(image USA Today) I’m fascinated by this “Google Barge” story. It reminds me of the Google container stories of years past, which first sparked all manner of speculation, but turned out to be pretty mundane – a portable, water cooled data center, as I recall.
But their appearance in the San Francisco Bay, as well as off the coast of Maine, is laden with the echoes of science fiction blockbusters. As in alien spaceships mysteriously appearing over major capitals around the world.
It may be that this latest apparition will turn out to be hopelessly uninteresting. That’s certainly what most folks are speculating. But what the heck, it’s Halloween, so why not speculate wildly for a moment: What might be the purpose of these barges? What’s inside them? And why are they here, now?
Put your thoughts in the comments. I’ll publish the best answers in a followup post.
Update:
Here’s some funny tweets in response:
@johnbattelle offshore dorm and sweatshop for @MarkHalperin's google monkeys
— Rob Millis (@robmillis) October 31, 2013
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@johnbattelle 80s one-hit-wonder DeBarge, working on his come-back album in secret.
— Dr. Pete Meyers (@dr_pete) October 31, 2013
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@johnbattelle They're giant containers for Google's cash that has to stay offshore for tax reasons
— Terence Kawaja (@tkawaja) October 31, 2013
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@johnbattelle Deal between Google and NSA to allow them to monitor Google users comms 'not on mainland US soil'?
— Doug Monro (@dougall) October 31, 2013
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@tkawaja @johnbattelle It's the next Microsoft CEO hidden in the Google Barge. #winninganswer
— Calibre One (@Calibre1Search) October 31, 2013
John – “their”->”there” and “its”->”it’s” – come on, dude!
Doh. All fixed. I was writing while going into a meeting.
Hey wait, it *is8 “their”.
Data centers.
mmm data centers. Nougaty data centers.