All in it together. CC/Kenneth Lu
This item (excerpt, link, below) is about more than a cross-cultural exchange between two of the largest data-gathering giants on Earth.
I say, welcome to the Internet of Things. P&G wants all of its goods to bear RFID tags, which for the first time will match each of us to the individual items we purchase with credit or customer loyalty cards.
Google is also already in the locative business, through Google Flu Trends, and as the co-investor (with former CIA, Bechtel and Bin Laden family officials) in a company deploying a wireless grid over San Francisco.
Now, imagine a search engine, accessible to government agencies only, which could light-up a Google Earth map with everything you ever paid for, anywhere on the planet.
At Procter & Gamble Co., the corporate culture is so rigid, employees jokingly call themselves “Proctoids.” In contrast, Google Inc. staffers are urged to wander the halls on company-provided scooters and brainstorm on public whiteboards.
Now, this odd couple thinks they have something to gain from one another — so they’ve started swapping employees. So far, about two-dozen staffers from the two companies have spent weeks dipping into each other’s staff training programs and sitting in on meetings where business plans get hammered out. The initiative has drawn little notice. Previously, neither company had granted this kind of access to outsiders.