13 ms·

I can't imagine ever building something that relies on a Google service at this point. There is a lot of collateral damage when they do things like this, damag

I can't imagine ever building something that relies on a Google service at this point. There is a lot of collateral damage when they do things like this, damage that hurts them when even when it comes to developers like me who've never written a single line of code that integrates with Google Checkout.

przemelek 13y ago
Yeah, but how many business was using Google Checkout as only method of payment? This decision will hurt only those businesses. Rest of businesses using Google Checkout will remove one of payments method. Not a big deal, and we may guess that this method was probably not so popular already.
- unreal37 13y ago
  I had a client that used Google Checkout as the only method of payment. It's not rare. It is a mom & pop (truly) web site selling products online.
  - Moto7451 13y ago
    Indeed. I did a similar setup years and years ago for a mom and pop shop (well before Braintree and Stripe) and I had to choose between Paypal and Google Checkout. Glad I set them up with Paypal.
- deleted 13y ago
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- spoiledtechie 13y ago
  My startup for a time being was only using Google Checkout. Here lies the problem. Can't trust Google with building APIs when they reorganize. This is surprising to me, but I wonder if Google Maps could close down....
  - gwern 13y ago
    > I wonder if Google Maps could close down.... No. Google has bought what must be dozens of companies at this point just to support and improve Maps (Waze being the latest), it's reportedly profitable & popular, with the continued rise of mobile I'd expect it to become more important, and my little survival analysis (http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns) gives it 87% odds of surviving to May 2018 (which IMO is too low).
    - mcintyre1994 13y ago
      That page is always really interesting when it comes up, but have you considered adding data for existing product improvements by acquisition? You include a variable for whether it was initially acquired or not, but perhaps big acquisitions clearly for the purpose of improving a product are a strong signal of longevity?
      - gwern 13y ago
        That's not a bad idea, but at this point it would be hard to go back and be able to classify each product by how many other products were merged into it. That information is not always clearly laid out publicly (to say the least).
    - doubt_me 13y ago
      Also there are a bunch of government people who work on it I think. I saw a bunch of public linkedIn profiles with NSA analysts and people in the private sector with google maps listed as experience for whatever reason
      - 13y ago
- kkthnxbye 13y ago
  I feel the problem lies in the fact that Google shuts down whatever service they deem not "successful". Because of this, I'm starting to weigh my options differently when Google services are in the picture, and I don't think I'm alone in this. That being said, any other services could be shut down via an aqui-hire, or other reasons. Maybe this is the prevailing problem of small time developers like myself, and there's no other way around it apart from getting your idea bootstrapped with these services, and hopefully by the time any of those services gets shut down (if ever), you'll have a migration / backup plan of some sort.
grinning 13y ago
Enough with that nonsense. You had plenty of notice and a reasonable deprication period: http://googlecommerce.blogspot.com/2013/05/an-update-to-google-checkout-for.html http://googlecommerce.blogspot.com/2013/05/an-update-to-goog... and also a superior replacement in Wallet If anyone is to depricate anything that is the way to do it. Yours is the generic reactionary comment for these sorts of submissions. You ignore the motive and thinking behind these actions and resort to FUD.
vicks711 13y ago
Completely agree with you there mate.
c4mden 13y ago
As someone previously burned by this business model, let me be the first to tell you how right you are. I built a small business around their SOAP search API some seven years ago, and received a commercial license and increased API usage to bring my product to market. After easily lining up enough customers to exceed my daily limit, I lobbied for higher usage and a method to share the revenue (they had no structure to charge for API calls back then). For years I tried to contact anyone I could within the organization, but there was no response. After an eternity, they simply shut it down with no notice. You just never know how long they're going to enjoy experimenting with their APIs, and unless you have a backup plan, it's a deal breaker.
ChuckMcM 13y ago
I got yelled at for telling people that :-) Or more seriously when I worked at Google a third party came to me excited about a new Google service that I knew was like the half baked 20% project of a new employee and getting little traction. I suggested they hold off on committing until it was more fully baked. Long story short it got back to the guy and I got scolded for 'sabotaging' a project (which vanished without a trace 9 months later when the person moved on to a project that didn't encourage 20% time). I completely understood the idea of 'trying' something to see if it would work, but worried about the difference between the project "inside" the plex vs the view of it outside the walls. Personally I think that bringing some more discipline to that was one of the better things Larry has done as CEO so far. That said, payments systems at Google have always been really really weird. Weird in the sense that they tend to 'force' a user support infrastructure which has historically been anathema to Google product deployment. People will put up with "Go to this forum and ask your question, maybe another user can help you out." for a lot of things, but when it involves actual money, not so much. Not to mention the rules that come along with handling money. It's really too bad since Google could be a force for great good here, instead PayPal continues to own the space. (I'm rooting for Dwolla and Square though, they are showing great strength here).
- DanBC 13y ago
  > but worried about the difference between the project "inside" the plex vs the view of it outside the walls. Personally I think that bringing some more discipline to that was one of the better things Larry has done as CEO so far. Wasn't that the point of Labs? To allow experimental projects to get used by people outside Google?
  - ChuckMcM 13y ago
    Yes, as far as I could tell that was part of the Labs mission (this was between 2006 and 2010). The confounding factor at the time was that "labs" was one of about four different ways something went from idea into "production" (aka visible outside Google), a tremendous amount depended on the project manager you worked with. There were people who had been at Google long enough that they could get an idea from first successful build to production in a month, knocking down all the various stubs of process that were in the way (like Marissa's UI review). These folks were well regarded by the fact that they got a lot of stuff done. Pretty much anyone, with the right set of people, could ship nearly anything. The downside was that sometimes things that came out were not as baked as they might appear to someone on the outside.
ClashTheBunny 13y ago
> I can't imagine ever building something that relies on a <any company name> service at this point. Seriously, if you don't build it or own it, you can't rely on it. SaaS is convenient, but it's a flawed business model if you depend on any startup/product lasting forever. If you want to last forever, you have to innovate for yourself or buy the people you will depend on.

przemelek 13y ago

Yeah, but how many business was using Google Checkout as only method of payment? This decision will hurt only those businesses. Rest of businesses using Google Checkout will remove one of payments method. Not a big deal, and we may guess that this method was probably not so popular already.

unreal37 13y ago
I had a client that used Google Checkout as the only method of payment. It's not rare. It is a mom & pop (truly) web site selling products online.
- Moto7451 13y ago
  Indeed. I did a similar setup years and years ago for a mom and pop shop (well before Braintree and Stripe) and I had to choose between Paypal and Google Checkout. Glad I set them up with Paypal.
deleted 13y ago
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- deleted 13y ago
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deleted 13y ago
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spoiledtechie 13y ago
My startup for a time being was only using Google Checkout. Here lies the problem. Can't trust Google with building APIs when they reorganize. This is surprising to me, but I wonder if Google Maps could close down....
- gwern 13y ago
  > I wonder if Google Maps could close down.... No. Google has bought what must be dozens of companies at this point just to support and improve Maps (Waze being the latest), it's reportedly profitable & popular, with the continued rise of mobile I'd expect it to become more important, and my little survival analysis (http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns) gives it 87% odds of surviving to May 2018 (which IMO is too low).
  - mcintyre1994 13y ago
    That page is always really interesting when it comes up, but have you considered adding data for existing product improvements by acquisition? You include a variable for whether it was initially acquired or not, but perhaps big acquisitions clearly for the purpose of improving a product are a strong signal of longevity?
    - gwern 13y ago
      That's not a bad idea, but at this point it would be hard to go back and be able to classify each product by how many other products were merged into it. That information is not always clearly laid out publicly (to say the least).
  - doubt_me 13y ago
    Also there are a bunch of government people who work on it I think. I saw a bunch of public linkedIn profiles with NSA analysts and people in the private sector with google maps listed as experience for whatever reason
    - 13y ago
kkthnxbye 13y ago
I feel the problem lies in the fact that Google shuts down whatever service they deem not "successful". Because of this, I'm starting to weigh my options differently when Google services are in the picture, and I don't think I'm alone in this. That being said, any other services could be shut down via an aqui-hire, or other reasons. Maybe this is the prevailing problem of small time developers like myself, and there's no other way around it apart from getting your idea bootstrapped with these services, and hopefully by the time any of those services gets shut down (if ever), you'll have a migration / backup plan of some sort.

grinning 13y ago

Enough with that nonsense. You had plenty of notice and a reasonable deprication period: http://googlecommerce.blogspot.com/2013/05/an-update-to-google-checkout-for.html http://googlecommerce.blogspot.com/2013/05/an-update-to-goog... and also a superior replacement in Wallet If anyone is to depricate anything that is the way to do it. Yours is the generic reactionary comment for these sorts of submissions. You ignore the motive and thinking behind these actions and resort to FUD.

vicks711 13y ago

Completely agree with you there mate.

c4mden 13y ago

As someone previously burned by this business model, let me be the first to tell you how right you are. I built a small business around their SOAP search API some seven years ago, and received a commercial license and increased API usage to bring my product to market. After easily lining up enough customers to exceed my daily limit, I lobbied for higher usage and a method to share the revenue (they had no structure to charge for API calls back then). For years I tried to contact anyone I could within the organization, but there was no response. After an eternity, they simply shut it down with no notice. You just never know how long they're going to enjoy experimenting with their APIs, and unless you have a backup plan, it's a deal breaker.

ChuckMcM 13y ago

I got yelled at for telling people that :-) Or more seriously when I worked at Google a third party came to me excited about a new Google service that I knew was like the half baked 20% project of a new employee and getting little traction. I suggested they hold off on committing until it was more fully baked. Long story short it got back to the guy and I got scolded for 'sabotaging' a project (which vanished without a trace 9 months later when the person moved on to a project that didn't encourage 20% time). I completely understood the idea of 'trying' something to see if it would work, but worried about the difference between the project "inside" the plex vs the view of it outside the walls. Personally I think that bringing some more discipline to that was one of the better things Larry has done as CEO so far. That said, payments systems at Google have always been really really weird. Weird in the sense that they tend to 'force' a user support infrastructure which has historically been anathema to Google product deployment. People will put up with "Go to this forum and ask your question, maybe another user can help you out." for a lot of things, but when it involves actual money, not so much. Not to mention the rules that come along with handling money. It's really too bad since Google could be a force for great good here, instead PayPal continues to own the space. (I'm rooting for Dwolla and Square though, they are showing great strength here).

DanBC 13y ago
> but worried about the difference between the project "inside" the plex vs the view of it outside the walls. Personally I think that bringing some more discipline to that was one of the better things Larry has done as CEO so far. Wasn't that the point of Labs? To allow experimental projects to get used by people outside Google?
- ChuckMcM 13y ago
  Yes, as far as I could tell that was part of the Labs mission (this was between 2006 and 2010). The confounding factor at the time was that "labs" was one of about four different ways something went from idea into "production" (aka visible outside Google), a tremendous amount depended on the project manager you worked with. There were people who had been at Google long enough that they could get an idea from first successful build to production in a month, knocking down all the various stubs of process that were in the way (like Marissa's UI review). These folks were well regarded by the fact that they got a lot of stuff done. Pretty much anyone, with the right set of people, could ship nearly anything. The downside was that sometimes things that came out were not as baked as they might appear to someone on the outside.

ClashTheBunny 13y ago

> I can't imagine ever building something that relies on a <any company name> service at this point. Seriously, if you don't build it or own it, you can't rely on it. SaaS is convenient, but it's a flawed business model if you depend on any startup/product lasting forever. If you want to last forever, you have to innovate for yourself or buy the people you will depend on.