I think Google is going to do with consumer AI as they have done with search engine. Full monopolization. They own the lumberyard and the forest.

They'll just see whats popular and then clone, launch and instantly own verticals.

It's over for the little SaaS guys.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxFQYw_MmAA

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riffraff 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

They can't even monopolize the ai effort in their own org. There's a dozen google ai products that all compete with each other (ai studio, firebase studio, opal, Gemini etc).

They have all the potential but have lost direction years ago.

I think they will stay relevant but not dominant, much like the case of Google meet.

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w10-1 3 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> all compete with each other

It's common business practice to set up internal innovation competitions, and blend the best.

	▲	sabellito an hour ago \| parent [-]
		You call all these products launches from google "internal innovation competitions"? And even if they were, which they aren't, are you sure it's a "common business practice"? How many companies can afford that.

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hopelite an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

> lost direction years ago.

I’ve never thought of Google as having some clear direction short of having dominated with the pagerank search.

It reminds me of people who invented a thing that is ubiquitous and therefore just sits there printing money all their life, but basically every single other thing they’ve done since then has been at abysmal returns on capital (ie, where they would have been better off just not doing anything and putting it in the money market… their contribution was extremely negative), while they delude themselves into what wonderful success they’ve been because the one-shot invention keeps printing money.

One exception might be YouTube, but if I recall the story correctly, Google was going to shut it down too when one guy (I don’t recall now) made a proposal and single-handedly turned it into the powerhouse it now is. But that’s just dumb luck on Google’s part. That guy could have also just as well have been somewhere else at that pivotal point and Google would have killed off YouTube like it has killed off so many other projects because it lacks the actual competence to follow through with things… everything always remains with a sense of being half-baked.

That reminds me of a thing I stumbled upon a while ago now, that technically speaking several of Google’s core offerings are still designated as Beta projects behind the scenes. I’m not sure why exactly, but even if it’s just an oversight of background clutter, that seems symbolic of Google; the disheveled, disorganized, cluttered personality that has not resolved loose ends smothered in decades of other loose ends.

	▲	cindyllm an hour ago \| parent [-]
		[dead]

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archerx 6 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I doubt that, I hear on the internet that Gemini pro is great but every time I have used it has been beyond disappointing. I’m starting to believe that the Gemini pro is great is some paid PR push and not based on reality. The Gemma models are also probably the least useful/interesting local models I’ve used.

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satvikpendem 6 hours ago | parent | next [-]

What are you using them for? Gemini (the app, not just the Google search overview) has replaced ChatGPT entirely for me these days, not the least of which is because I find Gemini simply be able to handle web searches better (after all, that is what Google is known for). Add to that, it can integrate well with other Google products like YouTube or Maps where it can make me a nice map if I ask it what the best pizza places are in a certain area. I don't even need to use pro mode, just fast mode, because it's free.

Claude is still used but only in IDEs for coding, I don't ask it general questions anymore.

I use Gemma as a developer for basic on-device LLM tasks such as structured JSON output.

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pants2 5 hours ago | parent [-]

Gemini just has many basic things missing like the ability to edit a message more than one message in the past and see branches of that conversation.

	▲	satvikpendem 5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		That's true but to be honest I didn't really use those features anyway, my chats are just one long stream of replies and responses. If I need to switch to a new topic I make a new chat.

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Flere-Imsaho 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I use Gemini from within AI Studio [0]. Not sure in what way you find Gemini disappointed, but I have get success with it through AI studio.

[0] https://aistudio.google.com

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woodson 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

The local Gemma models are pretty good for tasks involving multilingual inputs (translation, summarization, etc.). They have their niche.

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7bit 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

I used Gemini Pro and it was unable to comply with the simplest instructions (for image diffusion). Asking it to change the scene slightly by adding or removing object or shifting perspective yielded almost the same result, only with some changes I did not ask for.

The image quality was great, but when I ask a woodworker for a table and get a perfectly crafted chair of the highest quality, I'm still unsatisfied.

I cancelled my subscription after two days trying to get Gemini to follow my instructions.