This is a submission for the Google I/O Writing Challenge
I had barely caught up from my email backlog and the disorienting reality distortion field as a City known as Las Vegas for Google Next when Google I/O creeped up.
So once again I found myself in a middle seat on a 777 with spotty WiFi headed to the Mecca of all things tech for Google IO 2026.
Mountain View is in many ways more dangerous than Vegas. With Vegas- the gaudiness is front and center- but Silicon Valley the danger is much more subtle.
Instead of Neon lights there are always pitfalls like the next performance-maxxing Founder bro that wants to do a 9-9-6 for the startup because of his Tik-Tok Feed.
In this era of the AI Job Apocalypse - I am surprised it hasn't morphed into 12-12-7 - with DNA testing Gattica style- but I am sure that it is coming.
I digress.
So Google I/O is in full swing. The first job at any Google event is decoding the symbols on your badge. One of the key benefits of the GDE program is early access and preferred seating.
This doesn't sound like much but it gets you into to the massive Keynotes and if you get there early - a great seat.
I had pretty much figured out the "E" on the badge was early access - but it took some asking around to figure out what the other symbols were. Don't trust the first guy you ask- they are usually temp staff just on hand for the big event.
Main Keynote
So somehow by sheer luck and grit- I ended up front row for the Keynote with a swarm of my fellow GDES. I guess the early bird gets the worm sometimes.
I am surprised my phone battery held up as I kept posting pics almost unedited to my Linked In feed.
The first thing that jumped out was numbers. Mind boggling numbers.
AI is mainstreaming new numerical terms. A Quadrillion Tokens?
You bet!
Maybe that will be enough for a tank of gas in the post apocalypse.
What followed was a non-stop barrage of new stuff:
Gemini 3.5: the latest family of models–starting with Gemini 3.5 Flash.
Gemini Omni: Nano Banana on steroids
Google Antigravity: One platform to rule them all!
Gemini Spark: Your very own corporate Open-Claw.
Probably the biggest impact for me personally was the sun-setting of Gemini CLI. I am a huge stan. But I get it. Why support two tools when one can do the job?
Dev Keynote
After scrounging for some chocolate chip cookies and more coffee- I finally had a chance to install the Antigravity CLI.
Before the keynote started I had the whole thing working end-to-end on my Chromebook. Definately some growing pains - but there is a transition period to get the Gemini CLI configs moved over.
What followed was a barrage of product announcements and Live demos.
The presentations were definitely more cohesive- as it seemed like a bigger picture was coming together across the entire Google Tech stack. It still wasn't there but you could see palpable progress.
Then the real IO started.
Wandering around the Shoreline campus running into friends - old and new. Some that I had met only virtually and some from previous wanderings.
This is where the real discussions got interesting. I found the dialogues revolving around key themes.
Google Books / Aluminum OS / Android / Chrome OS Flex. There are so many goals with this one- I hope it can hit all the marks.
Gemma4. The whole family of models have been running like a champ.
A2A. For now- but cross agent and cross cloud are going to drive new protocols.
Looker MCP. I can finally do Looker!
Oauth. You can't do much without it- but so complicated!
What's next?
Day 2.
More sessions and an NVidia Event.
Maybe if I ask really nice I can get some more GPU credits. They never last.