Google: Monetizing the Automatrix – Rerun
Posted on | November 21, 2024 | No Comments
I originally wrote this in October 2010 but showed it to a student recently working on a paper about the economics of FSD. It was my first post on autonomous driving.
Google recently announced its work on a driverless car to mixed reviews. While a technical success, with only one mishap in 140,000 miles of testing, many felt that Google was losing its focus. I think this latter view underestimates Google’s strategy – to monetize the road. As we move towards the “Automatrix,” the newly forming digital environment for self-driving and wireless charging transportation, Google looks to situate its search/advertising business at its center.
Let’s face it; the car is almost synonymous with shopping and consumerism. Whether going to the mall to buy some new shoes, picking up groceries, or going out to look for a new washing machine – the car transports both our bodies and our booty.
Nothing in the fridge? Drive out to the nearest Applebee, Dennys, or Olive Garden for some nachos and a diet Coke. Got kids? Try the drive-in for a Happy Meal or some Chuck E. Cheese’s pizza after a day at the water park. You get the point: have car, will spend. It’s American.
Google, which “wants to organize the world’s information”, clearly sees your car as a major generator of that data and the car occupants as major traffic generators – the good kind of traffic – on the web, not the road. They want the passenger to focus on the navigation, not the road. They want to provide destinations, pit stops, and other places to rest and refresh. The car will provide the movement while “the fingers do the walking,” to draw on a famous Yellow Pages ad.
While Nielsen, famous for its ratings business, has championed the three-screen advertising measurement (TV, PC, mobile phone), you could say Google is going for a four-screen strategy: PC, mobile, TV, and now the dashboard. Talk about a captured audience! It has the potential to pay off big, adding billions more to Google’s bottom line by tying moving passengers to the web.
Can driving through downtown Newark, sitting at a light, or leaving a movie theater parking lot really compete with the latest user-generated video on YouTube? As you drive to the airport, wouldn’t you rather be making dinner reservations or checking out entertainment on your flight or destination? No, Route 66 is going to be route66.com because, well, Pops Restaurant bought the ad word, and you would rather be enjoying a Coke and burger anyway.
Actually, I’m all for computers driving my car, as long as they are doing it for other drivers as well. Yes, I enjoy the occasional thrill of driving and, probably more, the relaxing feel from the directed focus of the activity. However, I prefer looking out the window, listening to music, and or even reading a book. I’m good at reading in a moving vehicle.
GPS has already rescued me from the travel maps, and I now need reading glasses to see them anyway. Besides, the road is dangerous. It’s really scary passing that zigzagging car because the driver is zoning out in a conversation with his ex-wife, or some teenager is texting the girl he has a crush on.
Sure, I have mixed feelings about sliding into the Automatrix. Taking over the steering wheel seems like a bit of a stretch, even for Moore’s Law modern-day’s microprocessors. It will require a whole new framework for car safety testing. However, it has been over 50 years since they guided the Apollo spacecraft to the Moon, so it makes sense to replace the current system of haphazard meat grinders we currently use.
The next in this series is Google, You can drive my car.
Citation APA (7th Edition)
Pennings, A.J. (2024, Nov 21) Google: Monetizing the Automatrix – Rerun. apennings.com https://apennings.com/global-e-commerce/google-monetizing-the-automatrix-2/
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Anthony J. Pennings, PhD is a Professor at the Department of Technology and Society, State University of New York, Korea and Research Professor at Stony Brook University. He teaches ICT for sustainable development. Previously, he was on the faculty of New York University where he taught digital economics and media management. He also taught in the Digital Media MBA at St. Edwards University in Austin, Texas, where he lives when not in South Korea.
Tags: Google Maps and Google Mobile > search/advertising business > three-screen advertising measurement
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Professor at State University of New York (SUNY) Korea since 2016. Moved to Austin, Texas in August 2012 to join the Digital Media Management program at St. Edwards University. Spent the previous decade on the faculty at New York University teaching and researching information systems, digital economics, and strategic communications.
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