So I finally tried Wave... | Hacker News Reader

So I finally tried Wave...

paulbuchheit.blogspot.com

120 pointsmrduncan36 comments

I love this guy:

If you want to learn more about Wave, I would start there and skip this post

His point that the product must be in a very early stage of development because it apparently hasn't gone though the process where marginal features are winnowed is fantastic orthogonal thinking.

It's also surprising when you realize how rarely that assumption holds true. Far too many applications ship several versions without ever getting rid of the features that should never have been there in the first place. It's a testament to Google's reputation for quality (and long betas) that we feel we can safely assume that the marginal features will be removed or improved in a timely fashion.

Is there some history of this actually happening at Google? I can't recall any big products that have shed features. My recollection is obviously limited, but I'd love to hear of some examples. Shuttering whole products/services doesn't count to me.

Well, for one, the man himself gave Gmail as example.

It didn't sound like Gmail was made public with the features. Sounded like they were removed before it went public.

Well, he lists the gmail-specific ones in the post. I guess users of services provided by startups later bought by Google could provide more data on this. Any Grandcentral or Jaiku users (off the top of my head, there are plenty more of course) care to tell us if anything was dropped before the Google release?

My impression from Wave was the same: the hierarchical structure turns "waves" into an unmaintainable mess too easily and too quickly. I find the user interface a bit counter-intuitive and cluttered too.

Whatever Paul feels about Wave, he actually makes a couple of clever suggestions Wave's team, I think, should listen to: make it (optionally?) linear and also build the wave-to-email gate. These two things are more important for Wave at the moment than anything else.

If Paul built Wave it'd probably be in a more usable state now, wouldn't it?

Most insightful and original bit is at the end: I don't know what Google has planned for Wave or Gmail, but if I were them I would continue improving Wave, and then once it's ready for the whole world to use, integrate it into Gmail. Moving Wave into Gmail would give it a huge userbase, and partially address the "email is universal" problem. They could use MIME multi-part to send both a non-Wave, HTML version of the message, and the Wave version. Wave-enabled mail readers would display the live Wave, while older mailers would show the static version along with a link to the live Wave.

That's not insightful. You can't use Wave like that. It's technically an impossibility. Guy has no clue what he's talking about, just like every other armchair reviewer of Wave.

I like his response.

re: Wave itself: I am more enthusiastic about Wave as a platform (custom robots for back end processing, gadgets) for software development.

I'm not sure if this is because I have an obligation to try all new products, or because my views on the longevity of email will seem hopelessly naive once I try Wave, but either way, I mustn't disappoint the good people of TechCrunch :)

I think what's implied is much worse than that actually... namely that Paul would rather not have Google Wave eclipse GMail. And for that reason, he didn't even want to look at it.

yeah....he's just a nice guy and doesn't want to pick meaningless battles.

I don't think that Google Wave will replace GMail for a while.

For on thing, it contradicts the theory of "do the simplest thing that possibly works." Google Wave is great for collaboration and group work and game playing. However, when it comes to replacing email it is too bloated I think. Of course they will probably speed it up and simplify as it develops.

Also there will always be a market for a simple email client, if only for the simple reason that not everyone wants the entire world to see that they can't type very well.

It is more professional to send a completed email then to have the recipient see you typing in realtime complete with misspellings, clumsy typing, and grammar errors.

That is the main impression that I have with Google Wave. Everyone watching a wave can see me type so I have to be more careful rather than just typing then looking it over before hitting "Reply".

The "see me type" thing is a feature you can turn off.

Thanks for telling me. I'll have to dig through the settings and find it.

It's not in the settings, it's the "draft" tick box at the bottom of the textbox.

That "draft" tick box has been grayed out for me since I got into Wave.

It's amazing they enabled it as default.

I don't think the 'Draft' functionality works as yet. But from my experience using Wave, that'll definitely be something I will keep enabled for all business-related waves.

I don't understand why someone would care about whether one program (wave) eclipses another program (gmail)?

He wrote GMail. It's very common for humans to have a strong enough emotional investment and attachment to the fruits of their labor that they act irrationally in manners involving that creation. Seeing GMail get abandoned by users would be psychologically very similar to (though probably far less severe than) the pain of seeing your child spurned by his peers.

Indeed. As a parent and software producer I can feel the same part of my brain activate when (irrationally) defending my "offspring". I don't think I will change that though ;)

But it's a ridiculous comparison. Has twitter killed RSS yet?

maybe not yet on a global scale, but for me and some people I know, it certainly has. Never open my reader anymore: almost all good links come to me via twitter.

I don't think there's any chance of that. I've been the same about wave - it doesn't look that interesting enough to bother trying it out. Email, IM, twitter, etc is quite enough, and solves the main use cases very well.

Wave is a specific niche of communication, and that's why it'll never eclipse the above methods.

Definitely not a ringing endorsement..

I do like his idea at the end but I think it would make more sense for Gmail to be integrated into Wave instead of vice-versa.. Integrating back into Gmail seems awkward at best..

I'm a little confused about his description of linear vs nonlinear. Maybe it's because I haven't tried Wave yet.

P.S. If anyone has any invites available, my email is in my profile ;)

Sent you one. I have a few more if anyone else wants one - send me an email

btw - i think you won't receive the invite until the next "wave" of users. i'm guessing they're staggering users with product iteration.

almost everyone i talk to says: this is cool, but none of my friends are on it. maybe google is addressing this with different circles of folks, but from where i'm standing it seems like they could have forced a better distribution of invites.

Lately invites have been going out pretty quickly. Maybe they're hearing all of us saying that we really can't even try it if nobody is on it.

Actually invites are going out quite quickly at least from what I have seen. I received one about two weeks ago, only about a day after it was requested for me by another user.

Cheers - got it :)

Thanks, got it too!

That's the part that resonated with me. Am working with a couple of people on a document and that very "feature" drives me nuts and makes it difficult to keep track of where responses might have been made in the context of a wave. You could put that last response on top, but that spoils the continuity of the document and treating it like Word tracks changes doesn't work either

Wave seems to afford multiple interaction conventions, but unlike with email (where we know the pros and cons of top-posting, for example), it isn't obvious what way works best, and for what situations. It seems unlikely that we'll know anytime soon, either, given that Wave is meant to encompass a wider range of tasks than any of the systems is is typically compared with. Right now, we have the conventions of the linear or hierarchical conversations used by email and web forums, and we have the conventions of the collaboratively annotated and edited documents, but we don't know which to use in the gray areas, because that decision has previously been made by the choice of program. It feels to me like we're driving cars prior to the invention of turn signals, brake lights, stop signs, and demarcated lanes. We have to use trial and error to evolve the rules of the road.

nice response. i didn't realize there were bloggers out there who could be calm and informative.

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