Scoble responds to our HN discussion: http://twitter.com/#!/Scobleizer/status/3154038992412672
Instead of tweeting and cinching, why not just click the reply link? There are plenty on the page.
Why Google can’t build Instagram
41–50 of 50 posts
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#42Scoble responds to our HN discussion: http://twitter.com/#!/Scobleizer/status/3154038992412672
Scoble's blog post's thesis was 'Google could never build Instagram.' He seems to have changed his argument: 'guys, you don't get it, Instagram is innovative!'
Clearly Instagram is on to something, and I think they are doing some innovative work, but that has nothing to do with whether or not Google could build this.
Also, a stopped clock is still right twice a day: sure, Scoble was right about Twitter (and possibly right about Foursquare...we'll see), but he seems to call everything innovative and exciting. The products that flop are swept under the rug and forgotten, and the ones that make it are trumpeted as evidence of prescience.
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#43If you ever read the Innovator's Dilemma, this article makes a lot of sense. For a project to make financial sense for a big company, or appeal to its current user base, it has to get big fast, be scalable off the batt and be compatible with their current software. So, it's iteration speed goes way down. Think about Buzz. They couldn't launch to 1,000 users and iterate quickly as they grew. They had to release it to everyone. Imagine the pre-launch engineering required to make an app ready for tens of millions of users?
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
> "...and there were probably hundreds of thousands of users on it" I'd be really surprised if usage was that high. I'd believe there being maybe a few thousand using it regularly.
I know 3 completely separate (and non-tech focused) groups of people (each 30+) that were/are running on Wave and are each pretty upset that its going away. I know that each of them came to swear by Wave for almost all intra-team communication. It wouldnt be a stretch for active users to run into the high tens of thousands. Unfortunately, thats tiny compared to the usage of Google's high-profile projects, so it gets…
If you want a conversation between more than two people, Wave kicks everything's ass. And unless you're the kind of group that's comfortable with setting yourself up a phpBB, I can't even think of anything that comes close.
Wave's problem wasn't that it's not useful, it's that nobody knew about it (of people I know, it had 0 adoption outside of computer geeks), and it couldn't integrate with desktop applications. A lot of us are stubbornly hanging on to Mail.app and Entourage because they integrate with our workflow better than web based solutions.
If google had come out with a a desktop Wave client that worked with OSX's address book, photo libraries, etc, it would have had a lot more draw. That sort of integration is less expected on Windows, but I'm sure they could have come up with some compelling features that the website didn't offer.
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#45Because Google isn't stupid enough to waste engineering resources on such a small niche that will never grow into a million dollar market.
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know 3 completely separate (and non-tech focused) groups of people (each 30+) that were/are running on Wave and are each pretty upset that its going away. I know that each of them came to swear by Wave for almost all intra-team communication. It wouldnt be a stretch for active users to run into the high tens of thousands. Unfortunately, thats tiny compared to the usage of Google's high-profile projects, so it gets…
If you want a conversation between more than two people, Wave kicks everything's ass. And unless you're the kind of group that's comfortable with setting yourself up a phpBB, I can't even think of anything that comes close. Wave's problem wasn't that it's not useful, it's that nobody knew about it (of people I know, it had 0 adoption outside of computer geeks), and it couldn't integrate with desktop applications. A l…
I completely agree. I know from my experience that if I could have just put in my normal Google Apps email and pushed everything through Wave, I would never look back. The fact that it was a self-contained, closed system killed a lot of its usefulness.
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#47Scoble responds to our HN discussion: http://twitter.com/#!/Scobleizer/status/3154038992412672
Instead of tweeting and cinching, why not just click the reply link? There are plenty on the page.
Because he can change your perception of the message a lot more narrating it than by writing it down (which is something cold). Or he's just lazy to type it.
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#48Scoble doesn't point out why he see's instagram as the pinnacle of innovation, apart from the fact they've received a high number of downloads. Instagram's success stems from the viral nature of wanting to try out these filter's that you've seen others using. Dont get me wrong, Instagram is a nice little service. But not the right example when compared to Google's recent failures in Wave and Buzz. Besides, Google hou…
Google goes for apps you might call big and wide. Broadly useful tools that you can make intensive use of and that capitalize on Google's strengths. GMail is an example of this, but Mail is a well-known product area. Wave and Buzz were attempts to create innovative new ones.
Instagram is a tiny little toy camera app hooked up to a website. It's very narrow-interest. It's not the kind of thing you wrap your workday around or rely upon.
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#49The only ways you'll get an Instagram out of Google is
a) Google finds some serious way to monetize it
b) Someone gets a 20% wild hair
Re: Why Google can’t build Instagram
#50I'm not sure I agree with everything Scoble wrote, but it's definitely interesting. One thing I think he doesn't really talk about: whether Google wants to build things like Instagram. The Google Wave example is a telling one - Wave wasn't the success Google wanted, so they scratched it. Nevermind that there were great uses for Google Wave, and there were probably hundreds of thousands of users on it, at least, who r…
> "...and there were probably hundreds of thousands of users on it" I'd be really surprised if usage was that high. I'd believe there being maybe a few thousand using it regularly.
The technology behind it seems to have made it into Google Docs (real time collaborative editing). There are plenty of people using Google Docs.