Earlier quoted context omitted.
To an onlooker, it seems that it could both have worked last week, and not work today.
haha, I just died.
I was replying to yesbabyyes's comment and I get -3 points? Jesus...
Google is about to learn a tough lesson
171–180 of 242 posts
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#172Earlier quoted context omitted.
> By trying to be all things, they will become none. I just agree 100% they are an advertising company ,that's all they will ever be. The rest is bull. And i'm not going to use any of their vaporware anymore. But it's a great wake up call against all this Saas bull* , i guess journalists had a taste of what the implications of cloud computing are.
I don't think that's fair. They're an AI/machine learning company at heart now. Primarily that powers advertising of course, but they have the potential to do so much more.
Just that it used to be that they'd do it because it was cool, and potentially profitable.
Now they'd do things to be profitable first, and cool as a side effect.
It's arguable which iterative path leads to a greater market social and market impact.
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#173Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think people who use RSS realize what a small minority they are. I don't use RSS or Google Reader, I've never even seen it, but this week my Facebook has been filled by a tiny slice of my friends who are incredibly upset. The vast majority are just shrugging and not caring one bit. Only Google has the actual numbers on how many people are using their Reader, and they simply did the math. End of story. It's no…
Facebook users are also a small minority, if you want to go there. The problem is that some minorities count more than others, because they are influential (vocal, if you prefer).
They aren't just vocal; more importantly, people listen to them. They are the people that get products across chasms, so when Google encourages them to look elsewhere, they are encouraging many more people to look elsewhere, too.
The big question, which TFA states but provides no evidence for, is whether pushing these influencers away from Reader also pushes them away from other services, too.
My personal opinion is, by itself, no; but if you make Reader the frosting on a cake of discontinued products, it just might. Now, the general unease of "Will this thing I care about get terminated next spring?" becomes a much stronger fear, because it is tied to the personal emotions of Reader being killed.
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#174all of this (I think) is Larry Page in action. for a long time there was no clear strategy with Schmidt. "products" would pop up everywhere with no clear relationship. now Larry is cutting the wild growth. while it hurts some people I think in general it will strengthen Google.
> Oh, and I’m pissed with Google Reader going away. I used it 3-10 times a day to consume about 100+ feeds.
look, if you want to have a more effective RSS reading habit, use rss2email http://www.allthingsrss.com/rss2email/ and plug into the power of email-filtering. you don't even have to go to some "reader" to get updated.
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#175> Google made a big mistake cancelling Google Reader that will have severe ripple effects to its empire. Oh come on: enough already. Obviously there was a /vocal/ user base which is very loudly now upset that the product is being sunset. Guess what, Google didn't see it as a large enough set of people to make it worth monetizing. Such is life. Move on. It's certainly not the end of Google if that's what this article…
I don't think people who use RSS realize what a small minority they are. I don't use RSS or Google Reader, I've never even seen it, but this week my Facebook has been filled by a tiny slice of my friends who are incredibly upset. The vast majority are just shrugging and not caring one bit. Only Google has the actual numbers on how many people are using their Reader, and they simply did the math. End of story. It's no…
"they simply did the math"
Math is useless without a good model. The article challenges their model and rightly so.
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#176Earlier quoted context omitted.
haha, I just died.
I was replying to yesbabyyes's comment and I get -3 points? Jesus...
Probably because you aren't adding anything to the discussion (HN is not Reddit). See http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#177Earlier quoted context omitted.
Reading the commentary on this I feel like I'm only schlep in the tech industry that didn't use Google Reader. But then I ask my non-tech friends and guess what 90% of them say "Oh, I had some feeds on there from awhile back but I never really read them that often". I wonder if the people who used it are such trendsetters why that is the case ...
That's exactly my situation. I set it up, used it for about a week a long time ago, and never logged into it again. I think the coolest feature of it was its massive database of RSS feeds. I liked being able to flip through tons of categories and add them. However, it wasn't enough to keep me coming back, and that's probably why Google is discontinuing it. I wish there was some way to export all those feeds, though.
That's exactly my situation. I set it up, used it for about a week a long time ago, and never logged into it again.
That pretty much describes my relationship with Twitter, and almost none of my friends use Twitter. But I don't think Twitter is any less important for that; likewise, don't let your lack of interest in Reader blind you to the fact that it has high utility for others.
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
Google's mission is to organize the world's information, to be a Search Engine, not specifically a "Web Search Engine". People come looking for answers, not just sites. Their mission changes based on their revenue needs. First it was no ads on top, then send users as fast as possible to other sites, now it's almost all ads and keep users at Google at any cost. Even if what Google provides is sub-standard, very typica…
Vertical crawlers and linkfarms going out of business is different than publishers going out of business. The web's fertile lifeblood is content, federated, distributed, content accessible by URL. I worry more about newspapers going out of business than comparison shopping sites or RSS readers that never could charge $1 per month, that's nostalgia for a history that never existed. The open source community as a whole…
People seem to be clamoring for subscriptions to ostensibly free services that come at a cost, whether it's the threat of cancellation or restrictive use of their APIs. That's why App.net got so much buzz, remember?
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#179Earlier quoted context omitted.
People don't need gmail. They need email. You know, that thing that existed for years before gmail. To say people don't distrust google/gmail shows your naïveté and/or your rose coloured google glasses. Search and the collaborative part of google docs (ie multiple concurrent editors on a document) is the only thing where it's hard to find a true competitor that you can self host, not to mention hosted solutions.
>People don't need gmail. They need email. You know, that thing that existed for years before gmail. To say people don't distrust google/gmail shows your naïveté and/or your rose coloured google glasses. Aren't you a charmer. I'm about as far from a Google fanboy as exists. Trust in this conversation has been about existing tomorrow or not. No one doubts Gmail is going to exist tomorrow. And while you're right about…
I used to think that way, back when I had a Yahoo account. Now, lots of people could clone GMail and I wouldn't switch, because it's a decent service and pretty sticky. But on those infrequent occasions when I encounter a product that's a Big Leap Forward, I just migrate.
Search is the moat for me. Switching email is not nearly as big of a deal.
Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson
#180This just shows Google just doesn't get design. Sure, they may have figured out CSS3 and made Gmail super hard to use, but they don't really get design. Ever noticed how Facebook kills a feature? Slow, steady, they drift you away, showing you by hand what better is out there, and then the feature disappears, first from our conscious, and then from the website. If FB was the one calling shots here, they probably would…
An astute observation (and I say that as someone who dislikes Facebook and only logs in for about 1 hour a month).