Google's got a secret HQ?
The New York Times says the not-so-hidden complex sitting on the Columbia River is the laboratory for Google's next secret weapon. From above, it looks a big factory
or a nuclear plant, and it isn't situated in a particularly desirable area, either. That's barren desert land out there, on either side of the Columbia at the Oregon-Washington border--the
Times calls it "the intersection of cheap electricity and readily accessible data networking"--but it's also ground zero for Google's war with Microsoft for dominance of the Internet. The other
guys (Yahoo and Microsoft) are building tech fortresses of their own in Washington state. The
Times says Google is definite frontrunner in the global-data center race, remarking on the
impressive scale of its new computing center. The two buildings at the new complex, which will soon be three, will likely house tens of thousands of processors and disks, held together by Velcro tape
in a practice that makes swapping parts easy. There are also two large cooling plants that look like skyscrapers; these are essential because they absorb the heat produced by such intense computing
power. It's simply referred to as "The Dalles," (which is where it's located in Oregon) and no one can talk about it, save for the locals in Portland, 80 miles West. Employees are under a strict NDA;
the locals are the ones who told the
Times about it. Says one: "It's a little bit like He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named in Harry Potter."
Read the whole story at The New York Times »
