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Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

9to5google.com

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Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#51

Post by iainmerrick »

GuiA wrote: post #44
whitepoplar wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People can smell when a product isn't earnest. From the beginning, Allo smelled like a directive by a Google VP to "get messaging market share."

Not that I’m defending Allo, but I don’t know how useful your distinction is. What is an earnest product then? Any product released by a company that has bills to pay is released to “get market share”.

I think they mean it was a “me too” product. “Everybody’s using their messaging app. That should be us! Let’s make a new messaging app and take over that market.”

As opposed to a really new and innovative product (e.g. the iPhone) or at least one that’s a notable improvement over existing similar ones (Gmail).

It’s a spectrum rather than a hard and fast distinction, of course.

Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#53

Post by sigfubar »

drewg123 wrote: post #41
xnx wrote: post #20

I complain about Google having too many competing/overlapping products, so I can't really complain when they close/merge them. The best time to shutdown Allo was before it launched, the second best time is now.

From an Xoogler's perspective, the launches are all about the promos. Eg, just think about all those engineers who would not have gotten a promotion because then they would not have had a product launch in their promo packet.

The technical term for this is “circle jerk”.

Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#54

Post by iainmerrick »

kyrra wrote: post #11
alphabettsy wrote: post #10

Hangouts and now this? Their track-record is one of the reasons I don’t adopt personally or recommenced new Google services to friends and family.

FYI, there was an update to that article that stated (from the lead for Hangouts) that Hangouts has no set shutdown yet, and they plan on transitioning everyone to Hangouts Chat/Meet before Hangouts Classic goes down. see: https://9to5google.com/2018/12/02/google-hangouts-shutting-d...

I have never understood why Google always exposes these account migrations to end users. Okay, something significant about the implementation is changing, and that takes development time, sure; why do users need to know or care about it? Just figure out how to make the migration as seamless as possible for them.

Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#55

Post by Raidion »

dragonwriter wrote: post #17
unsignedint wrote: post #14

Personally, I will miss Hangouts more than Allo, and RCS is not an direct replacement for Hangouts either. One thing I hate about Allo is its use of phone number as user ID, so the same goes for RCS. Just because I'm willing to chat with someone really doesn't mean I am willing to provide phone numbers to them. Edit: Repeated Allo, where I meant RCS.

> Personally, I will miss Hangouts more than Allo, and RCS is not an direct replacement for Hangouts either. The replacement for Hangouts is more Hangouts, not RCS (that is, per the article, Hangouts Chat and Hangouts Meet are being opened to consumers next year, and are the official replacement for Hangouts classic for consumers, just as they already were for enterprise.) > One thing I hate about Allo is its use of…

I agree, I'm of the opinion "hangouts" isn't dead. I don't see them removing a chat option from gmail. So far, they've pretty much kept the consumer and enterprise gmail experience the same. I feel like Google knows that just setting an if(enterprise) and hiding hangouts in gmail would just piss a LOT of people off, so I full expect them to find the brand with the best available and flexible tech stack, and just merge hangouts and whatever else into one thing that they'll call something different but will still be mostly the same, in the exact same spot in gmail.

Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#56

Post by berbec »

s17n wrote: post #28
alphabettsy wrote: post #10

Hangouts and now this? Their track-record is one of the reasons I don’t adopt personally or recommenced new Google services to friends and family.

What company has a track record of indefinitely supporting products/services which have failed in the marketplace?

Automobile manufacturers. You can take an El Camino to a Chevy dealership.

Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#58

Post by iainmerrick »

moonsun wrote: post #27
drstewart wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone except Google knew Allo was a bad idea before it even launched though.

Personally, I'd be on board with Allo if it was incognito mode by default with no option for the currently default mode.

That wouldn’t be a Google product.

Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#59

Post by toast0 »

GuiA wrote: post #44
whitepoplar wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People can smell when a product isn't earnest. From the beginning, Allo smelled like a directive by a Google VP to "get messaging market share."

Not that I’m defending Allo, but I don’t know how useful your distinction is. What is an earnest product then? Any product released by a company that has bills to pay is released to “get market share”.

Google was clearly not strategically invested in Allo; as it was one of at least five messaging products? Duo, Allo, Hangouts, SMS app, the carrier RCS BS. As a consumer, when i see that, I know Google isn't going to continue doing all of those in two to three years, but I don't know which one they're going to keep, and it's not worth my social capital to get enough of my friends onboard to try it.

Re: Source: Google Allo will be officially shut down soon

#60

Post by Twirrim »

Good to see the shuttering of Allo.

I'm sure I'm not the only one, but one of the big reasons I didn't use Allo was because they keep shuttering their apps.

I'm not going to use something I have doubts will last more than a year or two. I just don't have any use for such a product.

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