I tried so hard to integrate into the Google ecosystem. I had a Gmail account and Google Talk to start. Eventually an Android phone, on Project Fi, with Hangouts and SMS (so I could send SMS over the internet). I upgraded from Gmail to Inbox. Then when they ditched that for Allo and Duo I tried to switch to those. Then I lost SMS on my computer because it got removed from Hangouts. Then I tried to switch to Google voice after they redid that, but you couldn't have Google voice with Fi...I also uploaded all my music to Google music. All my RSS in Google reader. I had a Google+ account. Multiple Google pixels.<p>I really thought Google was going to be the answer for a completely integrated, non-Apple online life.<p>Anyways, long story short, after endless frustration trying to get everything to work seamlessly, I ditched Google entirely.<p>My email is now IMAP. I have multiple accounts in one app. My calendar and contacts are now WebDAV. Every other app I use on PC and mobile can integrate with them. My messaging is now Element/Matrix with bridges to whatever other services I need. My search is DuckDuckGo, browser is Firefox, etc.<p>Currently, everything is as integrated, or more integrated, than it was with Google, and worlds more stable. Somehow, despite being huge and having all the data and basically a monopoly, they still can't integrate to save their lives.
This mostly skims over two additional issues that add whole additional dimensions to the mess that is Google's messaging services:<p>* How / whether you're allowed to integrate SMS / phone messages with web based chat (what we used to call instant messaging). E.g. can you get your text messages and voicemails on the computer? At some points you could, at some points you couldn't. At one point there was Google Voice, at another point Hangouts could do it, now you have to use the "Messages" app for texts, which is still relatively broken compared to either of the previous methods and doesn't support any kind of instant messaging.<p>* The different rules that apply if you're using Google Fi. For example, the Messages help page [1] says you can turn on "chat features", which lets you send messages over data and get other conveniences like read receipts and large photos (because they're not sent over MMS). But wait, if you use Google Fi, if you want to get messages and make calls on your computer (i.e. with your phone off), you have to disable chat features. You can't have both. [2] It's absolutely insane. This worked 100% correctly with Hangouts - perfect integration.<p>[1] <a href="https://support.google.com/messages/answer/7189714?hl=en" rel="nofollow">https://support.google.com/messages/answer/7189714?hl=en</a><p>[2] <a href="https://support.google.com/fi/answer/6188337" rel="nofollow">https://support.google.com/fi/answer/6188337</a>
A comment I don't see here yet is that this is to some extent a consequence of Google's business model. The assumption seems to be that a company should be wary about doing what they're doing, because they'll lose business. But Google's not directly selling these services, in most cases. I assume they're happy with the way they do things, which is try a bunch of stuff in a slightly chaotic but fairly nimble way, be happy when some of it works well (Gmail, Google Maps, Google Docs), and kill the rest. Frustrating for users, absolutely, but that's the company you're getting your free stuff from. It's pretty clear that this behavior isn't affecting their profits and maybe it's not even hurting their reputation, outside of circles like this one.
They forgot about Inbox!<p>After following this nonsense product timeline for 16 years from the original Google Talk days, my last chat thread still using Hangouts moved to Facebook Messenger. chat.google.com is just aggressively worse in far too many ways, and will surely be killed circa 2024.
The author seems to have forgotten about YouTube Messages:<p><a href="https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/12446824/heads-up-we%E2%80%99re-removing-the-ability-to-message-directly-on-youtube-after-september-18" rel="nofollow">https://support.google.com/youtube/thread/12446824/heads-up-...</a>
Living abroad, I'm still very reliant on Google Voice for the 4-5 annual calls I need to make with say my bank or credit card because they will only do certain transactions by voice. Or other services demand a US telephone number without allowing a country code because of myopic design.<p>We really need to disconnect the need for phones for services that can be digital. People don't have landlines and there's a lot of people that would probably prefer a data-only plan since they don't make phone calls. Regular phone calls aren't normally encrypted either.<p>At least with Google Voice I've been able to circumvent having a 'real' US number -- giving the data brokers more data points. That is until I get locked out of services like PayPal who blocked Google Voice so I have no way to authenticate (not that they have a reason to need my phone number to bridge my already-verified bank with another service).
I feel they missed out massively in not centralising the communications standards.<p>Not sure if this was realistic or the new products were trying to create whole new tech that stopped this but when they saw different directions some core standards for interoperability would have helped. So if you had Hangouts and I had Allo we could still chat as least in the most standard was of voice/video/message. Proliferation would have mattered less and the product teams could have focused on UX/ new features/brand separately to their hearts content.<p>It would also help people try platforms cause I I could swap to the latest and greatest but still chat to my contacts Id be more willing to try vs trying to drag people across to a new platform.
Does anyone have any insight into Google's internal politics or processes that lead to this mess, and why is chat so much more fragmented at Google than other services?
Gmail now displays a splash/loading screen that reads "Google Workspace".<p>Confused the heck out of me because I have a personal account with Google One for extra storage space, and a Google Workspace account for a managed domain for my startup.
Google have really made a hash over this entire space. I wouldn't even know which products to search for if I wanted to.<p>They had multiple opportunities to dominate the markets which Zoom, Slack, Discord, Whatsapp, Facebook Messenger own today. Simply iterating within a single brand rather than this ADHD approach would have got them there.<p>They own controlling percentages of the email market and mobile market, it was all an enormous open goal.
The problem with Google is Sundar Pichai.<p>His peers -- Satya Nadella, Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook, and Mark Zuckerberg -- all deeply understand and concern themselves with their companies' respective places in the world. They think twenty years into the future and frequently take risks to mitigate a changing landscape and position themselves for future wins.<p>Sundar Pichai isn't one to make bold bets. His company is a fat pig suckling on ad money. Google itself is completely drunk, comatose.<p>Google needs bold leadership. If nothing changes, it will eventually fall into decline and become a footnote.<p>Not only can this happen, it's already happened many times before.
I think Google tries so many things at once and this is why they end up killing most of their products.<p>I remember when they launched an email app Inbox i loved using it but 3 years later they decided to kill it and guess what they decided to integrate inbox app features into gmail app and then I was forced to use it.<p>On contrary if we compare apple to Google. Apple does one thing really better they integrate their services really well across all devices and that’s one of the reason its hard to leave Apple Ecosystem.
> it’s almost possible to see Google’s strategy. Gmail exists for emails; Chat is the GChat / Hangouts-style messaging system for real-time conversations and group chats; Spaces is the Slack / Discord-style area for more persistent, larger rooms based on a particular topic or conversation; and there’s Meet for video chats.<p>This is like the exact opposite of what we want. It was the best when my gmail tab was email, SMS, chat, video calling all in one.
I think it's a fair assessment to say that Google does not have a strategy. They're at their best when they were making something that hadn't been made before. Gmail, Google Maps, and Google Docs were/are in a league of their own in terms of offering, especially when they initially released, but now that Google is effectively trying to play catch-up and won't commit to anything that doesn't catch lightning in a bottle, I feel like confidence is remarkably low.<p>It's not so bad trying something new every once in a while, but a strategy of assuming everyone will immediately jump ship from an old product that worked just fine to a new product that does less and sucks more is self-assured destruction. You can apply this to a lot of Google products, such as Google Play Music > YouTube Music, not just their messaging blunders.
It hasn't been all that confusing to me. I was on Google Talk, then I switched to Hangouts, which I have been using with my family until about a month ago, we've since transitioned to the new Google Chat and it's been fine. I like that it works on every device just by logging in. I also use Signal if there's more confidential stuff I need to send. I haven't used SMS in years and I really hope they don't try to bake that back in. Nobody I know in Europe uses SMS, it's just for receiving codes and stuff.
Amazingly Hangouts is still the most cross platform, generally usable and useful chat app I have ... it even still accepts XMPP connections.<p>And of course, they are trying to kill it. (at least that is what the message I got last night said) ... sigh.
I've used Google Talk ie Hangouts since the beginning with my friends/family. It's been a service that's worked reasonably well, for ages - and we can't have that, can we? So now, on Android, they're trying to force us over to "Chat in Gmail".<p>No, just no.<p>I don't want to open my email to then hit a chat tab to message my brother. They must be separate apps; it's messy when they try to cram everything into one app, there's even Meet there now.<p>(So there's a separate Google Chat app as well, but that's not mentioned at all in the Hangouts messaging, so I can only assume it's another dead project#. Functionality was awful and clunky when I tried it at some stage before).<p>Whoever's come up with this has absolutely no idea how their products are being used in the real world.<p>Looking for an alternative now that's not eg Facebook. Not sure about Discord, due to security. Not too keen on Signal due to ease of use, but might end up on that.<p>----<p>Edit: Signal is looking much nicer on the mobile than I recalled, sharing multiple pictures is really easy! This might be the go to.<p>#Also checked again on "Google Chat", still buggy (tried sharing multiple pics, weird behaviour) - but at least it's got a dark background now, so appears to be in dev - even though they'd like us to Chat in Gmail..
There are two hard things in computer science: cache invalidation, naming things, (and off-by-one errors....)<p>I feel like naming things is something Apple works really hard on. And why they place so much emphasis on it in their keynotes, when they use the phrase "And we're calling it ..."
Have used all of them services and at the end I gave it all up because of their lack of commitment to their products. Tired of so many features that eventually lead to nothing.
> June 2021: Google releases Google Chat to all customers and announces that “Rooms” will become “Spaces.”<p>I still see "Rooms" in my Gmail window.
> SMS/RCS services: Google Voice, Android Messages app with RCS chat integration<p>Does it mean they are now plugged in SS7 network? Thats a throve of new user data.
But what's the situation for most people? Many people's personal messaging eco-system looks like this:<p><pre><code> - Out of use: AIM
- Out of use: IRQ
- Out of use: IRC
- Insert your old messanger: here
- Privacy nerds: Signal
- Feature fans: Telegram
- Lonely people: Tinder
- Parents-Generation: WhatsApp / FaceBook / deprecated
- Brick phones (the real privacy nerds): SMS or E-Mail
- Ahead of time people: delta.chat
- Grandparents: E-Mail
</code></pre>
Is this any better?<p>Let's have a different take on this: This company likes to experiment and innovate. :) Glad that this is still possible.<p>Having said that: Probably naming the messengers in a different manner could receive an overhaul to confuse less people. And: Wouldn't route my chat traffic neither over Apple, Google or any other FAANG+.