> In Louisville, Google Fiber reportedly was burying cables in "nano-trenches" that were just two inches deep.
> "When you're walking around the neighborhood, [the lines are] popping up out of the road all over the place," resident Larry Coomes said at the time. "People are tripping over it."
This is the most obviously Google thing I've read ever. Half-ass a job and then saying "screw it" and leaving because it's too difficult? Name another company that would do this. Not even Spectrum is this incompetent. They have the attention span of a stoned teenager. Their Toronto Sidewalk Labs also comes to mind. Probably for the best they pulled the plug early on that one. Imagine parts of your city just stop functioning because some private company got bored one day and left.
Facebook is also starting to see the issue with being a one trick pony.
But as for as Google, how many failed “other bets” have they been throwing money at since they were founded?
Google was founded in 1998. About the same time that Apple was close to bankruptcy.
One year they introduced three messaging platforms. How many failed first party phone initiatives have they had including buying Motorola?
Not to mention Google Fiber that left city streets ruined with “micro trenching” (https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/02/googl...)
Since then, Apple has grown the Mac business, iPhone, iPad, “wearables”, and has a growing services business.
Microsoft built Azure, Xbox and pivoted with Office365.
Amazon (disclaimer I work at AWS), built AWS.
Google has a lot of smart people. But not a good business development strategy.
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