"It Just Works"
MG Siegler:
With Chrome OS, everything is always there because everything only exists in the cloud. But Google has been bending over backwards to tack on a file management system to Chrome OS. That weakens their cloud argument, in my view. But again, their aim is to ease the transition of current PC users to the cloud.
Google seems to be aiming more for users who understand current computing paradigms and want to transition that knowledge to the future of computing, the cloud. Power users, if you will. Many of the people reading this post are in this camp. But there are many more who are not.
Apple has rethought and rewritten their apps — including their desktop apps — from the ground up to be woven with iCloud fabric that a user won’t see. Google wants the users to be able to see that fabric if they choose to, and in many ways, encourages it as sort of a safety net in the transition to the cloud.
Same cloud concept. Totally different execution.
Steve Jobs:
I’m actually as proud of many of the things we haven’t done as the things we have done. The clearest example was when we were pressured for years to do a PDA, and I realized one day that 90% of the people who use a PDA only take information out of it on the road. They don’t put information into it.
Pretty soon cellphones are going to do that, so the PDA market’s going to get reduced to a fraction of its current size, and it won’t really be sustainable. So we decided not to get into it. If we had gotten into it, we wouldn’t have had the resources to do the iPod. We probably wouldn’t have seen it coming.
One Night Out with GroupMe
Karol: The show starts at 7pm, right?
Mel: Yeah. I’m heading there 5:45ish with Marlo.
Mel: Ness, are we supposed to save seats for you or you guys gonna be backstage the whole time?
Nessa: We’re in the first act, so we’ll sit with you guys after intermission.
Krystal: Save two seats for Karol.
That is a texting conversation I had with my friends on Saturday with the group texting app, GroupMe. We actually started playing with the app a couple nights before, but Saturday we finally saw its true value.
GroupMe as a Utility
As shown in the conversation above, GroupMe comes in super handy when going out with friends. Simple situations like, “Hey, I just got parked. Where are you guys?” can be easily addressed with GroupMe.
Without a group texting app, how would you solve this situation?
Twitter? You can, but you’ll easily piss off your mutual followers because you’re spamming their timelines with a private conversation that doesn’t concern them.
Call/Text people individually? Messy and inefficient. Plus, it leaves the possibility of someone accidentally getting left in the dark.
With group texting, you’re in touch with everyone that needs to be informed. Everyone is on the same page. Everyone is in sync.
GroupMe as Entertainment
During the concert, GroupMe switched from being a utility to pure entertainment. In a setting where it’s rude to talk to each other while the performer is on stage, GroupMe gave us the freedom we wanted.
(Okay, texting each other during a performance isn’t exactly the most polite thing to do either, but hey, at least it’s discrete.)
Because the chat is private and everything goes directly to everyone’s phones, the experience is a lot more intimate than Twitter ever could be.
What about Beluga, Disco, Fast Society, etc?
One thing that made GroupMe stand out to me over its competitors: it’s compatible with Google Voice.
Personally, I am a very, very loyal user of Google Voice. It’s the only number that I give out. I am absolutely addicted to how I can type out & send text messages from my computer. And so far with all of the competing apps I’ve tested, GroupMe is the only app the lets me use my GV number.
This is important to me because when friends install GroupMe and the app scans their Address Books, I will actually show up as a suggested friend.
With the competing apps, I simply couldn’t use my GV number; I was forced to use my cell phone number, which is the number that nobody has.
Closing Thoughts
With just one full day of using GroupMe in the real world, I can tell this app has serious potential for my nights out with friends.
Will it go mainstream? I hope so but I’m not sure.
There is always the possibility that Facebook might integrate their Messages 2.0 feature with Groups, Places, Events, etc. And we all know how Facebook has a knack for making early adopter ideas into mainstream hits.
Google has the opportunity to come up with something too. They have all the pieces: Gmail, GTalk, Google Voice, Disco for iPhone…I’d LOVE to see them integrate all of those technologies into one seamless experience.
Hell, Apple has the same opportunity as well, with Facetime, iChat, and iPhones. It’d be like adding that Steve Jobs magic to RIM’s precious BlackBerry Messenger.
But those are all pipe dreams of mine; 100% speculation on my part based on zero insider information.
In the meantime, I’ve got a group of close friends on GroupMe. The cool thing is, if I want more friends to get on this, I don’t even have to wait for them to install the app — I can just add them to a group.
Even if the app never catches on with the rest of my friends, I’ve already got my closest friends on it.
That’s good enough for me.
Apple: The 4-Foot Walled Garden
Victor Agreda reported:
From where I sat, Apple was on the defensive — but in a good way. The defense was primarily “we own the store, we own the rules for the store, and our goal is to protect the consumer.” Working to Apple’s advantage is the tight control of the App Store, which some (including TUAW at times) have bemoaned as draconian. But I think today’s hearings show how a tightly-controlled store can benefit consumers if the entity controlling the store is genuinely proactive about protecting the privacy of consumers.
Google took a beating in the hearings, basically admitting that the Google app market is a Wild West of applications. With the Android Marketplace’s openness, developers can and do write apps that encourage or enable illegal activity. Also, Google’s policies on who does what with your data (be it location or email or whatever) are there, but each app developer can pretty much do as they please with only the vaguest notion that Google might (in case of malware, for example) come down on you and remove your app from the store.
By explicitly stating that the aim of the Android Marketplace is not for Google’s team to be gatekeepers, Google puts the onus on consumers to be aware of who is using their data and how they are using it.
I’ve always thought of the Apple ecosystem as a 4-foot walled garden.
For us Apple heads, we love everything in here. The Apple garden doesn’t have EVERYTHING but it has everything we need. Everything in here compliments everything else that’s in here.
Sure, there is a big wild world outside of our walls, filled with all sorts of things that we don’t have. And if we ever had to leave this place, it’ll take some effort to get all of our things over that 4-foot wall.
But hey, we feel protected by it. Nothing is forcing us to stay.
We just really like it here.
I’m actually as proud of many of the things we haven’t done as the things we have done. The clearest example was when we were pressured for years to do a PDA, and I realized one day that 90% of the people who use a PDA only take information out of it on the road. They don’t put information into it. Pretty soon cellphones are going to do that, so the PDA market’s going to get reduced to a fraction of its current size, and it won’t really be sustainable. So we decided not to get into it. If we had gotten into it, we wouldn’t have had the resources to do the iPod. We probably wouldn’t have seen it coming.
Re: Why doesn't Microsoft understand tablets?
Response by Robert Scoble
So, in this dream, er, nightmare I have, I walk into Steve Ballmer’s Microsoft office back in 2006 and say:
“Hi Steve, I gotta talk to you about our tablet strategy.”
“Sure, Scoble, what you thinking about?”
“Well, it sucks. It just isn’t working. Customers aren’t delighted. The market isn’t afire. Our employees are even bored with it.”
“So, what should we do?” he asks.
“We should ship a device that doesn’t run Office. Indeed, doesn’t run any Microsoft application. Doesn’t do multitasking. Doesn’t run Flash. Doesn’t have a camera. Can’t print. Can’t use a Microsoft Mouse or Keyboard, either. Oh, and just to be really revolutionary, we can’t put any of our normal packaging or stickers on the device or around it. Finally, we can’t sell it at Best Buy, but we have to build a new series of stores to distribute it in.”
“What the fuck are you smoking, Scoble? Get the fuck out of here before I call security. That’s the stupidest idea I’ve heard. Ever.”
Then I wake up and realize, no, I’m not Steve Jobs.
Android vs. iPhone
My Top Tech for 2010
Inspired by Michael Arrington’s 2009: Products I Can’t Live Without, here are my vital tech products of last year:
- Google — Chrome, Voice, Gmail, Reader
- Apple — iPad, Magic Mouse, MacBook Air, iPhone
- Twitter — Twitter for iPad, Hootsuite, TweetDeck
- Boxcar for iPhone
- Skype
- Tumblr
- Flipboard for iPad
- Foursquare
- BlogTV
- TokBox
Honorable Mentions: Adium, Mozy, Dropbox
Heating Up for 2011: Mac App Store, AT&T MicroCell
Lost That Loving Feeling: Firefox, Google Wave, Netflix, Hulu
