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Google is about to learn a tough lesson

blog.calbucci.com

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Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson

#181

Post by anigbrowl »

marknutter wrote: post #104

Twitter and Facebook killed RSS. It's a far friendlier interface for people to keep up with news and people they find interesting. Geeks may be lamenting the loss of Google Reader, but they make up a very small percentage of the internet population these days. When I suggest that Twitter/Facebook is the new RSS I often catch a lot of flack for it, but honestly, that's how far more people consume information than any…

It's a far friendlier interface for people to keep up with news and people they find interesting.

A preference for having things automatically sorted into neat categories may not be as unusual as you think.

Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson

#182

Post by anigbrowl »

WiseWeasel wrote: post #17

What are "influencers" going to do about it? Give Reader a bad review? Complain about the death of a product no one knew existed? I don't see how they have any leverage in this situation. The comparison with Microsoft's Word Count incident seems weakly relevant.

Well, I've been a strong promoter of Google's products over the years; I recommend them to others, show people how to use them, use them for project organization (thus pushing my usage pattern out to the rest of a team) and so on. I'm not about to suddenly stop doing that, but I feel an awful less invested than I did 48 hours ago.

Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson

#184

Post by coldtea »

henrikschroder wrote: post #13
llambda wrote: post #3

> 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…

>I don't think people who use RSS realize what a small minority they are.

Maybe you don't realise how many they are?

I mean, your very next line admits total ignorance:

>I don't use RSS or Google Reader, I've never even seen it

Thing is, people who have successful technical blogs know that lots of people come from Google Reader.

So even if it's a minority, it's a pretty important minority in the business.

Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson

#185

Post by anigbrowl »

zer0gravity wrote: post #33

I guess they're doing everything they can to get everyone to Google+. If they can't bait you, they force you. They want their own Facebook. Probably Blogger will also be phased out as soon as they afford to. But I don't think the future will belong neither to Google+ nor Facebook. I'm looking forward to a descentralized, user centric platform, that anyone can run on its raspberry pi box at home, that allows you to ma…

the thing is I quite like G+. I'm not a heavy user, it has flaws, but I am interested in what they are doing with it. If they were folding Reader into it in some meaningful way, I would feel a lot better about it.

Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson

#186

Post by sergiosgc »

llambda wrote: post #3

> 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…

Google did the math, and they used the numbers. What everyone is saying is that numbers are useless without a model. Now, GReader caters to the needs of the 9% in the 90-9-1 rule[1], so you could never expect it to see huge numbers of adopters. Google did the math wrong, because they set the wrong expectation, based on a wrong popularity model, and they will indeed suffer.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule_%28Internet_culture%2...

Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson

#187

Post by OGinparadise »

cromwellian wrote: post #169
OGinparadise wrote: post #156

Earlier 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…

What I said is a problem simply because of Google's market power, power they got by behaving differently. You don't care if people pay on everything they find through Google simply because that benefits Google. You also don't seem to care if Google, with 70%-99% market share penalizes competitors in search.

With you it's mission impossible. Have a wonderful life.

Re: Google is about to learn a tough lesson

#188

Post by sergiosgc »

henrikschroder wrote: post #13
llambda wrote: post #3

> 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…

> I don't think people who use RSS realize what a small minority they are.

They do: Contributors (curators) are, grossly, 9% of total users (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1%25_rule_%28Internet_culture%2...)

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