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I already find Google's handling of their chat software utterly nonsensical, but this one arguably takes the cake for ridiculousness, considering they already h

I already find Google's handling of their chat software utterly nonsensical, but this one arguably takes the cake for ridiculousness, considering they already have a chat product called "Hangouts". There is definitely no chance of branding confusion there.

chimeracoder 9y ago
> I already find Google's handling of their chat software utterly nonsensical, but this one arguably takes the cake for ridiculousness, considering they already have a chat product called "Hangouts". Apparently this product ("Google Hangouts Chat") is meant for work-related text chat targeted at businesses (I guess like Slack). Not to be confused with Google Hangouts Meet, which is Hangouts video chat, but branded for businesses. Google Hangouts Meet is also known as Hangouts Meet, or just Meet, and even their official website can't decide on which one to use, or even which one should show up in the Google search results: https://twitter.com/chimeracoder/status/968914718508371970 https://twitter.com/chimeracoder/status/968914718508371970 (Apologies for the self-link, but it's easier than reuploading the image).
- Declanomous 9y ago
  Google is taking naming cues from Microsoft now. Microsoft's naming conventions are maddening if you are trying to search for documentation. I have spent a lot of time developing for Access and Excel, and trying to search for VBA solutions is a madhouse. You could maybe chalk up the VBA|VB madness to decisions being made at a time when search engines were somewhat uncommon tools, but they have made this mistake so many times. For instance, try figuring out the difference between all the Active Directory solutions on Azure. The documentation describing the differences between them is spread out all over the place, and it's not clear which option is necessary to achieve a given result. Plus several of the Azure AD solutions have nothing to do with the Active Directory protocol. I would chalk it up to being unfamiliar with the Azure environment, but I'm working with a couple of Azure devs and even they were confused by the limitations of each version of AD and when you could use them. Honestly, if business units within a company could sue for copyright infringement resulting in market confusion I would highly recommend the Active Directory team send a cease-and-desist to the rest of the company.
  - chimeracoder 9y ago
    > I would chalk it up to being unfamiliar with the Azure environment, but I'm working with a couple of Azure devs and even they were confused by the limitations of each version of AD and when you could use them. Honestly, if business units within a company could sue for copyright infringement resulting in market confusion I would highly recommend the Active Directory team send a cease-and-desist to the rest of the company. Sometimes what happens is that a certain brand name becomes popular, and other people (or departments) want to piggyback off the popular name. For example: Watson is literally a household name, thanks to Jeopardy, so IBM now uses the Watson brand pretty generously, even applying it to things that are only vaguely related to the project that created a computer which beat Ken Jennings. I could believe that that's what's happening with Microsoft - Active Directory is a known entity to corporate IT departments, so tacking "AD" onto something makes it seem less threatening and more familiar. But I don't think that's what's going on here with Google. Hangouts was never that popular a name with users[0]. And it doesn't even look like they're piggybacking, from the trail of names we see. It just looks like a chaotic mess. I'm really perplexed as to what's happening internally to cause this sort of confused word salad of branding. I can't figure it out. [0] Amusingly, people still refer to it colloquially as "GChat", which was never one of the official names of the product! It was always "Talk" not "Chat" - look at the logo if you don't believe it - even though the records were stored in the "Chats" section on GMail.
    - ac29 9y ago
      Google certainly called it Google Chat: https://support.google.com/chat https://support.google.com/chat
mtgx 9y ago
It must be one of those accelerated returns laws - the number of Google chat applications doubles every few years.
JorgeGT 9y ago
But now you can have five Google IM apps in your phone! Allo, Duo, Hangouts, Hangouts meet, Hangouts chat... am I missing any? Definitely Franz Kafka is alive and well as Google's messaging PM.
- ucaetano 9y ago
  My guess is that the original hangouts will be deprecated, leaving: Consumer: - Video: Google Duo - Messaging: Google Allo Enterprise: - Video: Hangouts Meet - Messaging: Hangouts Chat
  - alooPotato 9y ago
    This seems right. The tricky part is what will they do in Gmail? Gmail is used by businesses and currently has Hangouts Chat built in. But Gmail is also used by consumers so will they have allo integrated into that too? Gmail seems like a big entry point for chat - not sure how they are going to solve that one if they split up the chat products as you suggested.
    - ucaetano 9y ago
      No reason why you can't have a product which is focused on enterprise, but has a free consumer version. I'd guess that in the real world outside Hacker News and SV, very few people use email for consumer communication, that role has been taken over by messaging apps. Personal email became a personal business tool, and its usage isn't that different from the regular business usage. So gsuite, which includes gmail, the new hangouts products and google drive/docs is now focused on enterprise with a free consumer version available.
      - y4mi 9y ago
        I think you're underestimating email. My almost 70 yrs old mother constantly exchanges mails with her friends. None of them use any chats.
    - andybak 9y ago
komali2 9y ago
I can't believe this isn't an April Fool's joke - it's just too ironic! Is google really not self aware enough to see what's going on?! My whole office is having a good laugh right now, we really cannot fathom how google can be this blind.
xapata 9y ago
It looks like they're going to switch from Hangouts Chat to just Chat.
- TremendousJudge 9y ago
  If you search for "Google Chat" the first result is Hangouts, and the sidebar card is for Google Talk. So, not even Google can keep up with their own rhythm
kyrra 9y ago
(I'm a Googler, opinions are my own. I don't work on chat apps). Hangouts Chat will sync with classic Hangouts, as called out on this page[0]. Copy/paste of that text here: >How will this interact with the older version of Hangouts, the one that lives in my Gmail? >To help make your chat experience seamless, all your Chat conversations will sync with your classic Hangouts experience. Though to be clear, it's 1-to-1 chats that sync between the 2. So migration for existing companies will be much easier. [0] https://gsuite.google.com/products/chat/ https://gsuite.google.com/products/chat/
- amluto 9y ago
  Hangouts can barely sync with itself. Does anyone really expect it to sync properly with the shiny new thing?

chimeracoder 9y ago

> I already find Google's handling of their chat software utterly nonsensical, but this one arguably takes the cake for ridiculousness, considering they already have a chat product called "Hangouts". Apparently this product ("Google Hangouts Chat") is meant for work-related text chat targeted at businesses (I guess like Slack). Not to be confused with Google Hangouts Meet, which is Hangouts video chat, but branded for businesses. Google Hangouts Meet is also known as Hangouts Meet, or just Meet, and even their official website can't decide on which one to use, or even which one should show up in the Google search results: https://twitter.com/chimeracoder/status/968914718508371970 https://twitter.com/chimeracoder/status/968914718508371970 (Apologies for the self-link, but it's easier than reuploading the image).

Declanomous 9y ago
Google is taking naming cues from Microsoft now. Microsoft's naming conventions are maddening if you are trying to search for documentation. I have spent a lot of time developing for Access and Excel, and trying to search for VBA solutions is a madhouse. You could maybe chalk up the VBA|VB madness to decisions being made at a time when search engines were somewhat uncommon tools, but they have made this mistake so many times. For instance, try figuring out the difference between all the Active Directory solutions on Azure. The documentation describing the differences between them is spread out all over the place, and it's not clear which option is necessary to achieve a given result. Plus several of the Azure AD solutions have nothing to do with the Active Directory protocol. I would chalk it up to being unfamiliar with the Azure environment, but I'm working with a couple of Azure devs and even they were confused by the limitations of each version of AD and when you could use them. Honestly, if business units within a company could sue for copyright infringement resulting in market confusion I would highly recommend the Active Directory team send a cease-and-desist to the rest of the company.
- chimeracoder 9y ago
  > I would chalk it up to being unfamiliar with the Azure environment, but I'm working with a couple of Azure devs and even they were confused by the limitations of each version of AD and when you could use them. Honestly, if business units within a company could sue for copyright infringement resulting in market confusion I would highly recommend the Active Directory team send a cease-and-desist to the rest of the company. Sometimes what happens is that a certain brand name becomes popular, and other people (or departments) want to piggyback off the popular name. For example: Watson is literally a household name, thanks to Jeopardy, so IBM now uses the Watson brand pretty generously, even applying it to things that are only vaguely related to the project that created a computer which beat Ken Jennings. I could believe that that's what's happening with Microsoft - Active Directory is a known entity to corporate IT departments, so tacking "AD" onto something makes it seem less threatening and more familiar. But I don't think that's what's going on here with Google. Hangouts was never that popular a name with users[0]. And it doesn't even look like they're piggybacking, from the trail of names we see. It just looks like a chaotic mess. I'm really perplexed as to what's happening internally to cause this sort of confused word salad of branding. I can't figure it out. [0] Amusingly, people still refer to it colloquially as "GChat", which was never one of the official names of the product! It was always "Talk" not "Chat" - look at the logo if you don't believe it - even though the records were stored in the "Chats" section on GMail.
  - ac29 9y ago
    Google certainly called it Google Chat: https://support.google.com/chat https://support.google.com/chat

mtgx 9y ago

It must be one of those accelerated returns laws - the number of Google chat applications doubles every few years.

JorgeGT 9y ago

But now you can have five Google IM apps in your phone! Allo, Duo, Hangouts, Hangouts meet, Hangouts chat... am I missing any? Definitely Franz Kafka is alive and well as Google's messaging PM.

ucaetano 9y ago
My guess is that the original hangouts will be deprecated, leaving: Consumer: - Video: Google Duo - Messaging: Google Allo Enterprise: - Video: Hangouts Meet - Messaging: Hangouts Chat
- alooPotato 9y ago
  This seems right. The tricky part is what will they do in Gmail? Gmail is used by businesses and currently has Hangouts Chat built in. But Gmail is also used by consumers so will they have allo integrated into that too? Gmail seems like a big entry point for chat - not sure how they are going to solve that one if they split up the chat products as you suggested.
  - ucaetano 9y ago
    No reason why you can't have a product which is focused on enterprise, but has a free consumer version. I'd guess that in the real world outside Hacker News and SV, very few people use email for consumer communication, that role has been taken over by messaging apps. Personal email became a personal business tool, and its usage isn't that different from the regular business usage. So gsuite, which includes gmail, the new hangouts products and google drive/docs is now focused on enterprise with a free consumer version available.
    - y4mi 9y ago
      I think you're underestimating email. My almost 70 yrs old mother constantly exchanges mails with her friends. None of them use any chats.
  - andybak 9y ago

komali2 9y ago

I can't believe this isn't an April Fool's joke - it's just too ironic! Is google really not self aware enough to see what's going on?! My whole office is having a good laugh right now, we really cannot fathom how google can be this blind.

xapata 9y ago

It looks like they're going to switch from Hangouts Chat to just Chat.

TremendousJudge 9y ago
If you search for "Google Chat" the first result is Hangouts, and the sidebar card is for Google Talk. So, not even Google can keep up with their own rhythm

kyrra 9y ago

(I'm a Googler, opinions are my own. I don't work on chat apps). Hangouts Chat will sync with classic Hangouts, as called out on this page[0]. Copy/paste of that text here: >How will this interact with the older version of Hangouts, the one that lives in my Gmail? >To help make your chat experience seamless, all your Chat conversations will sync with your classic Hangouts experience. Though to be clear, it's 1-to-1 chats that sync between the 2. So migration for existing companies will be much easier. [0] https://gsuite.google.com/products/chat/ https://gsuite.google.com/products/chat/

amluto 9y ago
Hangouts can barely sync with itself. Does anyone really expect it to sync properly with the shiny new thing?