Google does an Elon Musk: Netizens remember Tesla CEO as Gemini live demo fails twice during Pixel 9 launch; here’s why

Google introduced its Pixel 9 lineup at the Made by Google event on Tuesday with many new AI features that are powered by the company's Gemini AI model. The new feature were demonstrated by Google via live demos and things turned a bit awkward for the company when a live demo of a new Gemini feature that failed to go as planned despite two attempts and ‘demo spirits’ finally got going in the company's favour on the third attempt. 

During the presentation, Google's Dave Citron attempted to showcase a new Gemini integration with the Calendar app. Citron first attempted the feature via Galaxy S24 Ultra during the first two attempts and then finally switched his device in order to get Gemini working as expected.

“So if I happen to come across this Concert Poster for Sabrina Carpenter, I'll just open Gemini and ask, check my calendar and see if I'm free when she's coming to San Francisco this year. Gemini pulls relevant content from the image, connects with my calendar and gives me the information I'm looking for.” Citron explained as he tried to show the demo of Gemini's integration with the calendar app

‘Let’s see if the demo spirits are with us today' Citron hopefully remarked as Gemini took its time before returning an error message. The Google executive tried again only to get the same result. 

Netizens react to Gemini demo failure: 

Social media users were immediately reminded about another epic live demo failure when Elon Musk's Tesla Cybertruck demo didn't go as planned. In a 2019 demo of the Cybertruck's armoured glass, Musk asked the company's chief designer Franz von Holzhausen to throw large steel balls at the windows and in a epic fail the windows cracked, leaving the Tesla CEO red faced. 

One user while drawing parallel with Elon Musk's 2019 mishap replied to Gemini live demo video with the 2019 Cybertruck video. 

Meanwhile, one other user stated that Google could blame the failure on other issue like Elon Musk's DDoS attack excuse for issues during live-stream with former US President Donald Trump. They wrote, “Well, they can always pull Elon and claim that they were under imaginary DDoS attack”

Another user linked the Gemini demo fail to an issue Apple faced during the iPhone X presentation years ago. They wrote, “Google’s Gemini live demo failed twice. 💀 This reminds me of when Face ID refused to work in iPhone X”