Apple By Graham Templeton Apr. 29, 2014 9:30 am
Talk about having “one last thing” to say.*A retired VP from Intel, Avram Miller, has taken to his blog to make maybe the oddest and most provocative statement about Apple since the death of Steve Jobs. He claims to know of a top-secret Apple project called Found, a service designed to destroy the backbone of Google’s business model: search.
Miller claims that Jobs was obsessed with the Found project, even forcing his successor Tim Cook to promise to continue it after his death. But probably the most sensationalistic claim: Steve Jobs actually recorded a part in an announcement for Found, estimating it would be shown in the year 2015.
The blog post has provoked a fair bit of consternation in the field, as on the one hand Miller is a reputable source who could believably have been in a position to know the truth of these matters. On the other hand, the “matters” at issue are incredible by any standard, positing that Apple has a secret promotional reel from their deceased founder aimed at scuttling the company’s biggest modern rival from beyond the grave.
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.
Miller writes that Found was developed as a direct response to Google’s acquisition of Android as an iOS competitor, partly as a business strategy and partly as a personal rebuke. Google’s then-CEO Eric Schmidt was serving on the board of Apple, and Jobs allegedly felt betrayed by the push into Apple’s territory. According to Miller, at the beginning fewer than four people knew about Found, and none of them were on Apple’s board of directors.
So, what is Found? We don’t know for sure, but it’s got something to do with combining artificial intelligence with search-like functionality — if, of course, it exists at all. Some think Found technology has be repurposed into Siri, while others think it’s still in the works as a more fully realized Siri successor. There’s some real belief here; Miller writes his post as though reporting on a blockbuster press conference in 2015, the result of which is a dip in Google’s stock by*30%.
Tupac was the first celebrity to perform live from beyond the grave, but he may not be the last.
That seems unlikely, and not just because Apple’s history of high-profile leaks makes it doubtful the company is capable of keeping a project of this magnitude under wraps. Google’s tendrils run deep into the foundations of the internet at this point; even if Found is the greatest piece of software ever created, many times better than Google’s search service in every conceivable way, it could never take a third of Google’s stock price overnight.
Still, as tech-analysis pseudonym Robert X. Cringely writes, Miller is the man who would know, if anybody did. He’s in the position to do things like get beers with Apple’s top technologists, and his eccentric personality makes a leak like this at least possibly in-character.
Personally, it seems very likely that Found did exist at one point, but the idea that Apple is still gearing up to change its business model so fundamentally, and that this is the first we’re truly hearing about it, seems far fetched.
More...
Miller claims that Jobs was obsessed with the Found project, even forcing his successor Tim Cook to promise to continue it after his death. But probably the most sensationalistic claim: Steve Jobs actually recorded a part in an announcement for Found, estimating it would be shown in the year 2015.
The blog post has provoked a fair bit of consternation in the field, as on the one hand Miller is a reputable source who could believably have been in a position to know the truth of these matters. On the other hand, the “matters” at issue are incredible by any standard, positing that Apple has a secret promotional reel from their deceased founder aimed at scuttling the company’s biggest modern rival from beyond the grave.
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt.Miller writes that Found was developed as a direct response to Google’s acquisition of Android as an iOS competitor, partly as a business strategy and partly as a personal rebuke. Google’s then-CEO Eric Schmidt was serving on the board of Apple, and Jobs allegedly felt betrayed by the push into Apple’s territory. According to Miller, at the beginning fewer than four people knew about Found, and none of them were on Apple’s board of directors.
So, what is Found? We don’t know for sure, but it’s got something to do with combining artificial intelligence with search-like functionality — if, of course, it exists at all. Some think Found technology has be repurposed into Siri, while others think it’s still in the works as a more fully realized Siri successor. There’s some real belief here; Miller writes his post as though reporting on a blockbuster press conference in 2015, the result of which is a dip in Google’s stock by*30%.
Tupac was the first celebrity to perform live from beyond the grave, but he may not be the last.That seems unlikely, and not just because Apple’s history of high-profile leaks makes it doubtful the company is capable of keeping a project of this magnitude under wraps. Google’s tendrils run deep into the foundations of the internet at this point; even if Found is the greatest piece of software ever created, many times better than Google’s search service in every conceivable way, it could never take a third of Google’s stock price overnight.
Still, as tech-analysis pseudonym Robert X. Cringely writes, Miller is the man who would know, if anybody did. He’s in the position to do things like get beers with Apple’s top technologists, and his eccentric personality makes a leak like this at least possibly in-character.
Personally, it seems very likely that Found did exist at one point, but the idea that Apple is still gearing up to change its business model so fundamentally, and that this is the first we’re truly hearing about it, seems far fetched.
More...
