Google hopes that people in decades to come “shrug” at the technology it is working on, according to its chief executive. Sundar Pichai, the boss of both Google and parent company Alphabet, revealed the importance of making technology go from “extraordinary to ordinary” in a memo to staff written to celebrate the company’s 25th anniversary. Traditionally, Google celebrates its birthday on 27 September, for largely arbitrary reasons. The company undertook a number of firsts through the summer and autumn of 1998, meaning that it has a range of options to choose as its official launch date. This year, however, Google appears to be celebrating throughout the whole month. Mr Pichai’s note was intended as a way of kicking off those celebrations, according to an editor’s note attached to it. Mr Pichai said that it is a “huge privilege to reach this milestone, made possible by the people who use our products and challenge us to keep innovating, the hundreds of thousands of Googlers past and present who have given their talents to building those products, and our partners who believe in our mission as much as we do”. And he looked forward to the future technology that the company is building, which revolves largely around artificial intelligence. But it hopes that those technologies become normal, Mr Pichai said. “Ideas my dad marveled at as science fiction — taking a call from your watch, or telling your car to play your favorite song — make my children shrug,” he wrote. “Those shrugs give me great hope for the future. They set a high bar for what the next generation will build and invent... and I can’t wait to see what will make their children shrug, too. “An essential truth of innovation is that the moment you push the boundary of a technology, it soon goes from extraordinary to ordinary. That’s why Google has never taken our success for granted.” Concluding the note, he said that he hoped that the contested questions of artificial intelligence will eventually elicit the same kind of response. He noted that the technology has undergone sustained questioning and criticism in recent months, but indicated that he hopes it becomes ordinary in the same way. “As these new frontiers come into view, we have a renewed invitation to act boldly and responsibly to improve as many lives as possible, and to keep asking those big questions,” he wrote. “Our search for answers will drive extraordinary technology progress over the next 25 years. “And in 2048, if, somewhere in the world, a teenager looks at all we’ve built with AI and shrugs, we’ll know we succeeded. And then we’ll get back to work.” He also revealed the importance of lobsters to Google. The first company to use its advertising platform was a “mail-order business selling lobsters”, he said – and that platform has since gone on to contribute the vast majority of Google’s revenues. Read More Why is Elon Musk obsessed with the letter X? Elon Musk ‘borrowed $1bn from SpaceX’ at same time as Twitter acquisition Sonos releases Move 2, its chunky speaker for the outdoors Why is Elon Musk obsessed with the letter X? Elon Musk ‘borrowed $1bn from SpaceX’ at same time as Twitter acquisition Sonos releases Move 2, its chunky speaker for the outdoors

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Conspiracy theorists have been turning their attention to Antarctica more than you’d expect over recent years. First, there was the case of the “bleeding waterfalls”, which remains one of the strangest natural phenomena you're likely to see, and there’s also the mystery of a so-called “pyramid” which has been found on the continent. Only, it’s not a pyramid at all – in fact, it’s a mountain. The Ellsworth Mountains are the highest mountain range in Antarctica and stretch 400km and the mountain in question was discovered by the British Antarctic Expedition of 1910-1913 Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter It was called “The Pyramid” to keep the true nature of the discovery hidden from others at the time. Over the last hundred years, however, people have been speculating about the true nature of the location (even though it’s very much a mountain, poking up out of the ice) and now a second interesting geographical feature has bee discovered and got them talking all over again. The location in question is found at the coordinates 79°58’39.25?S 81°57’32.21?W, which has been a much-searched spot on Google Earth. Speaking to IFL Science, geologist at the German Research Centre for Geosciences in Potsdam, Dr Mitch Darcy, said: “The pyramid-shaped structures are located in the Ellsworth Mountains, which is a range more than 400 km long, so it’s no surprise there are rocky peaks cropping out above the ice. The peaks are clearly composed of rock, and it’s a coincidence that this particular peak has that shape. “It’s not a complicated shape, so it’s not a special coincidence either. By definition, it is a nunatak, which is simply a peak of rock sticking out above a glacier or an ice sheet. This one has the shape of a pyramid, but that doesn’t make it a human construction.” So, the new location is just that – a mountain poking out the top of the ice in Antarctica, and not a mysterious pyramid at all. Antarctica has been the subject of more than its fair share of speculation recently, after conspiracy theorist Eric Hecker described the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station by the south pole as an “air traffic control” hub for aliens earlier this year. Hecker claimed that in 2010 Raytheon, the US aerospace and defence conglomerate chose him to be a contractor on the research centre operated by the United States National Science Foundation. There was “much more” to the station that first met the eye, according to Hecker. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

CHARLOTTE, N.C.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 10, 2023--

The U.S. Justice Department is pressing ahead with its antitrust case against Google

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BOSTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 2, 2023--

FIFA 23 Bundesliga Team of the Season release date is set for Friday, May 12 at 1 p.m. ET.

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Wall Street projects that Tesla delivered about 455,000 units in the third quarter. Estimates are wide-ranging though. The number could come in anywhere from 440,000 to 485,000 units.

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