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October 4, 2005

Google-Sun: Today the Toolbar, Tomorrow... Um...


Speculation on the big Google-Sun joint webcast today was mostly off-target, as the companies released rather tepid news: users downloading Sun's Java Runtime Environment (JRE) would also be offered the Google Toolbar, and possibly vice-versa.

Perhaps it was just a ploy to drum up a little good press for Google and Sun, or maybe the real announcement was shelved at the last minute, either because of technical difficulties, or because they thought better of over-antagonizing Microsoft with a big announcement about how they're joining forces to take down Bill Gates' Office cash-cow.

Back in 1995, Marc Andreessen's statement that Netscape would reduce Windows to a "mundane collection of not entirely debugged device drivers" was the sting that woke the sleeping giant from Redmond, and the beginning of the end for Netscape.

Gates definitely isn't sleeping when it comes to the Google threat, but why antagonize the man when you don't need to? As Sun Tzu says:

"Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win."

It's possible the victorious warriors over at Google are partnering with Sun for a thin-client Google Office application, written in Java, and perhaps hosted on Sun's enterprise servers. Google certainly has people with the Java chops to pull it off. And Sun could easily provide the infrastructure.

I'm a bit skeptical in the whole thin-client thing. My programming chops aren't what they used to be, but tell me again how thin clients are different from "dumb" terminals? Wouldn't we just be going back to a glorified form of mainframe computing?

Still, it's hard to believe they went through all this just so Sun could get a bit of publicity and Google could get a few more toolbar downloads. Something big is likely in the works. Like my man Sun Tzu says:

"All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved."

Around the net:

Battelle
The Register
Om Malik
Henry Blodget
Jonathan Schwartz

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