Toward the end of 2004 and beginning of 2005, I knew that Google would go through some growing pains due to the rate at which they were hiring. So, when the blogosphere started to wonder why google was releasing bland products like Talk, Google Base, Web Accelerator and not scaling well, like Analytics I was not surprised. With so many new heads, it was bound to happen.
But I also knew that as they started to learn, we were bound to see some interesting things with so many new heads in there. As anyone noticed that the recent product releases are a bit more polished – Calendar, Spreadsheets, Notebooks, Finance. They might not be the best, but they are not half-baked, and did not suffer from having too much server loads. Something right is happening up in the plex (although everything isn't right, but if it was, Google would be boring.) The focus though seem to be on fast releases – cool and simple products.
But here is what I'm really looking for. The convergence of the new forces at Google should be working to come out with their next killer product – more complex with mass usage. Search, Adwords, Adsense are google's most impacting products in terms of buisness success. Google needs another product on this vein(or a VERY significant improvement), and it would be sad if they are not working on that, or at least a significant improvement to any of those cash generators. |
"But here is what I'm really looking for. The convergence of the new forces at Google should be working to come out with their next killer product"
Whats a killer fo you , may not be the same for me!!
The diffrential equation of crowds at play... one size does not fit all concept!! |
Yes, true. Maybe I'm misusing the term killer. So let me say what I mean clearly – "A product that creates significant and measurable value/impact to the masses(either personal consumers or businesses), and to Google's bottom line." Other products outside of that does have value for some, but most regular people just don't care.
MS for instance understands that they must have significant upgrades to Windows – that's their product with the most significant and measurable impact on the masses. |
I think Calendar was suffering the launch traffic, it's even often slow nowadays...
I think what they're trying to do now is get a big fat foot in the door when it comes to "Web OS". They want to get the Web OS users right now, and then improve their products, so that the competition will have a hard time stealing their users. It's a soft lock-in; with web sites, competition is just a click away, but it's just so much more convenient to only register for a single (Google) account and then be able to use lots of Web OS tools.
Google Talk, to me, was a 90% perfect chat program. It didn't do *anything* special, but it also didn't do anything annoying. So, for anyone who doesn't care, and just wants to download a chat tool, and sort of knows Google and already has their account, that is a 90% cool option.
Google Calendar is a 95% perfect calendar. There are dozens others out there, for much longer. Some of them are good, others have lower usability, I'm sure some are great as well. But the competition is also at around 95%. Users don't need a perfect calendar to make appointments, they just need something that works.
Google Spreadsheets, on the other hand, is seriously lacking features at the moment – especially creating graphs. So that's the 80% good product – it's not enough to convince me and possibly others to switch from Excel. Google Co-op I think was another 80% product – just totally not good enough in terms of ease of use to make anyone switch from other sites (though for Co-op, I have a hard time even defining competition sites).
But as long as Google releases 90% cool products, people have reason to switch because they already have a Google Account, and they're naturally lazy like we all are. If a calendar competitor comes along today and creates something of 99% quality, much better than Google Calendar, he still doesn't have the grip of an existing community to make it take off – he might not stand a chance against Google. This might be bad in the future as Googleland monopolizes the scene, crushing smaller competitors (or, well, buying them). The only thing Google needs to make 90% cool products take of is a 98% cool web search. That's their real strength in building the Web OS... but will it be dangerous for free competition in the future? |
Philipp, I agree with all that you said. Actually, the number one thing I see Google really putting its brains and resources behind is Adwords, and doing a good job too. Search – they are really doing a good job keeping their quality the best.; but it seems to be getting boring, so there is a gap for someone else to come in with a new approach(Windows live tried, didn't work). Google needs to offer its own Google Search 2.0, before someone figures out the right new search formula.(I think people are itching for something new here)
I actually think they are investing alot in Base, and I think we will see Base and Coop have some type of merging.
If they have a strategic plan for all the other web apps/web os stuff. I don't see it. It seems more like a big experiment for now., as you said, a foot in the door. Google Web OS Labs?? |
