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Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

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Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#101

Post by csydas »

ProxCoques wrote: post #66

Video calling is a great example of something you don't need, but because you can do it, you do it. It's also impossible to refuse a video call for fear of being seen as secretive or worse when in fact you just don't care to look up somebody's nose when you talk to them. I also wonder if it's mainly nerds who care about video calling because it speaks to their otherwise rather broken social skills. "Normal people loo…

I find your position strange and contrary to what I've observed.

I wouldn't say that my friends/family/colleagues first instinct is video call, but we certainly use it enough when the situation is appropriate. My cousin uses FaceTime to be with his gf when they are supposed to be doing homework, my family does FaceTime/Hangouts with one another to keep in touch (spread out across midwest), I've used FaceTime and Hangouts to provide technical support remotely when I wasn't able to get to a computer, we've used it to "stream" events that certain family members weren't able to attend (e.g., weddings, etc).

Video conferencing has a lot of normal everyday applications; it's also not uncommon for people to just join up on various webcam chats just to hang out with people online, or for people matched on dating sites to start with a video chat.

I don't know how you came to some of these conclusions, but I really don't think that this is representative of most users.

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#102

Post by nagarjun »

It's already bad enough that I have a row of chat apps (WhatsApp, Messenger, Hangouts, Skype, Slack, Telegram etc.) on my phone because I can't get everyone I know to agree on one app and now, Google's trying to get me to add yet another icon to that list! I love Telegram but I couldn't get more than a few friends to try it out and even then, no one checks their Telegram anymore because none of THEIR friends are on it. Even though I love the tech here, I can't get enough people to try and use it.

Not sure why this had to be its own app. Could have just been included into Allo. Also, all of the other apps I mentioned above have some form a desktop app (which is in a way, the biggest factor for me considering that's where I spend most of my time). Sigh! Great tech, terrible packaging.

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#103

Post by comex »

> You shouldn’t have to worry about whether your call will connect, or if your friend is using the same type of device as you are.

...From the blurb from app that only runs on two operating systems (notably excluding Windows Phone), is proprietary (preventing third party clients from being written for other systems), and has no support for desktop operating systems (laptops are devices too).

On the last point, I suppose mobile-only for messengers is the new normal, but I for one frequently use iMessage and FaceTime from my MacBook in addition to my phone - depending on which device is closer, mainly - so Allo would be a significant downgrade for me. For video calls, laptops have an advantage over phones if there's more than one person on your side of the call, since you can get farther away from the camera to let everyone into the picture, without awkwardly keeping your arm held out horizontally or whatever.

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#104

Post by euyyn »

emsy wrote: post #74
ende wrote: post #5

Have they announced when it will be discontinued?

A bit cynical but that was my initial thought as well. It's sad because FaceTime exists for so long and is so easy to use and I'd really like to have an app that I can use with both of my parents (one Android, one iOS). But I see Google failing with this already.

So you rather Duo not exist and keep not having an app that you can use with both of your parents?

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#105

Post by sinaa »

sidcool wrote: post #18

Sounds promising. But not sure what this adds on top of Hangouts, which has a great group (and of course one to one) video calling feature. The only difference seems that Duo works with phone numbers, not Google Accounts.

It seems that a main differentiating feature is also the fact that all calls are end-to-end encrypted.

Perhaps as a video-calling alternative to Whatsapp? (given that neither of them are open source)

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#106

Post by yomly »

tonfa wrote: post #77
lern_too_spel wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worse, now I have to find my friends' phone numbers. Is this targeted to people in developing countries who use apps like WhatsApp? Those people don't have fast enough mobile internet to make video calling work.

WhatsApp is not specially an emerging market product, I think it is the most popular chat app in a bunch of European countries.

Yeah haha - the concept of people not using WhatsApp is as alien to me as people who use WhatsApp is alien to the parent comment.

In the last 4/5 years, the only time I've met people not on WhatsApp were Chinese (WeChat) or Korean (Kakao) so basically. Amongst people I've just met it's pretty common to go straight to WhatsApp now when "adding" each other

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#108

Post by csydas »

wutbrodo wrote: post #42
karma_vaccum123 wrote: post #20

I know these will be preinstalled on Android, but many friends and family use iOS and I will feel silly asking them to install Duo and Allo. Hangouts is able to mix voice, video and text just fine. Why start requiring separate apps? This is Google at its dumbest. They are squandering the small amount of momentum Hangouts has.

Google's communications strategy has been bafflingly dumb for years and years now. Almost my ENTIRE social network (that was on chat; this was before every part of society was "on the Internet") used to be on Gchat. That's a massive network-effects advantage that they had ages before anyone else did (including Facebook, but Facebook's network did surpass them with the ability to find someone by their face). Almost a…

> This is a pretty chronic Google problem that I noticed both from the inside and outside: their engineering and design talent are incredible, but the people responsible for the product and marketing side are evidently really, really bad at what they do.

See, I don't even think it's marketing, it's Google not understanding what they already have and engineering a solution without a problem. Hangouts as an app on mobile is okay - I have qualms, but it works well enough. Hangouts on Desktop though is horrible, and it's integration into Gmail is frustrating at best (it took them a long time to get something as simple as status messages back to Hangouts after the switch). I get the impression Google saw what was happening with Slack and wanted Hangouts to be that (and also a successor to Wave); a persistent "better than email" communication method with every bell and whistle you could want for communication. But since Hangouts was released, they've removed the few fun social features, removed hangout plugins, and just took what was feature-rich and dumbed it down to the point where I wonder why I should have an entire separate page open dedicated to hangouts when even Skype is a more graceful solution with more functionality.

I really liked gChat when it was small and out of the way. I won't make the claim "everyone used it", but we certainly enjoyed in our GAFE environment as it was an appropriate intermediate between email and phone call.

Duo makes me ask the same question now - why do I want this as opposed to just Hangouts, unless video is going to be removed from Hangouts or only Duo is going to get improved performance updates. This seems like it could easily be a hangouts update instead of a standalone application, and Hangouts is already available cross-platform on iOS and Android, or via any modern web-browser.

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#109

Post by [deleted] »

aluhut wrote: post #92

I don't have a number on my Pad...there is not even a Sim in there. Why can't it be just their damn Google account?! I dont even want to give my phone number to them and when I'm in a foreign country i don't want them to easy Switch between WiFi and the super expensive Roaming just because I went in the wrong corner of the Hotel room...

[deleted]

Re: Google Duo, a simple 1-to-1 video calling app

#110

Post by [deleted] »

nagarjun wrote: post #102

It's already bad enough that I have a row of chat apps (WhatsApp, Messenger, Hangouts, Skype, Slack, Telegram etc.) on my phone because I can't get everyone I know to agree on one app and now, Google's trying to get me to add yet another icon to that list! I love Telegram but I couldn't get more than a few friends to try it out and even then, no one checks their Telegram anymore because none of THEIR friends are on i…

[deleted]
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