Google Wallet Card
google.com
google.com
From the top of the other thread:
"Let's clarify some things here, before the comment threads take off too much:
- This is a prepaid card. It does not proxy other cards, unlike previous rumored versions of a Wallet card.
- It only draws from Wallet balance. Funds can be added to wallet balance via various means (bank account [free], receiving a GMail P2P payment [free], credit cards [2.9% fee]), but this does not happen automatically.
As such, it does not appear to be trying to achieve the same "card replacement" that e.g. Coin is. No, it is simply providing another way to get at Wallet balance that doesn't involve transfer to a bank account or NFC payment. Could be useful for people who make use of GMail P2P payments."
This is a terrible analogy.
Edit: I should mention that I know that credit card companies sell data to third parties. But they don't exist only for that purpose, like Google nowadays. Thus, people are understandably less comfortable with Google knowing things.
Sigh...
I think GP is rather trying to make an assessment based off Google's history of closing down services. Similar to I rather trust a stranger than a known con-artist, while realizing the possibility that either could walk away with your money.
Yes but it also natural for human beings to follow: "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."
Most startups die and most products fail, eventually. It's not some sort of habitual bad behavior that companies selectively choose to participate in. So judging Google as a repeat (and thus untrustworthy) offender is unfair, and unrealistic, too, because you're just as likely to get burned elsewhere.
I don't know maybe I am an exception but I see companies shutting down products far from the norm. I normally tend to trust bigger companies with stability and invest most of my energy in them. I still have my hotmail/yahoo/aol accounts from the mid 90s working just fine.
Google is an exception. It feels like they are punching themselves when walking forward. Their current goal is to provide a comfortable integrated experience. Even though from a business perspective, it makes sense to shut down unviable products and services, from a consumer point of view it only causes frustration and loss of trust, which ironically is quiet opposite of what they are trying to achieve.
Ask yourself:
Keeping all other variables constant, which would you trust to be around longer:
Google Drive or Dropbox?
Google App Engine or AWS?
Google Wallet or Paypal?
Google+ or Facebook?
None of those products are Google's core competency. They're almost all imitation products that are extremely late to the game and that, consequently, have a relatively high chance of failure. On the flip side, AWS, Dropbox, Paypal, and Facebook are all high-revenue market leaders with practically no chance of failing any time soon and owners who can't be enticed to sell out. If you were to replace these products with newer, riskier, less-profitable alternatives from smaller companies, I'd have picked the Google option every time.
Stability, profitability, and market dominance are the primary reasons I trust products to last, not company track record. If Dropbox made a search engine, Amazon made a webmail service, or Facebook made a mobile OS, would you trust any of them to outlast their Google counterparts?
(+)
The probability of this shutting down given the history of Google shutting down non-core products before.
(+)
The lack of customer support if something were to go wrong.
(=s) (understandably)
The lack of interest and skepticism shown by grandparent poster.
However, other companies, namely Microsoft and Yahoo might only have to deal with one or two of the above and can be said to be given a free pass at skepticism.
They want to provide very powerful incentives so they can take a small bit of every transaction.
Adding money to Wallet Balance from credit or debit card 2.9% fee with a $0.30 minimum
So how long does it take for your google wallet balance to pull money from your other accounts or transfer the funds?
This would be innovative, if you could spend money on it, then choose from which account you want it to be deducted ex post facto, and if you don't choose within 24 hours then it gets deducted from your default account. While this might be cool, google would be assuming a large amount of risk.
Edit- and I mean different from Coin in a use case kind of way. I realize that Coin does stuff with the magnetic strip directly whereas this is just another card that is linked on the net to all of your other cards.
In any case, big whoop.
I'm leaving the original below anyway...
I believe it is linked. The idea is that you'll tell the app you want to pay with your Amex. You hand the Google Wallet Card to the retailer/waiter/etc and when they run the card it will be piggy-back-charged to your Amex by Google.
The difference to Coin is the switching to your "real" card is done in the datacenter not on the card itself via the mag strip.
And when the world evolves to contactless payments as the norm, you've already been trained to use the Google Wallet App (which supports that), whereas Coin will be obsolete.
Google is playing the long game.
> The Google Wallet Card is funded by your Wallet Balance. Money is added to your Wallet Balance either by someone sending you money via Wallet or Gmail or by adding it yourself from a linked bank account or from a credit or debit card. The card has no fees to order and activate. There are no annual or monthly fees for the Google Wallet Card.
"Google Wallet Card is only available to US residents."