
So... (Score:4, Informative)
Google has announced a product they already make, now with more AI shoved up its butt.
Re: (Score:2)
New ad copy (Score:2)
GoogleBook never sleeps! It is always watching...
Uh, out for you! Yeah, that's it. It is always watching out for you.
Okay, no. (Score:3)
and deeply integrated Gemini features
Just, no.
Re: (Score:2)
Use case test (Score:2)
Gbook (Score:1)
boondogglebook (Score:2)
Just make a good, cheap, easy to repair laptop.