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> Their real problem at the moment is productization Hasn't this always been a problem at Google? Post-Gmail, what have they successfully taken from raw tech

by ethbr0 4y ago

> Their real problem at the moment is productization Hasn't this always been a problem at Google? Post-Gmail, what have they successfully taken from raw tech to successful product on their own? Hangouts/Duo/Meet? Chrome? (Although that latter they leveraged marketing pretty heavily) They've had a helluva lot more success buying successful or nascent products, then developing the hell out of them into more successful products. E.g. YouTube, Android, Docs

elefanten 4y ago
None of these really contradict your point… but they have some ongoing shots, some near hits and some successful non-monetized products: >Ongoing It’s not a successful product yet, but there’s a good case that they’ve got a strong lead in self-driving cars. Same with AI broadly, super recent sentiment notwithstanding… ongoing shot. >Near hits Stadia was a huge product marketing failure that proved the (very slowly) growing and succeeding cloud gaming model. >Non-monetized Go lang isn’t a “product” in the same sense, but it seems pretty successful. Similar deal with Kubernetes. Point is… productization + adoption from incubation is hard and they aren’t just totally flopping every time. Not sure any other big tech is doing way better?
- dandellion 4y ago
  The three best examples are a product that hasn't been proven yet, one of the biggest flops in recent gaming history (I would say the most notorious since the Dreamcast, probably), and a non-commercial project? If anything that reinforces the grandparent's point, I think.
- yyyk 4y ago
  Stadia didn't prove cloud gaming (there are many other efforts often predating Stadia), and its failure was much more a business strategy failure than a marketing failure.
- ren_engineer 4y ago
  Stadia failed because even in the launch thread people said they wouldn't buy because they assumed it would be shut down in a few years, which became true. Google is in a self-fulling prophecy situation for most of their stuff because nobody will build on their stuff because of all the stuff they kill and they kill stuff because nobody will use it
bluelightning2k 4y ago
Chrome, Kubernetes, Google Home, Waymo Although it's a good point for sure
sokoloff 4y ago
There’s nothing anti-product about using marketing to increase product adoption. If Chrome was slower or crappier (at launch), marketing wasn’t going to save it.
- ethbr0 4y ago
  I'd point to IE's market share while it was obviously technically inferior. Most people don't want to think about "Which browser?", sadly. Thus, marketing or default installs win.

by ethbr0 4y ago

elefanten 4y ago

None of these really contradict your point… but they have some ongoing shots, some near hits and some successful non-monetized products: >Ongoing It’s not a successful product yet, but there’s a good case that they’ve got a strong lead in self-driving cars. Same with AI broadly, super recent sentiment notwithstanding… ongoing shot. >Near hits Stadia was a huge product marketing failure that proved the (very slowly) growing and succeeding cloud gaming model. >Non-monetized Go lang isn’t a “product” in the same sense, but it seems pretty successful. Similar deal with Kubernetes. Point is… productization + adoption from incubation is hard and they aren’t just totally flopping every time. Not sure any other big tech is doing way better?

dandellion 4y ago
The three best examples are a product that hasn't been proven yet, one of the biggest flops in recent gaming history (I would say the most notorious since the Dreamcast, probably), and a non-commercial project? If anything that reinforces the grandparent's point, I think.
yyyk 4y ago
Stadia didn't prove cloud gaming (there are many other efforts often predating Stadia), and its failure was much more a business strategy failure than a marketing failure.
ren_engineer 4y ago
Stadia failed because even in the launch thread people said they wouldn't buy because they assumed it would be shut down in a few years, which became true. Google is in a self-fulling prophecy situation for most of their stuff because nobody will build on their stuff because of all the stuff they kill and they kill stuff because nobody will use it

bluelightning2k 4y ago

Chrome, Kubernetes, Google Home, Waymo Although it's a good point for sure

sokoloff 4y ago

There’s nothing anti-product about using marketing to increase product adoption. If Chrome was slower or crappier (at launch), marketing wasn’t going to save it.

ethbr0 4y ago
I'd point to IE's market share while it was obviously technically inferior. Most people don't want to think about "Which browser?", sadly. Thus, marketing or default installs win.