Google launches and then kills new products so frequently it makes me extremely reluctant to try anything new. Best case the product sucks and I don't care. Worst case I love it and they shut it down a year later. I'm otherwise a pretty enthusiastic early adopter of most things tech, but when Google is the brand behind it I feel like it's not worth even looking until the thing has become huge otherwise it's just going to get shuttered.
I hate Pinterest, all it does is to pollute my search results with garbage. If I search for something I want to get to the source, not some middleman.<p>Why do we need an alternative??
Google needs an entirely separate brand/entity to launch these things. Nobody wants to hang out at the utility company office no matter how much free coffee they put in the lobby.
It's borderline journalistic malpractice to say "Google" launched this, when it's clearly from the internal incubator, Area 120. This distinction is important - projects in Area 120 have different aspirations and fold frequently. I know people have this perception that Google kills projects too easily, and this just feeds it without good reason. Like - they're telling you to expect a rocky ride, and people will still complain when it folds.
So this is just Google Collections, which already existed? [1] Why did you need to create yet another new app for something you already do - just focus on improving the existing product.<p>[1] <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2020/01/22/googles-collections-feature-now-pushes-people-to-save-recipes-products-using-a-i/#:~:text=Originally%20a%20name%20given%20to,to%20Collections%20based%20on%20your" rel="nofollow">https://techcrunch.com/2020/01/22/googles-collections-featur...</a>
I give it a year before the project gets canned. Google is great at tools and utilities (e.g. Maps, Gmail) but whenever they try their hand at something that involves the human soul, they fail at attracting regular people. For all of Pinterest's faults, at least their branding is such that most people don't see it as a generic giant corporation.
Google is pretty awful at maintaining anything that isn’t a billion dollar profit maker. They also suck at doing anything social network related. Pinterest shouldn’t have much to worry about. They could copy the good ideas like Facebook copied circles when Google Plus came out.<p>Google’s brand is tainted. They are real good at search, tracking and shoving ads. Not so great at fostering things from 0 and maintaining them.
There are lots of conversations about ideological echo chambers online. I am concerned that tools like Pinterest and now Keen may be creating creative echo chambers that result in large swaths of artists drawing from the same few styles to help build their own.
It must be uncomfortable being a google engineer on these products.<p>Having your work cancelled and thrown away is one of the most disheartening things as a developer.<p>It has to be back of mind for them when they are building. When it gets released they get to come see all the comments better on how long until Google kills it, and the people who won’t try it because of that risk.
Well it does look like an interesting experiment.<p>All the standard warnings about lack of privacy on Keen, treat it like you would FaceBook, enjoy checking it out, but treat it much as you would a rattlesnake on a hiking trail. I almost regret reading the book Surveillance Capitalism because life before that was like ignorant life in the move Matrix (except for me, I could have written a shorter version of SC myself). Reading that book was definitely taking the Red Pill. I don’t blame anyone for continuing the good old Blue Pill lifestyle :-)<p>EDIT: it is interesting how the site is not really “Google branded” at all. Just in the fine print “ Keen - An experimental product from Area 120 and PAIR at Google”