Google: Just tell it like it is
I am getting really amused by the tone of the Google blog. I blogged about this recently when the froogle announcement came out and they have done it again today.
If you read the gmail / gtalk announcement, it follows the same tone as the other product announcements: " I am an engineer, someone came and said: dude, why dont we merge gmail and gtalk? I said right on! so we worked real hard and stuff and here it is. Cool huh?"
Please. stop. the. BS.
I am not questioning the value for users but anyone who has spent a little time working on the web knows that the gmail / gtalk integration will also you to do two things:
- Build inventory for placing more ads. (How about live ads that change as you chat?)
- Refine the personomies of your users and the relationship between them.
But Google keeps on pretending that innovation and revenue happen by accident. Just like that. You put a bunch of engineers together and you dont need a business strategy. They still want us to believe that they dont have a grand plan for consolidating all user information, interactions into a massive targeting and monetization engine. Come on!
Or maybe not. Maybe I am wrong, maybe they are just a bunch of geeks playing around, feeling and getting lucky. But in that case, why didn't I see a cool post about increasing your ad's font size to make more money? You know something like:
My mom wanted to buy a plane ticket to come see me for the celebration of my 12th PHD and she told me she could not read the ads on google. So, after my massage, I increased the font size and bam, she found a ticket. (and we doubled the average click through rate).
No?
personomies, google, gtalk, gmail
The
[...] I sooo totally agree
[...] I sooo totally agree with the author of this post. § [...]
Hahaha. Nicely said. A side
Hahaha. Nicely said.
A side note: I don't know how about others, but in my Gmail, Gtalk disappeared the next day and it's been gone for two days now. Guess, they did not work that "hard" on doing it and something went south? :P
A timely discussion given
A timely discussion given the outburst over Google's intention on and this, in particular:
My point about Orwell is that history has shown how difficult it is for institutions that acquire great power to live by the motto “Don’t be evil.” If you want to believe that Google is “different,” and that history doesn’t repeat itself, well then more power to you.
Full post
Which is precisely my point.
Which is precisely my point. It seems that many improvements google has made is coming from an engineer "who had a good idea". See the
If everything is driven by cool ideas, then one might wonder where is the strategy to generate revenue while "organizing the world's information"?
Sure google is looking for
Sure google is looking for money. And I think it's sure that they do all this because of money. But if they wrote this in every news it would get boring. And if you want to make money you need a great idea. Here they write how they got the idea. Is it so unrealistic? If you want to get money you shouldn't start with thinking how to make it. You should ask yourself what you and others maybe look for. Then you could think about making money with it. Couldn't it be possible that this guy really though that it would be cool to mix a mail account with an instant messenger? Then he wrote it down and presentated it in front of a google work group. They decided that they could make money with it and that developing it would be a good idea. That's how it goes normally. You got it now?
Greetings from Germany
Tom
I know about the 20% time
I know about the 20% time allocation. The point i am trying to make is that, from a corporate communications standpoint, Google hangs on to this "geeks rule!" approach without really acknowledging that they clearly are in for the money, and that they have a strategy to make it happen. They capitalize too much on their brand and i feel it is starting to erode.
actually, google encourages
actually, google encourages this kind of behavior, and programmers are given a certain amount of payed time and resources to use on their own personal projects, which they can then present to the department heads. if it's a good idea and fits in with their business plans, they're allowed full resource usage and it eventually gets either a beta or full release. read up on google, this info is readily available.
-mediaphile
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