8 ms·

Pandas and Lobsters: Why Google Cannot Build Social Applications

131 points by ssclafani 16y ago

frossie 16y ago
Quote: Google's culture has no respect for successful social applications. YouTube's office is still far from the Google campus to avoid the toxic attitude described by a former Orkut employee, "[Google has] an environment that viewed social networking as a frivolous form of entertainment rather than a real utility, and I'm pretty sure this viewpoint was shared all the way up the chain of command to the founders." I am not social networking's biggest fan - far from it. But the totally weird thing for me has been how Google has stepped away from even search-related functions of social utility, eg. withdrawing Public Calendar Search. The above statement would go some way towards explaining that - I'm still so baffled by the whole thing.
- Tichy 16y ago
  Maybe they worry about causing a privacy disaster?
  - frossie 16y ago
    You had to jump through hoops to make your calendar public and searchable (it was not the default option), so I doubt it.
sharan 16y ago
An astute article. "Understanding those concepts is not easy. It takes lots of practice, and lots of patience, and lots of learning." I think that's an important precis of the article. Google's engineers are used to designing and doing what's "right". They inherited the concept of search and have built a sophisticated algorithm around that established notion same with mail and their more successful products. Social on the other hand is a fuzzy science, it's hard to know what works and why ahead of time. It's much easier to do it in hindsight, but by then it's too late.
wallflower 16y ago
One of the more colorful, stream-of-consciousness opinions to appear on News.YC. Some interesting observations in the prognostications. > Google FAILED in acquiring and integrating other social products. Blogger, Picasa, JotSpot, Dodgeball, Jaiku. None are their category leaders now. Some are dead. Why? Metaphorically, foursquare rose from the ashes of Dodgeball. > Google cannot hire a Head of Social because no individual can change Google's DNA of building applications for pandas, not lobsters. I wonder what Marissa Mayer thinks about Google's role in Social. I'm sure they have something in the labs... but you can't grow a social network in a petri dish. Now I can see why Facebook probably won't ever merge with Google. It would be like an arranged marriage. Android is the wildcard wildebeast. Mobile phones are inherently social.
- waterlesscloud 16y ago
  Mobile phones, maybe, but pocket computers? I'm not so sure they're inherently social. Not completely so, anyway. They have a lot of utility beyond communication, and that may dilute their socialness to the point that it's no longer central.
  - roc 16y ago
    > "Mobile phones, maybe, but pocket computers?" If it has a data connection, then yes. If it does not, then no. A PC has all sorts of utility; none of which dilutes its "social-ness" once it has a data connection.
    - gcb 16y ago
      true. no matter how advanced is your device, it must be connected. google realized that a while ago. Anyone remember all the fuss with free wifi and darknet? my bet is that it's now trying a more subtle approach. Andoid thetering via open wifi hotstop by default, anyone? Btw, as my personal "fuck you" to AT&T i make my android became a open hotspot over 3G every time it's charging.
- benologist 16y ago
  Someone will probably build a huge and successful social whatever on Android, and maybe even the one that dethrones Facebook. But it won't be Google.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
aaronbrethorst 16y ago
I haven't gotten around to reading the linked article yet, but the first link in the linked article is a great way to end a long day of hacking code and building businesses: http://ifindkarma.posterous.com/what-do-pandas-do-all-day http://ifindkarma.posterous.com/what-do-pandas-do-all-day
code_duck 16y ago
Chrome makes me feel like lingering and luxuriating, in fact it's the way I linger everywhere else... so maybe they'll find a new niche with that sort of basic platform hardware and software.
DannoHung 16y ago
I still think Wave is a cool idea :/ I wish people I knew used it.
- theBobMcCormick 16y ago
  I wish you could buy a Wave appliance or Wave server to run behind the firewall. I think it could make a killer enterprise collaboration tool. Much better than kludgy crap like Sharepoint, etc.
- waterlesscloud 16y ago
  I think Wave's biggest obstacle was a clunky, slow interface. The concepts are quality, it just needs a real UI.
  - rortian 16y ago
    When was the last time you used it? Wave is not slow currently.
    - liedra 16y ago
      Yeah but that's part of the problem. They released it, it was slow and clunky, and that turned everyone off. OK so they made some improvements, but they probably should have done that before releasing it and turning people off :)
    - Maro 16y ago
      I just logged in, it still lags behind as I type.
      - moultano 16y ago
        What browser?
        Maro 16y ago
        It can be slow on FF3.6, fairly fast on Chrome.
greenlblue 16y ago
The article misses one big point. Social is all about generating noise whereas google products are all designed to cut through all the noise and bring you something that you need by filtering all the noise. There has not been a single social network I have been able to stand for more than 10 minutes because of the noise problem whereas google products are a joy to use for somebody that wants to get things done.
- ThomPete 16y ago
  Buzz? wave? you call these designed to cut through the noise?
  - greenlblue 16y ago
    Wave certainly since it's a collaborative tool for people that want to get things done. Buzz is a twitter clone but we already have twitter so I didn't really understand why they launched buzz in the first place.
    - ThomPete 16y ago
      Wave is noise IMHO. The very fact that you can go back in history and replay, have multiple people talk together and the way that it's built up is not what I would consider cutting out the noise. But that might just be me.
      - roc 16y ago
        Would you say that's more or less noisy than the email chain that exchanged and integrated as many changes and additions? A busy wave is noisy. But I think it can be quite an improvement over plain email.
        ThomPete 16y ago
        I think the problem is that Google does great when it comes to behind the scene filtering. For instance their spam filter in gmail is almost flawless at least from my experience. Anything that's about algorithms being part of the design they are great. But they fail completely when it comes to allowing people to interact with each other. They simply don't have the design principles for that. It's not part of their DNA.
spydum 16y ago
"Facebook is literally filled with master baiters" How can you go wrong with a quote like that.
- mahmud 16y ago
  The whole article was written for virality and news aggregators. Way too many interweb inside jokes, too many distracting links, way too much knowledge about flimsy websites, etc. I really felt tired reading it.
robryan 16y ago
Does Google need to conquer social though? I guess in a world of shareholders and delivering ever increasing profits they need to try. From the outside it seems it would just be smarter to consolidate a bit, focus on what they can do in the social based search space, do a deal with Facebook ect. I think they spread themselves across way to many areas without perfecting the core, like better support for the advertisers driving their massive revenues.
- wdewind 16y ago
  Google doesn't necessarily need to conquer social, but they definitely need to understand it better. They wasted a lot on wave and pissed a lot of people off with buzz. Plus the way the gchat contact list and the greader following work is completely mysterious, and that's kind of an important aspect of their social backbone.
  - mindcrime 16y ago
    Buzz and Wave both still have potential though. For me, if they would just roll out a standalone Buzz site that lets me view Buzz's and post without going into my GMail inbox, I'd use it a lot more. But having to go through GMail just feels incredibly clunk. Wave also has tons of potential, but they need to do a better job of explaining to people what it's useful for. And as somebody else pointed out, a better UI would be nice as well. Using Wave is still confusing to people who are used to different metaphors.
- jsz0 16y ago
  I think the big challenge for Google is they desperately need to be where the users are spending the most time online. Outside of search and YouTube Google just doesn't have anything that can generate Facebook/Twitter type traffic. I think maybe Google is starting to realize when traditional search becomes less relevant they're kind of in trouble. They don't have a whole lot to fallback on right now.
guelo 16y ago
Let's see how many Google products with massive social components I can come up with: Gmail obviously Youtube obviously Earth has a huge community building layers Maps is used and embedded by every other social service out there Blogger of course Groups of course Knol, though I guess you can call it a failure Orkut is massive in Brazil Picasa photo sharing Reader has sharing Talk obviously
- stuntgoat 16y ago
  So you are defining 'social components' as within the user space of the Internet proper. The author seems to be defining the user space as a single branded site. One difference is this: Google creates products that are designed to be shared via URLs. Other companies are really good at keeping their users logged in to their domains while users share with each other.
- dotcoma 16y ago
  I'd say: (almost) none of these. GMail is a utility. Same with Earth, Maps (we're talking about social components for users, not for developers), Blogger (Tumblr, that is based on a social component!), Groups, Reader and Talk. Social sharing in YouTube is extremely limited. I save my YouTube favourite videos on delicious, just to give you an idea, and never receive more than one suggestion a month about a video from the community. Knol is a failure. Orkut is strong only in Brazil (and India, perhaps) and is largely the (free) Brazilian AdultFriendFinder (you dive deep into it, and then you tell me).
  - GiraffeNecktie 16y ago
    YouTube for me is only social in the sense that the videos I like get fed to my Facebook stream. I have no connection with my friends or family from within Youtube and the quality of comments is so dreadful it makes me feel like I don't want any presence there whatsoever.
  - tansey 16y ago
    Interesting point about Orkut. I wonder if there is a Google Dating in the works. It seems to fit their mission of organizing and helping people search-- one of the most important search tasks in most people's lives actually. It's also inherently a panda task since you have a clear, stated objective that you want to accomplish and then move on.
gcb 16y ago
from tfa : google should be concerned because fb serves bazillion likes clicks a day. so what? the department of water should be concerned because coca cola sells a bazillion cans a day? who will ever go to Facebook to search how to buy some power tool? I already have ppl from the office telling me all the brand stereotypes. I want to see tables of rpms and torque. and price on stores. screw my friends opnions. I already got them offline. Facebook will only replace email (if ever) or IM. how to search case insensitive in less? have you ever seen one question like that on fb? I just got my answer on google. and I don't want to look nerd or newb on Facebook while doing that. so, great article on the initial reasons. but tried to stretch too far.
- doron 16y ago
  "the department of water should be concerned because coca cola sells a bazillion cans a day?" That is exactly the point, Google is not a public utility service, it is for profit. Google should be concerned in the same way Coca Cola is concerned about Pepsi, they dominate a certain market, but a moment of hesitation, and oops, you just lost the young demographic. When Google appeared, Yahoo ware an empire, Alta vista ruled certain searches, where are they now?
  - gcb 16y ago
    my point is actually the opposite of what you assume. my point is that facebook does not supersede google. as you assume saying cocacola vs pepsi. google search superseded yahoo search and altavista search. coca cola also does not replace DWP mainly because as much as people drink soda instead of water, they will ever hardly cook and bath in it. so, the article talks about two ways to lure users. but they aren't exclusively.
- zephyrfalcon 16y ago
  "who will ever go to Facebook to search how to buy some power tool?" Well, considering many people already have Facebook open pretty much all day... if Facebook decided to add a non-sucky form of search, somewhere in a sidebar of wherever, then nobody would have to "go" to Facebook... the ability to search would be already there. (Traces of that are already showing. Doing a search for X in Facebook shows people and pages as usual, but also a few web results. Nowhere near a threat for "real" search... yet.) Maybe in a few years people will say, "Why did we ever go to Google to search, when we can do it right here on Facebook?" <0.1 wink> (Of course, things may be different in work environments... If I worked at an office and had to look something up at Google, that should be OK; having Facebook open all the time, on the other hand, well...)
scottporad 16y ago
From the perspective of an investor owning or considering GOOG, here's what I think about: Over the next 5 years which is going to be more valuable: leading in social apps or mobile OS (with Android)? I don't know the answer to that question, but it seems like Google is placing their bet on mobile OS. Which do you think is more valuable...the OS or the social apps?
- jsz0 16y ago
  Betting on the mobile OS seems old fashion to me. In a few years we'll have complete parity in mobile. It really won't matter what OS you use. Even today we're pretty much there. I don't think Android can Windows-ize SmartPhones. There's too much competition and already too much parity. Google has a big problem if people are buying Android devices to mostly spend their time in non-Google services with non-Google ads. They'll still have a lot of mobile advertising but it may not be in the same ballpark as more targeted ads closer to the services/apps people are sharing data with.
msy 16y ago
>As opposed to Facebook, which hates whales because whales distract the lobsters from the traps. I agree with the article but I would never forward it on because it's so goddamn thick with unnecessary and absurd analogies and allusions.
- joubert 16y ago
  I thought they were kind of fun and matching my temperament this morning.
nochiel 16y ago
I'm uncertain about how this article ranked so highly on HN. It is such a woeful, tasteless soup of mixed metaphors and trite aphorisms that it becomes almost impossible for any well meaning person to tolerate it, read it and extract new insights, if any, from it.
brown9-2 16y ago
Consider this example: Google Answers focused on answers and failed; Yahoo! Answers focused on social and succeeded. Is Yahoo Answers really considered a success? And one-month-public Quora is "hot"? Lots of hyperbole here.

131 points by ssclafani 16y ago

Quote: Google's culture has no respect for successful social applications. YouTube's office is still far from the Google campus to avoid the toxic attitude described by a former Orkut employee, "[Google has] an environment that viewed social networking as a frivolous form of entertainment rather than a real utility, and I'm pretty sure this viewpoint was shared all the way up the chain of command to the founders." I am not social networking's biggest fan - far from it. But the totally weird thing for me has been how Google has stepped away from even search-related functions of social utility, eg. withdrawing Public Calendar Search. The above statement would go some way towards explaining that - I'm still so baffled by the whole thing.

Tichy 16y ago
Maybe they worry about causing a privacy disaster?
- frossie 16y ago
  You had to jump through hoops to make your calendar public and searchable (it was not the default option), so I doubt it.

sharan 16y ago

An astute article. "Understanding those concepts is not easy. It takes lots of practice, and lots of patience, and lots of learning." I think that's an important precis of the article. Google's engineers are used to designing and doing what's "right". They inherited the concept of search and have built a sophisticated algorithm around that established notion same with mail and their more successful products. Social on the other hand is a fuzzy science, it's hard to know what works and why ahead of time. It's much easier to do it in hindsight, but by then it's too late.

wallflower 16y ago

One of the more colorful, stream-of-consciousness opinions to appear on News.YC. Some interesting observations in the prognostications. > Google FAILED in acquiring and integrating other social products. Blogger, Picasa, JotSpot, Dodgeball, Jaiku. None are their category leaders now. Some are dead. Why? Metaphorically, foursquare rose from the ashes of Dodgeball. > Google cannot hire a Head of Social because no individual can change Google's DNA of building applications for pandas, not lobsters. I wonder what Marissa Mayer thinks about Google's role in Social. I'm sure they have something in the labs... but you can't grow a social network in a petri dish. Now I can see why Facebook probably won't ever merge with Google. It would be like an arranged marriage. Android is the wildcard wildebeast. Mobile phones are inherently social.

waterlesscloud 16y ago
Mobile phones, maybe, but pocket computers? I'm not so sure they're inherently social. Not completely so, anyway. They have a lot of utility beyond communication, and that may dilute their socialness to the point that it's no longer central.
- roc 16y ago
  > "Mobile phones, maybe, but pocket computers?" If it has a data connection, then yes. If it does not, then no. A PC has all sorts of utility; none of which dilutes its "social-ness" once it has a data connection.
  - gcb 16y ago
    true. no matter how advanced is your device, it must be connected. google realized that a while ago. Anyone remember all the fuss with free wifi and darknet? my bet is that it's now trying a more subtle approach. Andoid thetering via open wifi hotstop by default, anyone? Btw, as my personal "fuck you" to AT&T i make my android became a open hotspot over 3G every time it's charging.
benologist 16y ago
Someone will probably build a huge and successful social whatever on Android, and maybe even the one that dethrones Facebook. But it won't be Google.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

aaronbrethorst 16y ago

I haven't gotten around to reading the linked article yet, but the first link in the linked article is a great way to end a long day of hacking code and building businesses: http://ifindkarma.posterous.com/what-do-pandas-do-all-day http://ifindkarma.posterous.com/what-do-pandas-do-all-day

code_duck 16y ago

Chrome makes me feel like lingering and luxuriating, in fact it's the way I linger everywhere else... so maybe they'll find a new niche with that sort of basic platform hardware and software.

DannoHung 16y ago

I still think Wave is a cool idea :/ I wish people I knew used it.

theBobMcCormick 16y ago
I wish you could buy a Wave appliance or Wave server to run behind the firewall. I think it could make a killer enterprise collaboration tool. Much better than kludgy crap like Sharepoint, etc.
waterlesscloud 16y ago
I think Wave's biggest obstacle was a clunky, slow interface. The concepts are quality, it just needs a real UI.
- rortian 16y ago
  When was the last time you used it? Wave is not slow currently.
  - liedra 16y ago
    Yeah but that's part of the problem. They released it, it was slow and clunky, and that turned everyone off. OK so they made some improvements, but they probably should have done that before releasing it and turning people off :)
  - Maro 16y ago
    I just logged in, it still lags behind as I type.
    - moultano 16y ago
      What browser?
      - Maro 16y ago
        It can be slow on FF3.6, fairly fast on Chrome.

greenlblue 16y ago

The article misses one big point. Social is all about generating noise whereas google products are all designed to cut through all the noise and bring you something that you need by filtering all the noise. There has not been a single social network I have been able to stand for more than 10 minutes because of the noise problem whereas google products are a joy to use for somebody that wants to get things done.

ThomPete 16y ago
Buzz? wave? you call these designed to cut through the noise?
- greenlblue 16y ago
  Wave certainly since it's a collaborative tool for people that want to get things done. Buzz is a twitter clone but we already have twitter so I didn't really understand why they launched buzz in the first place.
  - ThomPete 16y ago
    Wave is noise IMHO. The very fact that you can go back in history and replay, have multiple people talk together and the way that it's built up is not what I would consider cutting out the noise. But that might just be me.
    - roc 16y ago
      Would you say that's more or less noisy than the email chain that exchanged and integrated as many changes and additions? A busy wave is noisy. But I think it can be quite an improvement over plain email.
      - ThomPete 16y ago
        I think the problem is that Google does great when it comes to behind the scene filtering. For instance their spam filter in gmail is almost flawless at least from my experience. Anything that's about algorithms being part of the design they are great. But they fail completely when it comes to allowing people to interact with each other. They simply don't have the design principles for that. It's not part of their DNA.

spydum 16y ago

"Facebook is literally filled with master baiters" How can you go wrong with a quote like that.

mahmud 16y ago
The whole article was written for virality and news aggregators. Way too many interweb inside jokes, too many distracting links, way too much knowledge about flimsy websites, etc. I really felt tired reading it.

robryan 16y ago

Does Google need to conquer social though? I guess in a world of shareholders and delivering ever increasing profits they need to try. From the outside it seems it would just be smarter to consolidate a bit, focus on what they can do in the social based search space, do a deal with Facebook ect. I think they spread themselves across way to many areas without perfecting the core, like better support for the advertisers driving their massive revenues.

wdewind 16y ago
Google doesn't necessarily need to conquer social, but they definitely need to understand it better. They wasted a lot on wave and pissed a lot of people off with buzz. Plus the way the gchat contact list and the greader following work is completely mysterious, and that's kind of an important aspect of their social backbone.
- mindcrime 16y ago
  Buzz and Wave both still have potential though. For me, if they would just roll out a standalone Buzz site that lets me view Buzz's and post without going into my GMail inbox, I'd use it a lot more. But having to go through GMail just feels incredibly clunk. Wave also has tons of potential, but they need to do a better job of explaining to people what it's useful for. And as somebody else pointed out, a better UI would be nice as well. Using Wave is still confusing to people who are used to different metaphors.
jsz0 16y ago
I think the big challenge for Google is they desperately need to be where the users are spending the most time online. Outside of search and YouTube Google just doesn't have anything that can generate Facebook/Twitter type traffic. I think maybe Google is starting to realize when traditional search becomes less relevant they're kind of in trouble. They don't have a whole lot to fallback on right now.

guelo 16y ago

Let's see how many Google products with massive social components I can come up with: Gmail obviously Youtube obviously Earth has a huge community building layers Maps is used and embedded by every other social service out there Blogger of course Groups of course Knol, though I guess you can call it a failure Orkut is massive in Brazil Picasa photo sharing Reader has sharing Talk obviously

stuntgoat 16y ago
So you are defining 'social components' as within the user space of the Internet proper. The author seems to be defining the user space as a single branded site. One difference is this: Google creates products that are designed to be shared via URLs. Other companies are really good at keeping their users logged in to their domains while users share with each other.
dotcoma 16y ago
I'd say: (almost) none of these. GMail is a utility. Same with Earth, Maps (we're talking about social components for users, not for developers), Blogger (Tumblr, that is based on a social component!), Groups, Reader and Talk. Social sharing in YouTube is extremely limited. I save my YouTube favourite videos on delicious, just to give you an idea, and never receive more than one suggestion a month about a video from the community. Knol is a failure. Orkut is strong only in Brazil (and India, perhaps) and is largely the (free) Brazilian AdultFriendFinder (you dive deep into it, and then you tell me).
- GiraffeNecktie 16y ago
  YouTube for me is only social in the sense that the videos I like get fed to my Facebook stream. I have no connection with my friends or family from within Youtube and the quality of comments is so dreadful it makes me feel like I don't want any presence there whatsoever.
- tansey 16y ago
  Interesting point about Orkut. I wonder if there is a Google Dating in the works. It seems to fit their mission of organizing and helping people search-- one of the most important search tasks in most people's lives actually. It's also inherently a panda task since you have a clear, stated objective that you want to accomplish and then move on.

gcb 16y ago

from tfa : google should be concerned because fb serves bazillion likes clicks a day. so what? the department of water should be concerned because coca cola sells a bazillion cans a day? who will ever go to Facebook to search how to buy some power tool? I already have ppl from the office telling me all the brand stereotypes. I want to see tables of rpms and torque. and price on stores. screw my friends opnions. I already got them offline. Facebook will only replace email (if ever) or IM. how to search case insensitive in less? have you ever seen one question like that on fb? I just got my answer on google. and I don't want to look nerd or newb on Facebook while doing that. so, great article on the initial reasons. but tried to stretch too far.

doron 16y ago
"the department of water should be concerned because coca cola sells a bazillion cans a day?" That is exactly the point, Google is not a public utility service, it is for profit. Google should be concerned in the same way Coca Cola is concerned about Pepsi, they dominate a certain market, but a moment of hesitation, and oops, you just lost the young demographic. When Google appeared, Yahoo ware an empire, Alta vista ruled certain searches, where are they now?
- gcb 16y ago
  my point is actually the opposite of what you assume. my point is that facebook does not supersede google. as you assume saying cocacola vs pepsi. google search superseded yahoo search and altavista search. coca cola also does not replace DWP mainly because as much as people drink soda instead of water, they will ever hardly cook and bath in it. so, the article talks about two ways to lure users. but they aren't exclusively.
zephyrfalcon 16y ago
"who will ever go to Facebook to search how to buy some power tool?" Well, considering many people already have Facebook open pretty much all day... if Facebook decided to add a non-sucky form of search, somewhere in a sidebar of wherever, then nobody would have to "go" to Facebook... the ability to search would be already there. (Traces of that are already showing. Doing a search for X in Facebook shows people and pages as usual, but also a few web results. Nowhere near a threat for "real" search... yet.) Maybe in a few years people will say, "Why did we ever go to Google to search, when we can do it right here on Facebook?" <0.1 wink> (Of course, things may be different in work environments... If I worked at an office and had to look something up at Google, that should be OK; having Facebook open all the time, on the other hand, well...)

scottporad 16y ago

From the perspective of an investor owning or considering GOOG, here's what I think about: Over the next 5 years which is going to be more valuable: leading in social apps or mobile OS (with Android)? I don't know the answer to that question, but it seems like Google is placing their bet on mobile OS. Which do you think is more valuable...the OS or the social apps?

jsz0 16y ago
Betting on the mobile OS seems old fashion to me. In a few years we'll have complete parity in mobile. It really won't matter what OS you use. Even today we're pretty much there. I don't think Android can Windows-ize SmartPhones. There's too much competition and already too much parity. Google has a big problem if people are buying Android devices to mostly spend their time in non-Google services with non-Google ads. They'll still have a lot of mobile advertising but it may not be in the same ballpark as more targeted ads closer to the services/apps people are sharing data with.

msy 16y ago

>As opposed to Facebook, which hates whales because whales distract the lobsters from the traps. I agree with the article but I would never forward it on because it's so goddamn thick with unnecessary and absurd analogies and allusions.

joubert 16y ago
I thought they were kind of fun and matching my temperament this morning.

nochiel 16y ago

I'm uncertain about how this article ranked so highly on HN. It is such a woeful, tasteless soup of mixed metaphors and trite aphorisms that it becomes almost impossible for any well meaning person to tolerate it, read it and extract new insights, if any, from it.

brown9-2 16y ago

Consider this example: Google Answers focused on answers and failed; Yahoo! Answers focused on social and succeeded. Is Yahoo Answers really considered a success? And one-month-public Quora is "hot"? Lots of hyperbole here.