Google Tablet Mockups

> The ideas are only mock-ups, but Google has established itself as a real if not dominant force in the computing industry. Its Android mobile-phone operating system is increasingly influential, and its Chrome browser continues to steadily grow in usage. > > The tablet mock-ups show a variety of Chrome OS tablet ideas, including a virtual keyboard taking up the bottom half of the screen or detached and floating as a separate window. Also included are a slideshow mode, an application launcher, sidebar-mounted browser tabs, and a pop-up contextual menu. I don’t know about you, but this strikes me as desperate and a little sad, even. It actually reminds me of what Microsoft did with the surface a few years ago.

Apple announces AND demonstrates a fully-functional, real product that will ship in 60 days, and Google responds with some video of a prototype that may more may not make it to market in a year or so, in an attempt to divert attention away from Apple and cause a few users to “wait for the Google Tablet” instead of buying the Apple one.

“Look, we’re working on a tablet, too, and we even posted these videos of it two days BEFORE Apple announced its completed product.” As if the two days sooner proves in some way that Google wasn’t copying Apple on this. It’s been common knowledge that iPad was under development for years now.

Good luck selling Chrome netbooks, now that you’ve just told everyone that Chrome tablets will be coming along a few months later, by the way. You clearly didn’t learn anything from the Droid/Nexus One debacle.

It’s as if Google is still following the Microsoft playbook to the letter, despite clear evidence that this strategy is failing.