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The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

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Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#381

Post by jncraton »

blhack wrote: post #370
cmrdporcupine wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

G+. The slogan at the time was "one unified Google" -- to I think rightfully correct a mistake that Google had a very diverse set of products many of which did not properly interact. As I understand it, GChat wasn't seen seen as able to integrate well into G+. So Hangouts was built on the G+/social infrastructure. To that team's credit they did somewhat seamlessly move users over from GChat to Hangouts without many h…

There must be a name for a concept that seems like it would be obviously true, but actually isn't. I don't think it's a bad thing that google ha a diverse set of products that didn't work together. I don't need my google calc/excel to integrate with youtube, and I don't need google play music to integrate with gmail. Google should look at these things as individual companies, which it seems like is something that the…

> I don't need my google calc/excel to integrate with youtube, and I don't need google play music to integrate with gmail. Google should look at these things as individual companies, which it seems like is something that they finally somewhat figured out with the alphabet rebrand.

That makes sense to an extent. Unfortunately, Google has created a number of products or "companies" with overlapping features that are in direct competition with one another. Just in the communication space, they have: Hangouts, Gmail, Inbox, Allo, Duo, Messages, and Google Voice.

These actively compete with one another and make the sum of all the products worse than just one good product. If I want to send an SMS message, I can currently use Hangouts, Messages, or Google Voice. I don't want to decide which to use, and I certainly don't want the one I choose to just disappear one day while I get booted over to another app.

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#382

Post by axaxs »

zbentley wrote: post #352
axaxs wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same. I adore hangouts, ugly and 'outdated' as it is. With Fi/Voice, it integrates perfectly as to call or text from any internet device. And who cares about wifi calling or volte support when with hangouts, everything is over data always and more reliable. Killing it is a mistake. It's the only Google product I'd gladly pay a monthly fee to use...

> I adore hangouts, ugly and 'outdated' as it is How is hangouts ugly or outdated? I've heard this from several people and I don't know to what y'all are referring. I have no particular love or hate for hangouts, I'm just curious.

Just from its looks, mainly on mobile. It's got a large, dull green banner that just says 'Hangouts'. I'm no UI expert, but it just looks outdated...

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#383

Post by tehlike »

axaxs wrote: post #382
zbentley wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I adore hangouts, ugly and 'outdated' as it is How is hangouts ugly or outdated? I've heard this from several people and I don't know to what y'all are referring. I have no particular love or hate for hangouts, I'm just curious.

Just from its looks, mainly on mobile. It's got a large, dull green banner that just says 'Hangouts'. I'm no UI expert, but it just looks outdated...

try messages, looks way more outdated.

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#384

Post by kyrra »

kkarakk wrote: post #322
kyrra wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Googler also, also unrelated product) I felt like Allo was actually a really great product. Comparing it's UX and features to other messaging apps out there, I felt like it was one of the most polished (iMessage or FB Messenger being similar). From a product strategy POV, it felt like a product targeting Asia (specifically India, as it launched with Indian themed sticker packs), at least at launch, but that changed…

Allo was so unpolished compared to whatsapp/telegram att it was hilarious,you def drank the koolaid too much. every indian i met treated it with disdain.

I'd love to hear why you think it was unpolished. I've talked with a number of people (both Googler's and other tech people) that liked the product (at least where it was going).

My problems with it were:

* It used the "phone is the source of truth" like Whatsapp, but it didn't go with always-on encryption (so they could do Google assistant in it).

* They didn't launch with a desktop web client, which it eventually got (and I really like it).

* It didn't launch with any kind of backup/restore system, though it eventually got it (so you could move to new phones).

Things I liked:

* Encrypted chats (incognito mode) worked well and had expiring messages.

* The Overall UX/UI for the mobile app and Desktop are (in my opinion) better than all the other messaging apps out there (except maybe iMessage). (Though I don't use any FB products.)

* It was on iOS and Android, and had the same features on both.

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#385

Post by cloverich »

lscotte wrote: post #347
isolli wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, in Slack I also miss important conversations when they happen in threads while I'm not looking.

Threads are a terrible feature they should never have added to Slack. Threads take one conversation and fork into multiple, which is just awful.

Unfortunately its a tricky UX problem that I haven't seen anyone master. Threads work well in Slack when you have a team culture that uses them consistently -- the channel sets the topic and threads keep individual discussions focused.But that requires a lot of effort in culture building which most people won't or can't do. And its still not a silver bullet, just an improvement. Taste's vary of course.

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#386

Post by auiya »

Cookingboy wrote: post #188
jordanthoms wrote: post #164

This is just an utter mess. Google keeps ignoring and trying to kill Hangouts (which should still be called GChat, that was an incredibly stupid rebrand), and building new products instead of investing in the one which actually has some potential. Google could have been a major player in messaging if they had just stuck with GChat/Google talk from the early Gmail days and kept investing in it. It was great on the ear…

I was there when that happened. The whole rebranding/transition of GTalk/GChat was the result of some political muscle flex by Social and its army of PMs, then after Social lost its favorite child status Allo was born as a result, championed by another army of PMs, and I wonder if Duo had a similar story of birth. >Google could have been a major player in messaging if they had just stuck with GChat/Google talk from t…

This happens in every company that employs the Vitality Curve method for employee performance metrics. It ensures only highly visible projects are incentivized, regardless of their actual value added. You are promoted under such systems by merely paying lip service to your manager's assignments, and instead spending your time creating some widget, and exaggerating its usefulness non-stop until someone in upper management buys into your self-promotional hype. "I don't care if the world doesn't need this, it's going on my OKR's dammit!" Your product is green-lighted, and you get a promo. Then your product is pulled some years later futher pissing off your users. Try to operate in an environment like this without affecting the morale of your colleagues though. Go ahead, I'll watch. After dealing with such systems for over a decade I've learned I don't actually enjoy playing Game of Thrones every quarter with my co-workers.

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#387

Post by pasbesoin »

kkarakk wrote: post #330
pasbesoin wrote: post #215

You do realize, Google, that most of us are simply not listening to you any more, on this topic? Personally, you've burned me too many times, in this domain. I won't be looking at your products, going forward. (My last phone came with a Duo icon pre-installed on the home screen. I felt an active aversion to clicking it; that persisted, and I never have.) P.S. In retrospect, killing XMPP inter-operability was indeed a…

i remember when i told someone to try allo/duo they laughed in my face and said to stick to whatsapp

I'm not advocating for them, either. But, you make a good point.

Here, I'm saying I'm off the Google IM merry-go-round.

I'm not turning to the Facebook family for a replacement. I've been backing away from them, as well; it was friends who dragged me into their products (Whatsapp, as well as FB proper and Instagram), in the first place.

Between the two, I trust Google more -- with limitations. I might be ok using their IM products to communicate with friends I can't convince to switch to something private, for lower risk communications. But... Google's made a complete sh-t-show out of their IM offers.

So, this is a Google customer -- or, "product" -- saying to them that one more launch won't make any difference. Users have been looking for one launch, then stop and just work on that.

You are looking at the wrong end of the stick. The people repeatedly launching: They're your problem. (Beta and all is fine: I kind of miss the days when it was genuinely so. This is something else, and it sucks.)

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#388

Post by JoshTriplett »

arwineap wrote: post #363
JoshTriplett wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Project fi actually DEPENDS on hangouts. No, it doesn't. In the beginning they strongly suggested that you use Hangouts for SMS on Fi, but they don't require it. I just use Messages on Fi.

Have you uninstalled hangouts, or are you just not using it?

Originally I had it uninstalled. I recently reinstalled it to use for a completely separate Google Voice account, but before that I had it uninstalled and I exclusively used Messages.

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#389

Post by tubaguy50035 »

scarejunba wrote: post #302
tubaguy50035 wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Turn your phone off and send a message to someone from your computer. Oh wait...

Huh, I’ve done this before. Don’t know why you’re acting like it’s not a thing.

You can send messages using whatsapp desktop when your phone is off?

Re: The latest on Messages, Allo, Duo and Hangouts

#390

Post by ewjordan »

stephenhuey wrote: post #365
danmaz74 wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You need a trained and certified Master because otherwise people new to Scrum might not know to pick hats You certainly don't need a certified scrum master. Ideally, the scrum master should be somebody who is already in the team. A scrum master who does just that is really a project manager, and having a project manager is, IMHO, antithetical to doing scrum.

According to scrum, the scrum master is not the product owner and not a member of the dev team, but rather an objective person who does just the scrum master duties, e.g. facilitating when needed, e.g. making sure people are following scrum instead of getting distracted, not stalled by roadblocks, not taking marching orders from more than one product owner, etc. In scrum, the dev team organizes its time after priorit…

This seems like a great topic for a pre-trospective meeting to discuss the process of how to structure the process to figure out the process.
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