Look inside Google's toy shop

Perhaps the most high-profile initiative to emerge from "Google X," the company's research lab for daring, long-term projects, is the self-driving car.

The Wall Street Journal reported this week that Google is currently in talks with automakers on how to bring the technology to market, whether through designing its own car or making its system available to others. The system probably won't be widely available for about six years, executives said, but they predict that one day "a significant number of cars will carry Google technology."

If Google (GOOG) builds a car, it would only be the latest gadget in Google's ever growing toy shop.