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That works great for a service where costs scale with users so you can run lean in beta. Unfortunately I don’t think Stadia fits that description well; you nee

That works great for a service where costs scale with users so you can run lean in beta. Unfortunately I don’t think Stadia fits that description well; you need to build hardware, network PoPs, license games, etc. Maybe there is a private-beta approach that really iterates, initially uses off-the-shelf hardware, only launches in one state, has limited games, etc. but it’s hard to make a splash like that. I think if Stadia had just been better (so everyone using it was raving about it) the Google reputation might not have mattered. It just ended up not being a game-changer economically, people still want to buy consoles etc. The model of thin-client gaming might win long-term but it’s just not a clear winner yet.

jldugger 4y ago
> Unfortunately I don’t think Stadia fits that description well; you need to build hardware, network PoPs, license games, etc. Hardware is literally scaled by customer demand, and was one of the reasons gmail went with the invite only launch. Network PoPs are less an issue when you are already piggybacking off of Goog / GCP infrastructure, and you can mitigate the remaining costs by per country launches. And they did exactly that. It's still not supported in Hawaii. https://support.google.com/stadia/answer/9338852?hl=en https://support.google.com/stadia/answer/9338852?hl=en > I think if Stadia had just been better (so everyone using it was raving about it) the Google reputation might not have mattered. Stadia was too late to market, in a field where content is rare enough relative to the number of competitors to have bargaining power. And they have no vertical integration to lean on. Nvidia has GPUs in house, MS/Sony/Nintendo have game devs in house for exclusives. Amazon _might_ be able to parley Twitch into a profitable Luna, but its a long shot.
- munificent 4y ago
  > Hardware is literally scaled by customer demand Hardware manufacturing is, but design is most certainly not. It takes as much work to design a controller that you build one of as it does a controller you build a million of.
  - jldugger 4y ago
    Okay, fair, design costs have to be amortized across the userbase, and probably the correct solution to this is to build hardware people want to use with or without Stadia, so your design isn't anchored down. I.e. I can (and do) pair PS5 and Switch Pro controllers with other OS's. Obviously those other platforms don't offer the force feedback or HD rumble, but at the very least it's a signal to the your designers and the market that you expect your designs to be competitive in the open PC market. Obviously less viable for the set-top boxes, but still a valid strategy if you can do it.
- theptip 4y ago
  Hardware is well understood to be OpEx intensive, and have high up-front costs. Look at the pricing for injection mold dies for example. The opposite of a good fit for an iterative approach.
  - jldugger 4y ago
    In my defense I was thinking of the GPUs and servers, not the client devices (does stadia have clients?). In that scenario, might HW be capex -- a durable good you buy and use for many years, and can sell if you no longer require it?
    - theptip 4y ago
      Ah I see where you were coming from. Yes on the server-side that applies. The compute costs scale elastically with user count. They do have a client-side console/controller, and to be fair I had to look up why they did their own (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Stadia#Hardware https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Stadia#Hardware). > While Stadia can use any HID-class USB controller, Google developed its own controller which connects via Wi-Fi directly to the Google data center in which the game is running, to reduce input latency.[8] Google is also exploring further ways to reduce latency, using an idea called "negative latency" which involves prediction of user input through various means so that any apparent network lag between controller and game response is minimized.[12] During its GDC 2019 keynote reveal, Google confirmed that the controller would also feature Google Assistant, which will automatically search YouTube for relevant, helpful videos related to the game they are currently playing at the touch of a key.[13] I don't think any of Google's manufacturing capex is recoupable here; it's specific to making that thing, and if you don't want to make any more of that thing it's trash. (I'm not a hardware guru though, so that's not a statement made with high certainty. There might be bits that are reusable.)
mook 4y ago
> Maybe there is a private-beta approach that really iterates, initially uses off-the-shelf hardware, only launches in one state, has limited games, etc. but it’s hard to make a splash like that. That's… kind of the problem? They have a reputation for abandoning products after making a huge splash. The only way around it is to stop looking for big splashes and start building products slowly instead. Pixel phones were notoriously only available in selected countries. Google Fibre is even more limited.
TheCondor 4y ago
I never had stadia so I don't know, but was it games only? Or was it a YouTube TV box/Android TV and a game box? You could build a compelling user base to develop the scale and then make it more about the games. A coworker and I were chatting about it, what happens if/when Apple drops and Mx SoC in the AppleTV? There are the obvious apps, you create a camera add on and add FaceTime to the living room. Things like that but you also have a very serious machine that can go head to head with PS5 and Xbox, legitimately. I wouldn't be shocked if something like that were to happen.

jldugger 4y ago

> Unfortunately I don’t think Stadia fits that description well; you need to build hardware, network PoPs, license games, etc. Hardware is literally scaled by customer demand, and was one of the reasons gmail went with the invite only launch. Network PoPs are less an issue when you are already piggybacking off of Goog / GCP infrastructure, and you can mitigate the remaining costs by per country launches. And they did exactly that. It's still not supported in Hawaii. https://support.google.com/stadia/answer/9338852?hl=en https://support.google.com/stadia/answer/9338852?hl=en > I think if Stadia had just been better (so everyone using it was raving about it) the Google reputation might not have mattered. Stadia was too late to market, in a field where content is rare enough relative to the number of competitors to have bargaining power. And they have no vertical integration to lean on. Nvidia has GPUs in house, MS/Sony/Nintendo have game devs in house for exclusives. Amazon _might_ be able to parley Twitch into a profitable Luna, but its a long shot.

munificent 4y ago
> Hardware is literally scaled by customer demand Hardware manufacturing is, but design is most certainly not. It takes as much work to design a controller that you build one of as it does a controller you build a million of.
- jldugger 4y ago
  Okay, fair, design costs have to be amortized across the userbase, and probably the correct solution to this is to build hardware people want to use with or without Stadia, so your design isn't anchored down. I.e. I can (and do) pair PS5 and Switch Pro controllers with other OS's. Obviously those other platforms don't offer the force feedback or HD rumble, but at the very least it's a signal to the your designers and the market that you expect your designs to be competitive in the open PC market. Obviously less viable for the set-top boxes, but still a valid strategy if you can do it.
theptip 4y ago
Hardware is well understood to be OpEx intensive, and have high up-front costs. Look at the pricing for injection mold dies for example. The opposite of a good fit for an iterative approach.
- jldugger 4y ago
  In my defense I was thinking of the GPUs and servers, not the client devices (does stadia have clients?). In that scenario, might HW be capex -- a durable good you buy and use for many years, and can sell if you no longer require it?
  - theptip 4y ago
    Ah I see where you were coming from. Yes on the server-side that applies. The compute costs scale elastically with user count. They do have a client-side console/controller, and to be fair I had to look up why they did their own (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Stadia#Hardware https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google_Stadia#Hardware). > While Stadia can use any HID-class USB controller, Google developed its own controller which connects via Wi-Fi directly to the Google data center in which the game is running, to reduce input latency.[8] Google is also exploring further ways to reduce latency, using an idea called "negative latency" which involves prediction of user input through various means so that any apparent network lag between controller and game response is minimized.[12] During its GDC 2019 keynote reveal, Google confirmed that the controller would also feature Google Assistant, which will automatically search YouTube for relevant, helpful videos related to the game they are currently playing at the touch of a key.[13] I don't think any of Google's manufacturing capex is recoupable here; it's specific to making that thing, and if you don't want to make any more of that thing it's trash. (I'm not a hardware guru though, so that's not a statement made with high certainty. There might be bits that are reusable.)

mook 4y ago

> Maybe there is a private-beta approach that really iterates, initially uses off-the-shelf hardware, only launches in one state, has limited games, etc. but it’s hard to make a splash like that. That's… kind of the problem? They have a reputation for abandoning products after making a huge splash. The only way around it is to stop looking for big splashes and start building products slowly instead. Pixel phones were notoriously only available in selected countries. Google Fibre is even more limited.

TheCondor 4y ago

I never had stadia so I don't know, but was it games only? Or was it a YouTube TV box/Android TV and a game box? You could build a compelling user base to develop the scale and then make it more about the games. A coworker and I were chatting about it, what happens if/when Apple drops and Mx SoC in the AppleTV? There are the obvious apps, you create a camera add on and add FaceTime to the living room. Things like that but you also have a very serious machine that can go head to head with PS5 and Xbox, legitimately. I wouldn't be shocked if something like that were to happen.