WEBVTT - What does Google X do? 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to Tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:11.800 --> 0:00:14.320 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host 0:00:14.400 --> 0:00:17.119 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with iHeart Radio. And 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:20.640 how the tech are you? Listener Charlie Kniehouse asked if 0:00:20.680 --> 0:00:24.040 I might do an episode about Google X, which these 0:00:24.120 --> 0:00:27.520 days is just called X. So that is what we 0:00:27.560 --> 0:00:33.120 are going to do, and X focuses on moon shots. Well, 0:00:33.360 --> 0:00:35.760 was a moon shot some of you might be asking? 0:00:36.400 --> 0:00:40.839 That would be a project that's really ambitious. There's no 0:00:40.880 --> 0:00:44.880 assurance that the project is going to be successful, and 0:00:44.960 --> 0:00:48.000 even if it is successful, there's no assurance that it 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:52.599 would be marketable or profitable, at least in the short term. 0:00:52.640 --> 0:00:55.880 And the term itself moonshot is a play off of 0:00:56.160 --> 0:00:59.520 long shot. You know, a bet has really tough odds, 0:00:59.600 --> 0:01:02.680 but if it works, it will have an enormous payout. 0:01:03.360 --> 0:01:07.280 And it references also the Apollo program in the Space race, 0:01:07.560 --> 0:01:10.120 you know, the the one that sent human beings to 0:01:10.120 --> 0:01:13.039 the Moon. The space missions are a great example of 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:17.360 ambitious projects that had no guarantee of success and that 0:01:17.480 --> 0:01:22.920 subsequently provided tremendous benefits beyond just the program itself. Sure, 0:01:23.000 --> 0:01:26.480 the Space race likely would not have been nearly as 0:01:26.520 --> 0:01:29.440 productive had it not also been for the Cold War 0:01:29.920 --> 0:01:33.319 between the United States and the Soviet Union. But whatever 0:01:33.400 --> 0:01:36.600 the driving factors of the space race were, the truth 0:01:36.840 --> 0:01:40.240 is that the work that was done by scientists, engineers, 0:01:40.640 --> 0:01:44.040 mathematicians and others, it did more than just see people 0:01:44.120 --> 0:01:45.880 land on the moon. And I can't believe I just 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:48.760 said just see people in on the moon, because that 0:01:48.800 --> 0:01:52.680 alone is truly monumental, But no, their work would make 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:56.040 possible new technologies that were useful in lots of other ways. 0:01:56.200 --> 0:01:58.520 So there were a lot of other benefits they came 0:01:58.520 --> 0:02:01.600 out of the space race. Like the primary goal obviously 0:02:01.720 --> 0:02:04.680 was let's get there before the other guys do. But 0:02:04.960 --> 0:02:08.760 in order to do that, there were so many innovations 0:02:08.880 --> 0:02:12.440 made that would filter their way into other aspects of 0:02:12.440 --> 0:02:17.400 our lives that we saw an incredible benefit from that work. 0:02:17.520 --> 0:02:19.919 And that's kind of the idea here, that's the hope 0:02:19.919 --> 0:02:25.160 with a moonshot project. You identify a really tough goal 0:02:25.440 --> 0:02:27.600 that you want to achieve, so it has to be 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:31.119 really challenging. It maybe something that is years out from 0:02:31.280 --> 0:02:34.680 even being possible, and it may eventually turn out that 0:02:34.680 --> 0:02:37.880 that goal is just not achievable, at least not with 0:02:37.960 --> 0:02:41.800 whatever current resources are available. But the hope is, even 0:02:41.840 --> 0:02:45.840 if you can't realize the end goal, you'll discover useful 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:49.240 stuff along your journey, and it may turn out that 0:02:49.280 --> 0:02:51.720 you didn't get to the destination you had planned on, 0:02:52.160 --> 0:02:55.120 but you did create something truly remarkable. All the same, 0:02:56.080 --> 0:03:00.760 X serves that purpose for Google, but to be more accurate, 0:03:00.840 --> 0:03:04.400 it really serves that purpose for Alphabet. That's the parent 0:03:04.560 --> 0:03:08.480 company that oversees Google, as well as several other spin 0:03:08.520 --> 0:03:12.560 off companies like Waimo, which actually got its start as 0:03:12.560 --> 0:03:16.160 a Google X project. Now, to be clear, Google Slash 0:03:16.200 --> 0:03:19.680 Alphabet is not the only company to have a department 0:03:19.960 --> 0:03:24.440 like this. Over at Lockheed Martin, you've got skunk Works. 0:03:24.480 --> 0:03:28.280 That division serves a similar purpose. It is produced notable 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:31.840 aircraft like the U Tube spy plane and the F 0:03:31.960 --> 0:03:36.200 twenty two Raptor fighter aircraft, among many others. A. T 0:03:36.320 --> 0:03:39.600 and T has Bell Labs, which is notable for being 0:03:39.600 --> 0:03:43.600 the think tank that produced transformative technologies like the solid 0:03:43.640 --> 0:03:48.800 state transistor and the laser Xerox had the Palo Alto 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:53.360 Research Center or Park p A r C is now 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:56.400 a standalone company, so it's no longer a Xerox division, 0:03:57.000 --> 0:03:59.240 and Park was notable for producing a lot of the 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:02.600 innovations Steve Jobs would later lift to use in the 0:04:02.680 --> 0:04:06.240 Macintosh computer, you know, things like the graphic user interface 0:04:06.320 --> 0:04:09.440 and the computer mouse. Jobs was given a tour of Park, 0:04:09.920 --> 0:04:14.240 saw that Xerox engineers had developed this incredible technology, but 0:04:14.360 --> 0:04:18.919 that Xerox never really invested in making that a consumer product. 0:04:19.000 --> 0:04:21.039 So it was this technology that was just kind of 0:04:22.000 --> 0:04:25.159 wasting away, and so Steve Jobs made sure it didn't 0:04:25.200 --> 0:04:29.200 go to waste. However, let's focus on x and its 0:04:29.360 --> 0:04:32.800 story now. These things can be a little bit complicated 0:04:32.800 --> 0:04:36.760 to unravel, largely because Google has always been a company 0:04:36.960 --> 0:04:41.400 of engineers, and their ways can be complex and mysterious 0:04:42.200 --> 0:04:47.080 or sometimes haphazard and difficult to untangle. Engineers are great. 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:52.120 I love engineers. I loved talking with them. However, sometimes 0:04:52.120 --> 0:04:54.240 it takes an engineer to suss out what the heck 0:04:54.279 --> 0:04:57.159 another engineer has been doing this whole time. I actually 0:04:57.160 --> 0:04:59.240 feel like a lot of Google products fall into that 0:04:59.320 --> 0:05:02.520 category where if you are an engineer, you start to 0:05:02.600 --> 0:05:05.920 grock what is going on pretty quickly, But if you 0:05:06.000 --> 0:05:09.640 are a mere mortal like myself, you might encounter a 0:05:09.680 --> 0:05:12.400 Google product and you're spending the first you know, hour 0:05:12.560 --> 0:05:15.960 or so just trying to figure out how you're supposed 0:05:16.000 --> 0:05:18.760 to use it. And once you do, and you realize 0:05:18.800 --> 0:05:21.800 why the decisions were made to make it that way, 0:05:21.839 --> 0:05:26.160 it clicks. But it's not as intuitive as say, Apple's 0:05:26.279 --> 0:05:30.400 approach to things like user interfaces. Anyway, one way to 0:05:30.440 --> 0:05:33.279 tell the story of Google X is to talk about 0:05:33.400 --> 0:05:37.560 Sebastian Throne. Uh. Sebastian Throne was born in what at 0:05:37.600 --> 0:05:40.440 that point was West Germany. Now you would just call 0:05:40.480 --> 0:05:43.400 it Germany, and this was back in nineteen sixty seven. 0:05:43.680 --> 0:05:49.160 He studied computer science, among many other subjects, and by 0:05:49.440 --> 0:05:52.240 he had become part of the computer science department at 0:05:52.279 --> 0:05:56.520 Carnegie Mellon University. In two thousand one, he took a 0:05:56.600 --> 0:06:00.240 year off from CMU and he spent a year at 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:02.960 Stanford and that must have been quite a year, because 0:06:03.000 --> 0:06:06.920 in two thousand three he would leave CMU officially and 0:06:07.040 --> 0:06:11.839 join the teaching staff at Stanford University. He also became 0:06:11.880 --> 0:06:15.320 the head of the artificial intelligence laboratory there, and he 0:06:15.360 --> 0:06:20.880 would participate in a really important competition, actually several of them, 0:06:21.320 --> 0:06:24.560 but the one I'm specifically talking about is the DARPA 0:06:24.800 --> 0:06:30.440 Grand Challenge. So DARPA is the United States Defense Advanced 0:06:30.480 --> 0:06:35.960 Research Projects Agency. This is part of the Department of Defense, 0:06:36.240 --> 0:06:42.560 and it is instrumental and developing the next generation of 0:06:42.600 --> 0:06:46.719 technologies that the Department of Defense and by extension, the U. 0:06:46.839 --> 0:06:50.119 S Military will depend upon. So this is all about 0:06:50.160 --> 0:06:55.800 creating technologies that ultimately contribute to national defense. Now, DARPA 0:06:56.160 --> 0:06:58.960 doesn't really do research on its own. It's not like 0:06:59.000 --> 0:07:03.520 it's some secret underground government lab filled with robots and 0:07:03.600 --> 0:07:07.040 panels with flashing lights. I wish it were now. It's 0:07:07.080 --> 0:07:11.640 more filled with like administrators and budget sheets. DARPA really 0:07:11.720 --> 0:07:16.960 awards grants to organizations like universities or research facilities, sometimes 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:22.440 private companies for specific projects. And occasionally DARTBA holds competitions 0:07:22.480 --> 0:07:26.160 in which the agency identifies a goal or a task 0:07:26.200 --> 0:07:29.680 of some sort and the various participants try to create 0:07:29.720 --> 0:07:32.840 a solution that meets the criteria and beats out all 0:07:32.880 --> 0:07:36.720 the other competitors and usually will win some sort of prize, like, 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:38.720 you know, a couple of billion dollars in some cases. 0:07:39.200 --> 0:07:42.640 Now I should note that Throne had previously participated in 0:07:42.720 --> 0:07:46.840 other DARPA challenges. These were not Grand challenges, but these 0:07:46.840 --> 0:07:50.240 were various robotics challenges, and so he was working on 0:07:50.280 --> 0:07:52.880 things with robotics and artificial intelligence, so he was no 0:07:52.960 --> 0:07:56.400 stranger to competing, and he had been involved in those 0:07:56.440 --> 0:07:58.640 kind of competitions even before he was part of the 0:07:58.720 --> 0:08:01.760 car Carnegie melon University. I keep wanting to say Carnegie 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:05.600 because that's how Andrew Carnegie said it, but I've been reprimanded. 0:08:05.640 --> 0:08:09.920 It's Carnegie Mellon University. And he had been participating on 0:08:10.000 --> 0:08:13.040 teams with Carnegie Mellon. He did some a few times 0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:16.120 before he even joined Carnegie Mellon, and then he did 0:08:16.160 --> 0:08:18.840 it again with Stanford. So in two thousand four he 0:08:18.960 --> 0:08:22.960 participated in the first of several Grand challenges that would 0:08:23.000 --> 0:08:27.280 kick off the quest to create autonomous vehicles. The two 0:08:27.280 --> 0:08:32.320 thousand four DARPA Grand Challenge invited racing teams from various 0:08:32.440 --> 0:08:37.240 universities and research facilities to build an autonomous vehicle that 0:08:37.280 --> 0:08:40.160 would be capable of traveling a hundred fifty miles or 0:08:40.200 --> 0:08:45.880 two dty kilometers along a predetermined desert route. And it 0:08:45.960 --> 0:08:49.559 turned out this was a moonshot sort of project because 0:08:49.760 --> 0:08:53.479 ultimately not a single one of the vehicles that participated 0:08:54.120 --> 0:08:57.640 was able to complete the course. In fact, the vehicle 0:08:57.679 --> 0:09:01.040 that traveled the furthest only made its seven point three 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:05.320 two miles down the road or eleven point seven eight kilometers. 0:09:06.000 --> 0:09:08.800 That one was actually from Thrones Old stomping grounds of 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:14.360 Carnegie Mellon, undaunted. DARPA then held another Grand Challenge the 0:09:14.400 --> 0:09:17.920 following year. They changed up the course, they changed up 0:09:17.960 --> 0:09:21.440 some of the requirements, and that year would be very different. 0:09:21.480 --> 0:09:24.360 For one thing, there was now an actual community that 0:09:24.440 --> 0:09:29.040 had grown up around this quest to build autonomous vehicle technology. 0:09:29.160 --> 0:09:32.960 There were people who were developing new approaches and new 0:09:33.040 --> 0:09:35.559 you know, new technologies to make this happen, and that 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:39.000 meant there were new opportunities to collaborate and share knowledge. 0:09:39.320 --> 0:09:42.000 And while this was a competition, there were teams that 0:09:42.040 --> 0:09:45.079 were eager to develop or learn best practices and then 0:09:45.120 --> 0:09:48.679 share them with others. It became a very community experience 0:09:48.720 --> 0:09:52.320 and and the the engineers learned through their failures, and 0:09:52.360 --> 0:09:56.520 in two thousand five, Stanford's team would take first place 0:09:56.800 --> 0:10:01.400 in the competition. Interestingly, Carnegie Melon had two teams and 0:10:01.520 --> 0:10:04.840 both of those teams took second and third place. So 0:10:05.720 --> 0:10:09.720 you know, Thrun certainly had his influence on Carnegie Mellon. 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:13.040 I mean he had been there previously, and so presumably 0:10:13.080 --> 0:10:14.560 some of the people who are working on the team 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:19.280 were people who either had studied directly under Throne or 0:10:19.679 --> 0:10:22.560 at least new people who had, So yeah, he was 0:10:23.120 --> 0:10:26.400 very much at the center of this work. Now, I've 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:29.160 done episodes about the Grand Challenges before, so we're not 0:10:29.200 --> 0:10:31.400 going to go over all that there were more after 0:10:32.240 --> 0:10:35.600 the two thousand five one anyway, and that's a that's 0:10:35.600 --> 0:10:39.760 a story that's worthy of its own series of podcasts, 0:10:39.800 --> 0:10:43.080 So we'll stick with Thrun's work, and it definitely caught 0:10:43.080 --> 0:10:46.600 the attention of Google. In two thousand seventh, Round would 0:10:46.679 --> 0:10:50.839 join Google as a Google Fellow, that is, a level 0:10:51.000 --> 0:10:55.720 ten Googler or level ten Google engineer, which sounds kind 0:10:55.720 --> 0:10:57.960 of like I'm talking about a cult at that point, right. 0:10:58.360 --> 0:11:03.440 So in Google there was, and I presume still is, 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:06.960 sort of a hierarchy for engineers. So if you're like 0:11:07.120 --> 0:11:09.560 level one, you're kind of at the entry level of 0:11:09.600 --> 0:11:12.320 engineers at Google, so you might do something like work 0:11:12.360 --> 0:11:16.320 in I T Support. By the time you hit around 0:11:16.400 --> 0:11:20.000 level five, you're talking about folks who frequently have a 0:11:20.040 --> 0:11:23.280 doctorate in their respective fields, they're they're an expert at 0:11:23.280 --> 0:11:26.720 whatever they do. But beyond level five, you've got the 0:11:26.760 --> 0:11:30.439 engineers at Google that the company views as being pivotal 0:11:30.600 --> 0:11:33.040 for a project to succeed. So these are people who 0:11:33.120 --> 0:11:37.480 not only are experts, but they are drivers for success. 0:11:37.520 --> 0:11:40.640 These are people with vision and capability, and they make 0:11:40.679 --> 0:11:43.400 the impossible possible. By the time you're hitting up to 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:47.080 level nine, it means you are a distinguished engineer and 0:11:47.200 --> 0:11:50.800 you are highly respected generally speaking, at least for your 0:11:51.240 --> 0:11:55.080 expertise and ability. And then to become a level ten 0:11:55.240 --> 0:11:57.839 is to be a Google Fellow, which usually means you're 0:11:57.880 --> 0:12:01.440 also the leading expert in whatever your particular field is. 0:12:01.840 --> 0:12:03.800 So it's not just that you're an expert, you are 0:12:03.840 --> 0:12:07.960 the expert that other experts refer to when they need help. Uh. 0:12:08.000 --> 0:12:10.160 And there have also been a couple of Google Senior 0:12:10.240 --> 0:12:14.040 Fellows level elevens, but you know enough about that. So 0:12:14.160 --> 0:12:16.960 Thrown as a Google Fellow worked on some interesting challenges. 0:12:17.600 --> 0:12:20.160 He helped build out tech that would make turn by 0:12:20.200 --> 0:12:23.560 turn directions possible in Google Maps. And you'all, I don't 0:12:23.600 --> 0:12:26.560 know how many of you remember this, but way back 0:12:26.600 --> 0:12:30.839 in the early days of web based map solutions. You 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:34.160 had to plot out your your route and then print 0:12:34.200 --> 0:12:36.440 it out right. I'm talking back in the old map 0:12:36.559 --> 0:12:40.160 quest days, and this was definitely a huge jump from 0:12:40.200 --> 0:12:44.200 just using a regular old map or atlas right where 0:12:44.200 --> 0:12:46.199 you just had to turn the page, find the right 0:12:46.240 --> 0:12:49.360 map and trace your route. It was better than that, 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:52.720 but it did also mean that you typically needed to 0:12:52.760 --> 0:12:56.400 have an extra person, like an actual navigator, looking after 0:12:56.440 --> 0:12:59.080 the instruction so that you didn't miss a turn because 0:12:59.120 --> 0:13:02.360 you know it was printed, you couldn't you couldn't know 0:13:02.480 --> 0:13:04.480 how close you were to the next turn. You just 0:13:04.520 --> 0:13:07.280 had to really pay attention. And it was only later 0:13:07.320 --> 0:13:10.000 that we would get the turn by turn capabilities coupled 0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:14.559 with accurate GPS receivers that would transform navigation forever. I'm 0:13:14.559 --> 0:13:17.320 sure several of you out there have used maps to 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:20.679 get around, either because you've been driving for a while, 0:13:21.280 --> 0:13:25.920 or maybe you drive in places where there's little to 0:13:26.000 --> 0:13:28.440 no reception, so you have to have those physical maps. 0:13:28.760 --> 0:13:30.679 But for a lot of people that has a lost art, 0:13:30.800 --> 0:13:33.480 it is something that they are not used to and 0:13:33.600 --> 0:13:36.679 it would be very challenging for them to do it today. 0:13:37.080 --> 0:13:40.719 But this term by turned approach, in part, it's one 0:13:40.760 --> 0:13:43.320 reason why people don't get lost as frequently, and in 0:13:43.320 --> 0:13:47.760 another part, it's kind of made us less capable of 0:13:47.840 --> 0:13:50.199 reading maps, so you could look at it as both 0:13:50.200 --> 0:13:53.000 a positive and a negative. Thrown had also worked on 0:13:53.080 --> 0:13:56.320 street View, which is the Google project that saw vehicles 0:13:56.320 --> 0:13:59.679 with cameras mounted on their rooftops drive slowly through various 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:03.600 neighbors hoods and map the photographs of actual locations to 0:14:03.640 --> 0:14:07.040 their coordinates on a map. Also one that got a 0:14:07.040 --> 0:14:10.079 lot of controversy as it went into various neighborhoods around 0:14:10.080 --> 0:14:13.120 the United States and later on the world. And perhaps 0:14:13.160 --> 0:14:17.360 most importantly, Thrown brought his experience in developing autonomous vehicle 0:14:17.400 --> 0:14:21.600 technology to a project that at the time was called Chauffeur. 0:14:22.400 --> 0:14:27.440 This was Google's own driverless vehicle effort. We'll talk more 0:14:27.560 --> 0:14:31.920 about how that became kind of the the seed for 0:14:32.040 --> 0:14:43.080 Google X, but first let's take a quick break. Okay, 0:14:43.120 --> 0:14:46.640 before we went to break, Sebastian Thrun had started work 0:14:46.760 --> 0:14:51.360 on Chauffeur, Google's driverless car initiative way back in the days. 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:55.520 It's around like two thousand and nine ish, and Google's 0:14:55.560 --> 0:14:58.120 co founders Larry Page and Sarah gay Brenn were really 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:01.400 impressed by Thron's work, and they approached him and gave 0:15:01.480 --> 0:15:04.760 him the chance to spearhead an entire department dedicated to 0:15:04.840 --> 0:15:09.560 pursue challenging opportunities. Uh. They also gave him a new title, 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:14.960 the Director of Other, which I don't know. That kind 0:15:14.960 --> 0:15:16.560 of sounds like it came out of like a Neil 0:15:16.680 --> 0:15:19.200 game In book or something. To me, it's got that 0:15:19.320 --> 0:15:22.280 kind of ring to it. But yeah, this is still 0:15:22.520 --> 0:15:25.080 early on in the phase where he was Director of Other, 0:15:25.920 --> 0:15:31.120 as this concept of Google X began to take shape. Now, 0:15:31.920 --> 0:15:34.840 at that stage, Google's whole R and D approach was 0:15:35.360 --> 0:15:39.360 super duper secret, Like the outside world had no knowledge 0:15:39.920 --> 0:15:45.400 of this developing department within Google. Later we would have 0:15:45.440 --> 0:15:47.640 a better idea of what kinds of projects were going 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:50.280 on inside that department. But for a while, it was 0:15:50.400 --> 0:15:54.400 really hush hush, so much so that I actually remember 0:15:54.520 --> 0:15:58.480 visiting someone at Google around this time and then getting 0:15:58.520 --> 0:16:01.920 quite cross with them once word broke out about Google's 0:16:01.960 --> 0:16:06.640 self driving vehicles got into the public. I mean, if 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:10.080 you can't trust a nice guy like me who just 0:16:10.120 --> 0:16:13.280 happens to be the host of a widely distributed tech podcast, 0:16:13.520 --> 0:16:17.800 whom can you trust? But I should be fair. Even 0:16:17.920 --> 0:16:22.320 within Google itself, the X department, as it would become known, 0:16:22.960 --> 0:16:27.720 was mysterious. To get entry to their buildings, you needed 0:16:27.720 --> 0:16:30.480 an authorized key card, and not very many people had 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:32.960 one of those, Like they had normal key cards where 0:16:32.960 --> 0:16:35.720 they could get through most of Google campus. But once 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:38.120 you got up to this, yeah, you had to have 0:16:38.440 --> 0:16:42.920 special authorization essentially. And while the standard googler at the 0:16:42.960 --> 0:16:45.720 time was given up to of their work week to 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:51.320 tackle personal projects which could one day become a Google product, 0:16:51.440 --> 0:16:53.920 a lot of Google products actually began as one of 0:16:53.960 --> 0:16:58.320 those time projects. The X team was actually less structured 0:16:58.440 --> 0:17:04.000 than that. So with in the Google X division, creativity 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:11.240 reigned supreme. The department welcomed unlikely, outlandish ideas many in fact, 0:17:11.600 --> 0:17:15.440 probably most of them wouldn't pan out, but it sounds 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:17.679 like the early motto was something along the lines of 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:21.320 you never know if you don't try. So. Thrown was 0:17:21.359 --> 0:17:24.919 also fiercely protective of his team. He wanted them to 0:17:24.920 --> 0:17:28.119 have all the freedom to experiment and test ideas and 0:17:28.160 --> 0:17:31.600 to collaborate across teams. So maybe one team that's working 0:17:31.640 --> 0:17:35.280 on one really big problem ends up collaborating with a 0:17:35.280 --> 0:17:37.600 team that's working on a totally different problem, and that 0:17:37.680 --> 0:17:42.760 cross pollination ends up fueling new creativity. He didn't want 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:45.159 his team members to ever have to worry about attending 0:17:45.240 --> 0:17:48.720 meetings where they have to give status updates and budget 0:17:48.760 --> 0:17:51.000 reports and that kind of thing. He wanted them to 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:54.560 focus completely on their projects and not worry about having 0:17:54.560 --> 0:17:58.440 to justify those brought projects to to top brass. So 0:17:58.640 --> 0:18:03.240 Google effectively funded the X division, but the individual projects 0:18:03.240 --> 0:18:06.119 inside didn't have to break down costs or anything like that, 0:18:06.200 --> 0:18:09.439 at least not to a really granular level, certainly not 0:18:09.520 --> 0:18:12.000 to a level that you would expect for most businesses. 0:18:12.520 --> 0:18:17.120 Thron led the division from twenty ten until two thousand twelve. 0:18:17.359 --> 0:18:21.240 He actually got really focused on the driverless car project, 0:18:21.920 --> 0:18:26.360 ultimately kind of stepping back from overseeing the overall UH 0:18:26.359 --> 0:18:30.560 projects in Google X, and then ultimately left Google altogether 0:18:30.800 --> 0:18:34.720 in order to found a new education company called Udacity. 0:18:34.840 --> 0:18:39.479 So taking his place was Eric quote unquote astro Teller. 0:18:39.560 --> 0:18:43.000 Astro's nickname apparently that's what he goes by all the time. 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:45.960 And boy, howney, does this guy have a pedigree. So 0:18:46.520 --> 0:18:51.359 astro Teller's grandfather is the guy who spearheaded the development 0:18:51.440 --> 0:18:56.119 of the hydrogen bomb a k A Edward Teller. One day, 0:18:56.160 --> 0:18:59.320 I'm gonna have to do a full episode about Edward Teller, 0:18:59.400 --> 0:19:05.000 because that was one complicated dude. Uh, A brilliant person, 0:19:05.480 --> 0:19:09.800 a vilified person for reasons that would become clear if 0:19:09.800 --> 0:19:12.440 I do a full episode. So we'll put that aside. 0:19:12.600 --> 0:19:15.640 In the future. Maybe I'll do an Edward Teller episode anyway, 0:19:15.680 --> 0:19:20.399 Astro's other grandfather had also had won Nobel prizes, So 0:19:20.400 --> 0:19:22.280 so yeah, Astro came from a family that had a 0:19:22.320 --> 0:19:25.840 reputation for big thinking, and he would be very modest 0:19:25.920 --> 0:19:29.679 when describing his own role within his family. And Astro 0:19:29.800 --> 0:19:32.840 Teller had kind of a moonshot task of his own, 0:19:32.880 --> 0:19:37.360 which was to take this creative, whirlwind, chaotic department and 0:19:37.400 --> 0:19:40.040 give it a little more structure. You know, there was 0:19:40.080 --> 0:19:43.320 still a clear need for lots of freedom, but without 0:19:43.400 --> 0:19:46.240 any structure, there was little chance of being able to 0:19:46.240 --> 0:19:50.000 actually harness whatever came out of the research, Right, Like, 0:19:50.080 --> 0:19:52.800 you want to make sure that if you do come 0:19:52.880 --> 0:19:55.879 up with things that are useful, that you have a 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:59.720 process in place to make that come to fruition. Otherwise, 0:20:00.560 --> 0:20:02.800 if you're just creating cool stuff but nobody ever gets 0:20:02.840 --> 0:20:04.679 to see it, it would be kind of like, you know, 0:20:05.560 --> 0:20:08.240 Willie Wonka's chocolate factory before he ever gave out the 0:20:08.240 --> 0:20:11.080 golden tickets. Yeah, it's an amazing place, but who gets 0:20:11.119 --> 0:20:13.879 to see it. So to that end, tell her brought 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:18.040 in a woman named Obie Felton who had previously worked 0:20:18.040 --> 0:20:21.040 in Google's marketing department. So she was not from an 0:20:21.040 --> 0:20:25.359 engineering background, she was from a product marketing background, and 0:20:25.720 --> 0:20:28.240 she was specifically brought in because she could bring that 0:20:28.320 --> 0:20:31.920 kind of perspective to the department, and she helped design 0:20:32.080 --> 0:20:35.479 Google X so that had a little more framework to it. 0:20:35.840 --> 0:20:39.320 Her title became head of getting moon Shots ready for 0:20:39.520 --> 0:20:42.560 contact with the real world, and she would later go 0:20:42.600 --> 0:20:45.239 on to leave Google and found her own start up 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:49.000 with a focus on mental health. So yeah, she and 0:20:49.000 --> 0:20:51.639 and many others who have worked at Google X have 0:20:51.800 --> 0:20:53.919 gone on to become sort of a who's who have 0:20:54.000 --> 0:20:58.600 startup founders and industry leaders. It's it's really fascinating. In fact, 0:20:58.640 --> 0:21:04.240 I even got to interview a a former director over 0:21:04.280 --> 0:21:07.520 at at Google X, and it's just fascinating to talk 0:21:07.520 --> 0:21:11.119 with people who have been in those positions. Now. According 0:21:11.160 --> 0:21:14.880 to an article titled The Truth about Google X by 0:21:14.960 --> 0:21:19.080 John Gartner, and Fast Company. For a project to be 0:21:19.320 --> 0:21:23.280 considered within Google X. For for this to be something 0:21:23.320 --> 0:21:28.400 that the department actually pursues, UH, it has to meet 0:21:28.480 --> 0:21:33.080 three criteria. One is that the projects should address a 0:21:33.119 --> 0:21:37.480 problem that affects millions or potentially billions of people. Two 0:21:37.680 --> 0:21:40.440 is that some part of the solution should at least 0:21:40.440 --> 0:21:44.760 resemble science fiction. It should be you know, incorporating innovation 0:21:44.880 --> 0:21:48.439 in some way. Third is that these solutions need to 0:21:48.480 --> 0:21:52.000 rely on technologies that are either currently available or kind 0:21:52.000 --> 0:21:56.879 of on the cusp of availability. Alternatively, Wired says that 0:21:56.960 --> 0:22:00.159 third criterion is really that the solution should produce is 0:22:00.200 --> 0:22:03.879 a radically positive outcome, and that the outcome should be 0:22:04.200 --> 0:22:08.320 ten times better than whatever exists today. So, whatever the 0:22:08.320 --> 0:22:12.919 the challenges, whatever the goal is, the realization of that 0:22:13.000 --> 0:22:16.440 goal should be that where we are there is ten 0:22:16.480 --> 0:22:19.640 times better than where we were before. Now this appears 0:22:19.680 --> 0:22:23.320 to be when the department also began to formalize its 0:22:23.320 --> 0:22:27.040 approach a little bit, which was trying to make a 0:22:27.160 --> 0:22:31.240 project fail right away. And and I really do mean that. 0:22:31.320 --> 0:22:33.560 I mean the team would get together and they would 0:22:33.600 --> 0:22:36.639 start to identify, you know, some sort of approach to 0:22:37.359 --> 0:22:40.840 solving a problem, and they would first try to tackle 0:22:40.840 --> 0:22:44.200 the hardest part of whatever that problem was right away, 0:22:44.600 --> 0:22:46.720 you know, identify what is going to be the most 0:22:46.840 --> 0:22:52.000 difficult thing to get beyond with that problem, and try 0:22:52.080 --> 0:22:55.680 to solve for that first. And the wisdom was that 0:22:55.720 --> 0:22:58.480 the team discovered that the hardest part of the challenge 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:01.479 was totally beyond reach, it would be best to just 0:23:01.560 --> 0:23:04.640 admit failure at least for now, and to move on. 0:23:05.119 --> 0:23:09.560 So Google X would pursue some goals but abandon lots 0:23:09.560 --> 0:23:12.240 of others. Like they might say, you know what, this 0:23:12.440 --> 0:23:14.840 just isn't going to be a thing yet, let's put 0:23:14.880 --> 0:23:18.760 it aside now. Reasons for abandoning a project were varied 0:23:18.920 --> 0:23:21.719 and are varied to this day. So it might just 0:23:21.800 --> 0:23:25.159 be that the costs of the project are estimated to 0:23:25.280 --> 0:23:29.280 be beyond whatever the benefits are. Now. By costs, I 0:23:29.320 --> 0:23:32.560 don't necessarily just mean money, although it could be that 0:23:33.080 --> 0:23:37.360 those costs could be in stuff like effort. So if 0:23:37.359 --> 0:23:40.800 a project aims to create a new way to do something, 0:23:41.359 --> 0:23:44.240 but it turns out that this new way actually requires 0:23:44.240 --> 0:23:48.840 more work to complete than existing ways, well that's a 0:23:48.880 --> 0:23:51.600 good reason to pull the eject lever on that project. 0:23:51.920 --> 0:23:54.400 You know, I'm often left thinking about people and I'm 0:23:54.400 --> 0:23:56.879 guilty of this too, people who would spend more time 0:23:56.880 --> 0:23:59.760 and effort getting out of doing something than it would 0:23:59.800 --> 0:24:02.760 say for them to actually do the thing. That's the 0:24:02.840 --> 0:24:06.280 kind of stuff that the department wants to avoid. So 0:24:06.440 --> 0:24:10.199 an example of such a project was an attempt to 0:24:10.320 --> 0:24:13.840 build a safe jet pack. If you've been asking where's 0:24:13.880 --> 0:24:19.359 my jet pack? Well, Google's answer would be we tried. So. 0:24:19.400 --> 0:24:22.480 I had a tech Crunch Disrupt conference back in fourteen. 0:24:22.560 --> 0:24:25.879 Astro Teller was a speaker there and revealed that the 0:24:25.920 --> 0:24:29.480 Google X division had been at work on a jet pack, 0:24:29.600 --> 0:24:32.439 because that was one of those projects that Astro himself 0:24:32.480 --> 0:24:34.240 was saying, I just think it would be cool to 0:24:34.320 --> 0:24:39.160 have one. But ultimately the team concluded that it would 0:24:39.200 --> 0:24:42.560 be such an inefficient device from a power perspective, that 0:24:43.080 --> 0:24:47.119