Comments on: Why Google is not about constraint-based design, 37Signals is, Europe too

By: People Over Process

People Over Process — Tue, 14 Mar 2006 05:21:24 +0000

Web 2.0 IDE’s and Constraint-based Design

James sent over a post from John Montgomery wondering out-loud what a web based IDE would look like, or if it’s even possible and/or desirable. I know: it sounds crazy to all us developer types out there. The web is…

By: Robert Brook

Robert Brook — Thu, 16 Feb 2006 04:41:55 +0000

Clearly most of my problems are too small for Google to be bothered with.

By: Vaibhav Domkundwar - iNods.com

Vaibhav Domkundwar - iNods.com — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 16:11:53 +0000

I agree with you completely. After the search, almost all of Google’s products have suffered from innovation in design. Google Video Store was a disaster I thought. Comparing them to 37S is not fair. I am sure 37S can come up with a much smarter Gmail design that what Google has right now.

I am not sure why one has to compare Google to AOL, Yahoo or MSFT. Shouldn’t we be comparing them to the more innovative players out there? Just because their search is the best and that interface works the best, doesn’t mean their design philosphy is good enough.

By: People Over Process

People Over Process — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 12:02:32 +0000

I Love Google, or, Google Bashing: We Love to Hate What We Love

Our man in England had quite a bit to say about Mr. $343.32 A Share earlier today. Side Note: “Today” The notion of “today” starts to loose meaning when your work is spread across time zones. Steve is in Denver,…

By: vinnie mirchandani

vinnie mirchandani — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 11:30:08 +0000

Chui, great point - I would take Chui’s point and stretch it in the enterprise to TCO. If you as a vendor are not empathetic to a client’s budget (how much your integration partners make, how much pain your next release causes etc) it does not really matter how efficient or innovative your own shop is. Your customer/user’ s constraint is the measure…his/her attention, budget…as I wrote in a blog a few weeks ago Innovation is when you go wow not gulp…

By: Chui Tey

Chui Tey — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 09:33:13 +0000

Not entirely sure where your arguments are leading to. The examples of iPod and BaseCamp are good examples of industrial design, but I’d tender that attention is the real constraint. Of which, Google, Apple and 37Signals are addressing really well.

a) All the products are easy to learn,
b) All require very little time “gardening”, e.g. not having to delete or file away e-mails

In fact, I’d go as far as saying that Google is an attention broker. I have X amount of time to research something, Google pays for my attention span with it’s search results, while advertisers pay Google for my attention span.

Cheers

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 07:35:14 +0000

…Google Earth?

By: Eric

Eric — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 06:12:51 +0000

Haven’t some of Google’s best products been aimed at relatively trivial problems, such as e-mail? Their XMPP client shows potential. Where’s Google’s RoR? How about Firefox? (ie http://weblog.infoworld.com/udell/2006/02/14.html#a1387.)

Better email, funding and developing for an open IM protocol, and paying to put out better browsers: not bad. Like you, however, I doubt there are rigid constraints on those initiatives. Does it matter?

By: Dennis Howlett

Dennis Howlett — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 02:47:48 +0000

Paul Strassmann says Google may well fail.

By: /pd

/pd — Wed, 15 Feb 2006 02:09:25 +0000

James: I think that Google is doing just as good as anyone else. Their product churn is faster then the other 3 (AOL,YAHOO,MSFT). They are developing the products and feature as the internet as the OS type paradigm.

Recently they iniatated the 10K student gmail accounts for SJCC.
They outsource bearingpoint for their enterpise search folio. (Now thats interesting stuff) BearkingPoints is bearingpoints :)-
They clam up against the DOJ and fight their case *unlike AOL , YAHOO , MSFT*
They are intergaring Mobile Apps’ faster the Code Magneto (winmobile5.0) can handle.

..and for whats it worth.. “googleit” has become a normal verb.. :)- !!