[kybishop]

Given that this is Google, my money is on them either abandoning it, or making a new version every 2-3 years (for no discernable reason) making no actual progress as a result.

I would LOVE to be proven wrong, but Google's track record with bringing products to market, and actually keeping them for longer than a media boost, is downright depressing.

At some point it feels like every Google side project is just a media buy for their real business: hiring engineers to drive more ad revenue, engineers who are enticed by shiny projects like these.

[foobiekr]

It’s not depressing, it’s wonderful. Google’s abject failure in almost every area is great. They have nearly unlimited resources and a fantastic (though but as great as they think) engineering pool. It would suck if they managed to successfully attack adjacencies.

[kybishop]

I have a hard time calling immense wastes of resources "wonderful". Think of how many man-hours of at least better-than-average engineers have been wasted developing something like 5 separate chat apps... it's absurd.