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How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

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Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#281

Post by fauigerzigerk »

jhasse wrote: post #241
fauigerzigerk wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that you need to own that same phone number permanently. Phone numbers are tied to exactly one SIM card, which is tied to exactly one telco in one country. Too many ties. Threema doesn't require a phone number but it's not free.

No, you can change the number associated with your Telegram account.

I was talking about Signal. Sorry I didn't make that clear. The phone number is your identity. Changing it means reregistering with a different number.

[Edit] And I think it's essentially the same with WhatsApp, only they now make it a less manual process.

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#282

Post by lkrubner »

When I talk to the 20 tech people who I respect most, what I notice is that everyone respects Google less now than 5 years ago. Is it a successful branding strategy that generates so much dislike?

I'm especially curious because Google is famous for basing its decisions on "data". I have no idea how things work in Google, but I can say that every company I've worked at that supposedly valued "data" in meetings actually valued something darker. The use of "data" in meetings tends to be a passive aggressive negotiating tactic for a group of people who for cultural or emotional reasons don't think it is reasonable to express strong disagreement or actual anger. Instead of expressing strong emotion, people are taught to quote data -- they then cherry pick whatever statistics back up their beliefs.

As far as I know, there has never been a company that said "We want the worst informed people to make the decisions" so in a sense all companies have always valued data. But they didn't make a fetish out of it. They simply expected people to be well informed, and to make intelligent arguments, based on what they know. That would have been true at General Motors in 1950. That much has probably been true at most companies for centuries. When management says that the company is going to be "data driven" they are implicitly asking for a particular type of interaction to happen in meetings, an elaborate dance where people hide their emotions and quote statistics.

I can't cover all the nuances of company meetings in a comment on Hacker News, and of course I am not advocating that meetings should be abusive, but I do think it can be healthy to tell meeting participants that it is culturally acceptable to advocate strongly, and with emotion, for what they think the right policy is.

Google seems like an example of how a "data driven" company can go off the rails. I'm not sure what their meetings are like, but I know that in interviews the management at Google talks about their focus on data, yet their brand image continues to decline.

And of course, I'm on the record in believing there should be less group meetings and more one on one meetings, at every company that I've ever worked:

http://simpleleadership.io/why-group-meetings-can-be-time-wa...

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#283

Post by drewmol »

crankylinuxuser wrote: post #92
pasbesoin wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. There's a reason users/clients have come to fear the Google acquisition of a product they've come to depend on and in which they've vested hopes of continued improvements and solutions. At least Google hasn't outright put a bullet in Voice, yet.

Have any recommendations for commercially similar solutions, that also support a proper SIP interface? I'm preparing for that day, when GVoice dies.

I use Google voice # + OBI220 device for home phone service, and hangouts on mobile/tablets. The home phone service using obi device in nice bc it's portable, the hangouts integration is fragmented, frustrating and unreliable

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#284

Post by appleflaxen »

lkrubner wrote: post #282

When I talk to the 20 tech people who I respect most, what I notice is that everyone respects Google less now than 5 years ago. Is it a successful branding strategy that generates so much dislike? I'm especially curious because Google is famous for basing its decisions on "data". I have no idea how things work in Google, but I can say that every company I've worked at that supposedly valued "data" in meetings actuall…

Wow. That is a really apt critique of the culture you are describing.

It sounds like you're basically saying that as with programming styles, wellness, activism, and everything else in the world: there is a basis of truth that underpins data-centric management, but you can easily make it into a cult.

You put that idea together so succinctly - thank you.

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#285

Post by iforgotpassword »

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #200
scrooched_moose wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's been my experience as well. Facebook/Hangouts/WhatsApp/Allo/whatever might have amazing features but I truly don't care. SMS/iMessage (since it's seamlessly integrated) has completely taken over with my group of friends because of one defining feature - everyone has it. If you have a phone number, you can receive a text from me. A while back one member of our group got tired of the 8 person running group threa…

I suppose you live in a country where the telcos offer free SMS. In Spain they cost money, so almost no one uses SMS for personal messaging. All the SMSs I get are from companies.

In Germany there's a bunch of different options when signing up with a provider, eg I have one where I pay 2€ extra per month for 100 SMS which is plenty for me. For 4€ I'd get like 300 or so. Its the same pricing for free minutes for domestic calls (normal landline or mobile, no service numbers obviously).

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#286

Post by carlivar »

Spooky23 wrote: post #41
b1daly wrote: post #22

It is remarkable how thoroughly Google has munged their communications platforms. Especially as an iPhone user, I am constantly befuddled trying to get a semblance of a well organized contact list between my google apps, never mind a correspondence between the iPhone native contact list. I have a google voice number, and generally I assume that messages get to me one way or another. The most recent baffled was finall…

It’s not just Google. Have you tried Skype for Business lately? Meetings are incomprehensible. Teams is supposed to fix everything... but my O365 tenant doesn’t have it yet.

Skype for Business isn't really Skype, it's the new name for Lync, which has always been garbage.

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#287

Post by luka-birsa »

luka-birsa wrote: post #137
signal11 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if you didn't use Jabber, the #1 reason I recommended Google Talk was that it was very, very lightweight at a time when MSN Messenger and friends were adding stickers and other teenager/young-adult friendly* features. Today, ironically your choices for relatively straightforward messaging on the PC/Mac are: iMessage (Mac only), Skype for Business (the consumer client is too distracting for words), Whatsapp Web,…

There are others of course. You can go Telegram or Signal as a great cross platform chat. Not geared directly towards business, but still a great alternative. Chat apps are the posterchild of what happens when open standards (irc, jabber, xmpp,...) get replaced with walled gardens. On my phone I run: Telegram, Messenger, Viber, whatsapp, hangouts, signal, slack and SMS. I should have installed skype as well, but its…

I'd just like to add that one of the key things I love about the current crypto craze is the fact that it gives us something that never existed before - the capability to monetize protocols. I know that most ICOs will fail, but through this process we might get something that solves this shitty situation with chat applications.

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#288

Post by throwaway2048 »

jackson1way wrote: post #196
whateveruser wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps try Skype lite? It has almost zero bloat, and has been working flawlessly for all my needs.

"Introducing Skype Lite Built for India - Chat and share with friends." it appears to exist only for Android phones. It's nothing but a joke that you'd have to switch to a "lite" version that is built explicitly for India [because of bad infrastructure] just to make it work in a country with much better infrastructure. It's like buying a low-end car built for Indian market, because your regular car doesn't fit on the…

This is a worthless analogy, because some software is paired down and is "built for india" it sucks?

A paired down debloated skype sounds like a godsend to me.

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#289

Post by vxNsr »

smt88 wrote: post #263
vxNsr wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, they recently remembered they have it and have begun removing features and options.

This sounds like a cynical joke, but for those people who don't use Voice, it's sadly what's really happening. I want to get off Google products for many reasons, but the main reason is becoming that I can't trust them to listen to users.

Rereading it I can see how it might sound like a joke... it's not. Truly very sad, they let you go back to using the old interface but sometimes you get jolted back into the new one and there's no way to access some of the old options... maybe if you have a really old browser user-agent you can trick it into only giving you the old interface?

Re: How did Google Talk change from a dream to a nightmare?

#290

Post by petre »

Freak_NL wrote: post #152
luka-birsa wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are others of course. You can go Telegram or Signal as a great cross platform chat. Not geared directly towards business, but still a great alternative. Chat apps are the posterchild of what happens when open standards (irc, jabber, xmpp,...) get replaced with walled gardens. On my phone I run: Telegram, Messenger, Viber, whatsapp, hangouts, signal, slack and SMS. I should have installed skype as well, but its…

Signal and WhatsApp require a smartphone though, so not fully cross platform, and tied to their (closed) client software. Not sure if Telegram requires a smartphone too, but it does seem to require a phone number at least.

Wire doesn't. It uses the same protocol as Signal, has mobile, desktop and web apps and the source is on Github.
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