Inside Scoop: Video leak of rumored new Chromebook
Tech Industry
-Hey, everyone.
Welcome to the Inside Scoop.
I'm CNET's Kara Tsuboi joined by Senior Writer Casey Newton.
And Casey, we're talking about a new video that was released today allegedly showing off a new hot product from Google.
Tell us about the product and why it's alleged.
-So earlier this afternoon, a video showed up on the internet that purported to show something called the Chromebook Pixel which would be, if the video is accurate, the
first Google-designed Chromebook and the first touchscreen Chromebook.
And this is something that has been rumored since roughly November, and now a video has leaked, and we think that that's what this is.
-Now first of all, no comment yet from Google saying whether or not this is true.
-That's right.
They have not confirmed that it exists, and so we've been trying to do a little bit of digging to see where the video came from, but based on some more digging, we think that there's a good chance that it's a real laptop.
-Right.
I mean the rumors are, you
know, go back to the fall and, you know, Google has kind of in to me that they might be getting into both of these spaces.
-Yes.
In November there were reports coming from some Asian news sources saying that Google is working on a touch-powered Chromebook that had a 12.85-inch screen.
If you look at the video, it seems like this one would be in the ball park.
-Okay.
And why do we think that this video could be the real thing and not just a hoax?
-So the video was produced by a company called Slinky based in
Mountain View just like Google is.
It was started by an ex-Googler and this guy his name is Victor Koch posted on his Google+ page that Slinky's website had been hacked and all of their videos had been released to the public----
-Oh wow.
-Before their time.
He actually apologized and tagged Sergey Brin, the co-founder of Google, in that post.
Also posted a notice on his website saying they have been hacked.
So it seems like there has been some kind of hacking going on which does lend credence to the idea that this is a real video and maybe showing a
real product.
-Sure.
I mean the video is slick.
It's well-produced.
It's got a nice voice-over, but perhaps leaked, what, couple of weeks or months before it's really ready.
-It's hard to say.
You know Google loves to show off stuff at Google I/O, their developer conference.
That's gonna be in May this year.
That's only a few months away.
-Well, keep us posted.
If you hear anything more, I mean obviously it's going to be an interesting hot product.
Anything touch-enabled these days is a big deal.
-Absolutely.
We're starting to see touch come to more and more laptops.
It makes sense that Google would get into this market
and lots of the early comments that I've heard from people, they just can't wait to get their hands on it.
-Interesting.
Good back story too.
-Yes.
-Thank you so much, Senior Writer Casey Newton.
I'm Kara Tsuboi.
Thanks for watching the Inside Scoop.