Photo

Cabbies and limo drivers have so much to think about. Should they ally themselves with Uber or Lyft or Sidecar or someone else promising to revolutionize ground transportation? If they do, will they be insured if they get in an accident while working with their own car? And what of the future? Will they be replaced by a fleet of driverless cars, a technology that has been talked about so much it seems just around the corner?

Several Uber drivers have expressed that last fear to me. The reason may be that David Krane, a former Google executive who is now a general partner with Google Ventures, made a $258 million investment in Uber last year, the fund’s largest single bet. While Google Ventures invests separately from Google itself, the link prompted rumors that Google’s extensively publicized driverless program would be showing up soon in Uber cabs.

Just a coincidence, Mr. Krane said in an interview. “These things are exciting, incredibly forward, but nowhere near ready for prime time.” He mentioned that when he rode in a Google car from Silicon Valley to San Francisco, it involved a human driving in the beginning, the end and often in the middle.

“We’ll see driverless Ubers at roughly the same time I can take a jetpack to work,” he concluded.

It was a bold and highly unusual dismissal of a prominent Google initiative from a Google insider. This raises three possibilities:

1. Despite all the hype, the tooth fairy will be making payouts in Bitcoin before we get cars that drive themselves.

2. Mr. Krane is not in the loop about what Google is doing.

3. Google is secretly working on a jetpack.

A Google spokeswoman did not return a request for comment.