Problem: Working on the computer starts and ends with the search bar in browsers; however, these search bars are still extremely dumb. What would next-gen search, computing, and browsing look like?
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Solution: Michael Seibel in his April 13th Tweet had an interesting solution for this computing problem: a fully-integrated Google Chrome with G-Suite. His solution was being able to search Google Drive from the search bar: an absolutely new product feature that doesn’t currently exist.
To me, this idea actually sounds extremely similar to the concept of “Box Computing” which was extremely popular in the early 2000s. Box Computing was a theory that computing in the future will revolve around one search box that would be able to predict specific user intent in real time. Unfortunately, this idea never took off: but there is still a whet appetite for this type of product (as Seibel’s viral Tweet shows).
As described by Robin Li of Baidu in 2009,
"In coming days, you could find simply a box at the interface of your personal computer or any terminals. Input what you want to do, and then it responds," Li said.
For instance, a man who seeks to find a date through the online dating service would only have to type in keywords "single girl" in the box, and the search engine find out what he really wants instead of just text Web pages containing the keywords.
The Beijing-based search company Baidu hopes the "box computing" could provide one-stop online service by intelligently identifying clients' demands before giving optimized treatments and responses.
At the very least, ‘box computing’ signals a move towards a service-based internet that revolves heavily around client solutions.
Monetization: Perhaps selling this product or monetizing from advertising.
Contributed by: Michael Bervell (Billion Dollar Startup Ideas)