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I don't understand what Hangouts is as a product. It's another huge marketing/branding failure by Google too. They expect the world to learn intimate details

by seiji 13y ago

I don't understand what Hangouts is as a product. It's another huge marketing/branding failure by Google too. They expect the world to learn intimate details of all their crazy products that aren't hinted at by naming. Google loves to hijack short and extremely common words to use as opaque identifiers for products. Examples: "Google Wave" -- meaningless unless you read about it extensively. "Circles" -- takes a while for people to realize it's actually "Google Friend List Where People Can Exist In Multiple Lists At The Same Time." "Google Hangouts" -- okay, "hangout" kinda works, but it feels way too casual. I don't want to "hangout" with most work people. What is it anyway? Video chat? Text chat? A Skype replacement? Mobile messaging focused? People don't really know unless they research it first.

buro9 13y ago
I get where you're coming from, but those comments sound anti-Google... and as is clearly evident I choose to use Google for most of my communication, I'm fairly for-Google. I think this is perhaps my fault, I failed to explain in my message that the confusion isn't with the notion of Hangouts as a new product, it's very specifically in context of replacing existing services I know and use, and how I cannot cognitively see the old service in the new, to the degree that I'm now very confused about the whole offering (and am not the only one).
- seiji 13y ago
  It's not so much anti-google as anti-people-in-ivory-towers-who-think-they-can-unilaterally-do-whatever-they-want. As much as we enjoy reveling in our creepy autistic spectrum ignorance of the world, we do have to integrate with the rest of it.
thezilch 13y ago
Examples: "Lamp", "Desk", "Monitor", "Headphones", "Mouse" ... Internets, Googles, Yahoos, Twitters ... WTF are these things asked just about everyone ever You can't name your product "Google Friend List Where People Can Exist In Multiple Lists At The Same Time," just as much as "anti-people-in-ivory-towers-who-think-they-can-unilaterally-do-whatever-they-want" (from your future comment) makes not sense.

by seiji 13y ago

buro9 13y ago

I get where you're coming from, but those comments sound anti-Google... and as is clearly evident I choose to use Google for most of my communication, I'm fairly for-Google. I think this is perhaps my fault, I failed to explain in my message that the confusion isn't with the notion of Hangouts as a new product, it's very specifically in context of replacing existing services I know and use, and how I cannot cognitively see the old service in the new, to the degree that I'm now very confused about the whole offering (and am not the only one).

seiji 13y ago
It's not so much anti-google as anti-people-in-ivory-towers-who-think-they-can-unilaterally-do-whatever-they-want. As much as we enjoy reveling in our creepy autistic spectrum ignorance of the world, we do have to integrate with the rest of it.

thezilch 13y ago

Examples: "Lamp", "Desk", "Monitor", "Headphones", "Mouse" ... Internets, Googles, Yahoos, Twitters ... WTF are these things asked just about everyone ever You can't name your product "Google Friend List Where People Can Exist In Multiple Lists At The Same Time," just as much as "anti-people-in-ivory-towers-who-think-they-can-unilaterally-do-whatever-they-want" (from your future comment) makes not sense.