That thing almost nobody used? Seems fair.
EDIT: At this point, is there any value in comments about how Google kills things? I feel like it's a waste of time for a knowledgeable crowd like HN.
Google Kills Cloud Print
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Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#92(2013-2019) Gwern did a statistical analysis predicting Google product closures. It's useful context for discussions such as this: https://www.gwern.net/Google-shutdowns
Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#93That's a bummer; it was a god send for accessing printers without drivers on the client.
Printers are standardizing on a thing called "driverless printing," based on having some common Page Description Languages (or having the printer have support for handling a PDF directly): https://wiki.debian.org/CUPSDriverlessPrinting#Driverless_Pr... Each printer having its own driver is sort of like ... each terminal having its own escape sequences. When printers and terminals were purpose-built electronics with l…
Ha, 'bout time.
I bought an Oki 691 impact printer simply because it spoke to anything on the network without the need for drivers.
Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#94And that's an example why I think that it's stupid to jump on Stadia bandwagon.
Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#95Google has the corporate equivalent of ADHD. Having talked with ex-googlers and current googlers, the problem seems to be deeply baked into their culture. The incentive structures seem to favor the sexy over the boring, making it much more likely that someone will get promoted for launching products versus growing one. The fix seems to be obvious, create a separate path, a maintenance and growth hacker path, where pe…
While Cloud Print may be an exception, a problem seems to be that Google has perverse incentives.
Creating new products is probably over incentivized, while the boring work of operating and maintaining existing useful products is under incentivized.
Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#96Why doesn't Google just charge for this?
This is the only thing that makes printing off of an Android phone even ok. I have a Pixel and for the life of me I cannot print easily from it, and I have tried multiple different printer manufacturers.
Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#97Google has the corporate equivalent of ADHD. Having talked with ex-googlers and current googlers, the problem seems to be deeply baked into their culture. The incentive structures seem to favor the sexy over the boring, making it much more likely that someone will get promoted for launching products versus growing one. The fix seems to be obvious, create a separate path, a maintenance and growth hacker path, where pe…
My guess is these things are generally unprofitable because their internal costs are so used to operating as a near monopoly they simply can’t do anything on the cheap. Which ends up killing off seemingly viable products.
It’s much like how bell labs invented so much great technology, but could never make the transition to new producers themselves.
Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#98That's a bummer; it was a god send for accessing printers without drivers on the client.
Printers are standardizing on a thing called "driverless printing," based on having some common Page Description Languages (or having the printer have support for handling a PDF directly): https://wiki.debian.org/CUPSDriverlessPrinting#Driverless_Pr... Each printer having its own driver is sort of like ... each terminal having its own escape sequences. When printers and terminals were purpose-built electronics with l…
Thank f--- for that. The era of "Winprinters" and manufacturers trying to differentiate on (awful) software can't end soon enough. Apple had the right idea at the dawn of the LaserWriter back in 1985.
Re: Google Kills Cloud Print
#99Whatever happened to good old CUPS? Why did they have to introduce so many layers including Google's servers between the user and the printer?
CUPS is exactly what Google is switching Chrome OS to, as a replacement for Cloud Print. But the reason to have Google's (or someone's) servers involved is so that you don't need to be on the same network (e.g., you can print to your home printer, behind a firewall/NAT, while you're at a coffeeshop, also behind a firewall/NAT).
Buuuuut, is that really a valid use case? how many people do actually want to remotely print from another network to a printer, beside print shops without dedicated WiFi networks? How many people do actually want to use it as some sort of fax-machine replacement?