Comments on: Two Google Ideas

By: dps

dps — Mon, 06 Nov 2006 00:05:40 +0000

Um… the LA Times story was first posted on 6th October…

By: andrewferrier

andrewferrier — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 20:47:34 +0000

OK, Dave, thanks for the link - am pleased to see I’m two days ahead of the LA times Looks like some at Google are taking heed. They better hope Sergey can convince bright young programmers that dotting the Is and crossing the Ts is a worthy thing. But I wish Google luck.

By: dps

dps — Sun, 05 Nov 2006 16:57:37 +0000

Interesting post, Andy. On the point that Richard raised, see http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-google6oct06,0,945092.story

By: andrewferrier

andrewferrier — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 23:15:47 +0000

Richard, I think that’s a little harsh - Google have done a pretty good job of sticking a decent consistent interface on conversations (Google Groups, based off NNTP, a creaking old standard), email (Gmail, ditto for SMTP). Sure, they haven’t tied the front ends together, which I feel is an oversight, but that should be a piece of cake, considering they own all the source code.

But they are still a young company, and you’re right in that many such challenges do come as a company grows older and more self-satisfied. What I’ve seen of Google so far indicates they stand a good chance of weathering some of that.

And you still use their products - so they’re doing something right.

By: Richard G Brown

Richard G Brown — Sat, 04 Nov 2006 16:46:05 +0000

“but you could do a better job of tying them together to show what I’m actually looking for.”

This, I suspect, will prove to be Google’s undoing. Creating something brand new is fun and cool.

Integrating existing systems, dealing with legacy code and consolidating incompatible systems is hard.

Google has yet to show they have any competence at all in this area