The problem is with the product

But as a tool to help the mass consumer record random stuff? Not so much.

I think this is the most pedantic thing I've ever said.

Even that's somewhat reductionist, of course; there are a lot of good products that we use only occasionally. But there are some products which are designed to be with you most of the time: smartphones are an obvious example. Watches are another one. How about a smartwatch? I think it'd be fair to say that if you're wearing your smartwatch most of the time when you go out, it's a success for you; if you don't like wearing it -- for whatever reason, whether aesthetics or because it isn't that functional (or both) -- and mostly only trot it out to show people, it's really a failure for you. If most of the smartwatch's buyers are in the "only trot it out to show people" camp, the product is arguably a failure.

And, I think it's fair to use the same criteria for Google Glass. Are most of the people who own a Glass using it regularly, or are they only trotting it out when it'll be cool to show people? Scoble is, whether he puts it that way or not, effectively arguing the latter. Gruber is in turn saying that if that's true, it means that Glass -- even if it's a marvelous technology showcase -- isn't a good product.

(As for the contention that Gruber will argue history is relevant when it suits him and irrelevant when it doesn't, well, we all do that, and I think we'd all claim that we're doing it because in some cases history is relevant and in other cases it isn't, right? Whether Android will "windows" iOS depends on whether you think the mobile computing market will follow the same trajectory as the PC market did; if you think the concept of Glass will take off one day, maybe dramatically, but Glass itself will be something of a footnote, then the Windows Tablet comparison is apt.)

He told employees. That means completely different with just people. Employees are fully informed of it, and even already have it for free. (further, they are being paid for it)

If someone doesn't want to use a product which s/he already have, and knows very well, isn't it enough to think that's a crap?

But I doubt Google's grading it as a typical consumer product. It works for Google for it to be expensive and obvious, because the wearers become visible motivated evangelists for the technology. It just doesn't work for me, personally, and clearly doesn't work for Gruber.

All that said... aside from the decent-sized UI problems it has... once you spend some time with it, the "omnipresent screen" is as addictive as the original iPhone was. Blackberry is a better analogy; I look forward to Google's improvements as well as what I hope is serious competition from the A players and not just Kickstarters.

(Plus, I'm really enjoying coding for it. It feels new and exciting, like there's huge unclaimed areas waiting to be conquered. Lots of limitations to work around, too.)

This is the perfect case in point. What Gruber is saying is 100% correct as a response to Scoble's phrasing. That is, products don't sink or swim because the companies' employees choose to use them or not. Of course there's a correlation there since employees are also consumers. If pressed I suspect Scoble would probably concede that his phrasing was sloppy, and that he meant it more in the sense that lack of employee adoption is the canary in the coal mine.

"This is such bullshit it hurts my head." [...] "The point isn’t about what Apple can do but what they should do. And they shouldn’t be doing this." http://daringfireball.net/2008/09/podcasters_rejection

From an imaginary app-store reviewer diary: "Rejecting all of them, consistently, would in fact be no good at all. The feeling of being part of the monolith — of being the monolith — really only surges when I use my position to act capriciously. To act fairly would be to follow the rules. To act capriciously is to be the rules." http://daringfireball.net/2009/05/diary_of_an_app_store_revi...

"Translation" of Apple PR into English: "We decided from the outset to set the formula for our bars-of-signal strength indicator to make the iPhone look good — to make it look as if it 'gets more bars'. That decision has now bitten us on our ass." http://daringfireball.net/2010/07/translation_iphone_4

Their original product was a search engine. Their breakthrough money-making product was ads, indeed, and they've focused their business model on that, but I contest that it's in their DNA. Do you really think the only value they could derive out of self-driving cars is for more targeted ads?

That's all good. Where it's a problem is when they take a product that they haven't sufficiently researched—haven't finished, in other words—and then charge people real dollars for them. Lots of real dollars.

Google's bottom line is the same as everyone else's: making money.

Currently, the ads are very lucrative for them and they use the money from ad business to both expand the ad business (like investing in YouTube or Android) AND try to find other sources of revenue (e.g. Google Fiber or Google Apps for enterprise).

You can't assume that Google is terminally stupid and can't see past their current business model.

Google Fiber is not free. If people use Comcast, they'll see as many ads from Google as if they were using Fiber. Google can estimate how much ADDITIONAL ad revenue they could expect per user from Fiber vs. Comcast usage and that's probably not much.

At $70 or $120/month, this can be very profitable business (long-term, of course, initial investment is huge). Outside of US, companies make good profit at lower prices.

Same goes for self-driving cars: transportation is a massive industry. Taxis alone are $10 billion industry. Personal car ownership and use is massive. If Google could get a piece of that business, it could be more profitable than their ad business.

Anyone who says this or its many variants has no business acumen or creativity. It is the banal banter of the boring. This sounds harsh, but seriously it grows tiring watching people desperately try to stretch everything to fit some nonsensical hypothesis.

Google is a very large company and their product is technology. They happen to have entered the market at a time when advertising was literally the only way to make money online (they originally tried to use the web purely to sell business search appliances, but that didn't pan out), but assuming that their entire future business model is ads is the domain of simpletons.

And, as an aside, I see more ads on my iPad and iPod Touch than I do on my Nexus 5. Isn't that weird?

Building something that's is cutting edge isn't the hardest part. It's building something that is cutting edge and easy to understand that's hard. The iPhone was a good example of a product that did both. We saw it and we got it and most of all, we WANTED it. Same with the iPad. Google Glass? Not so much.

Collecting feedback from employees is indeed useful and in effect priceless when done right. Doing the same with a set of early adopters who know what they're getting into as well.

The same with a large pool of anyones, however, is a recipe to turn your not-yet-quite-ready product into something customers buy, eventually stop using, and never touch again no matter how much you improve it later on.

Think of it this way: You buy a game that is get mostly good reviews. You're unimpressed and are left scratching your head as to why it's getting them. It eventually gathers dust somewhere. A few years later, you hear that it needed this or that patched up ruleset, along with this and that mod or extension to be fun and playable. I predict that your odds of unearthing said game to give it a second try are about nil. The game had its chance and failed; you moved on, and so might Google Glass users.

Anyway, a limited release is also wise on those circunstances. Maybe when battery and display improves, somebody (maybe even Google) could "invent" glasses again, like Apple "invented" tablets.

They release monthly updates, based on feedback.

https://support.google.com/glass/topic/3284652?hl=en&ref_top...

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eating_your_own_dog_food

I think Gruber is arguing that the concept may be sound (just like tablet form factor computers, portable MP3 players, and smartphones), but the implementation is probably shit.

The reason everybody carries around something that looks more like the 2007 iPhone than the 2007 Blackberries is that Apple didn't iterate. They took the concept and completely rethought it.

Somebody may be able to do this with Glass. Who knows—it might even be Google!

He also didn't say you shouldn't wear it. Just that if you don't, it's not your fault.

Hope you took the picture with your phone, it would be worth seeing again.

Apple doesn't do that. They try to make a great product when they release it. It's better that way for consumer products. For SaaS it's different. You make something fast, and then iterate on it, but that's not how you do it for products that cost hundreds of dollars where you end up with shitty hardware that can't be replaced by downloading an update.

Wearable technology will come into vogue the same way - you can't make something fashionable just by making it unobtrusive or inoffensive, it will be considered fashionable when the celebrities who set trends find it useful enough to start wearing it. And no google, paying models to wear it during fashion week doesn't count.

The another point is people might not want to advertise the fact they work for Google in case they are subject to rants from weirdos in bars etc.

This is the one of the main main reasons that British Telecoms' staff where told don't post in the uk.telecom usenet groups.

I have a ThinkPad Tablet 2 which includes a Wacom pen. The pen is great - the sensitivity is very fine-grained and makes a big difference from finger painting. For finger use, the screen is as responsive as the iPad. (Windows 8 knows when the pen is hovering over the screen and treats it like a mouse, so you get a crosshair cursor near the tip the pen. Otherwise the cursor never appears.)