Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
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Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
1–10 of 185 posts
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#2I can't state this enough. Building your company which heavily relies on an API provided by someone else is risky business.
Why are we still in this infatuation stage of ignoring the pitfalls of this?
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#3The original post mentions a 3-year deprecation period. Given the speed of technological progression, that would be pretty difficult for me to complain about.
Edit: The Translate API, specifically mentioned, will be deprecated December 2011. That's pretty soon.
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#4Google has made some unpopular developer-facing moves lately (App Engine pricing changes come to mind), and it seems entirely out-of-character.
From now on, any API announcement from Google should be accompanied with a GIANT expiration date stamped all over it by default. Then, if it keeps going... happy surprise!
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#5I can't state this enough. Building your company which heavily relies on an API provided by someone else is risky business. Why are we still in this infatuation stage of ignoring the pitfalls of this?
This shit still happens?? and people fall for it?!
http://raganwald.posterous.com/this-shit-still-happens-and-p...
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#6I would be very interested in seeing how many developers would pay for the Translate API if Google had decided to monetize it instead of deprecating it then shutting it down as some of the commentors on the blog had suggested. At the same time if the Google Translate API is such a popular service then maybe there is enough demand to support a startup providing a Translate API ;)
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#7You mean, why should you build a for-profit product while relying on someone else's not-for-profit API?
I'm guessing you shouldn't!
I've seen a lot of neat projects come from Google APIs, but that's as far as I'd taking it.
Relying on someone else's good will for the lifeblood of your company is insane.
1 exception, though: Getting started. I could see using Google to get off the ground and then switching to a more reliable API (read: paid for) afterwards.
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#8I would be very interested in seeing how many developers would pay for the Translate API if Google had decided to monetize it instead of deprecating it then shutting it down as some of the commentors on the blog had suggested. At the same time if the Google Translate API is such a popular service then maybe there is enough demand to support a startup providing a Translate API ;)
I would pay for what I use which isn't a whole lot, but it will be hard to find a programmable replacement like the Translate API. It's also a little hard to believe that it was a "financial burden" for one of the richest corporations in the world.
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#9I would be very interested in seeing how many developers would pay for the Translate API if Google had decided to monetize it instead of deprecating it then shutting it down as some of the commentors on the blog had suggested. At the same time if the Google Translate API is such a popular service then maybe there is enough demand to support a startup providing a Translate API ;)
I was thinking exactly this.. is this basically a list of already vetted startup ideas? There is clearly demand!
Re: Why should anyone ever use a Google API again?
#10I would be very interested in seeing how many developers would pay for the Translate API if Google had decided to monetize it instead of deprecating it then shutting it down as some of the commentors on the blog had suggested. At the same time if the Google Translate API is such a popular service then maybe there is enough demand to support a startup providing a Translate API ;)
Starting a startup to replace Google Translate wouldn't be a simple proposition. Google's translation algorithms are considered best-of-breed and involve highly sophisticated statistical machine learning trained over a significant portion of their web crawl corpus data. Their staff scientists and engineers working on Translate are some of the best in the field, and the complexity here should not be underestimated. That said: yes, there's very obviously an opportunity here for the right team; but that opportunity is so big, its been there this entire time, even with the Google Translate API around.