Let's move the discussion to Branch so we don't bother the delicate Nick Kallen.
Google: Buyer or builder?
@mattknox @goldman @nk @sferik (sorry i'm late on this but) chrome was purchased.
@robey @mattknox @goldman @nk @sferik uh. No it wasn't.
@marius @robey @mattknox @goldman @nk @sferik chrome wasn't but android (at least dalvik) was.
@wil @marius @robey @mattknox @goldman @sferik you guys need to get a room/wiki
Man, @parislemon's on-point again: http://t.co/3Hpr4q0D ... his articles get me just as fired up as you know he feels writing them...
@joshm @parislemon adding a better photo uploading and viewing experience MIGHT capture the 5% of users who only use Instagram to cross post
@nk @parislemon agree re: capturing the 5% (see: https://t.co/drg6xNWS ) but not sure how you can argue that adding filters is NOT reactive?
@joshm @parislemon "reactive" - filters were innovative 2 years ago, improving shitty camera phone photos; now it's a commodity feature.
@nk @joshm @parislemon I agree w this.
@goldman @joshm @parislemon it strikes me as implausible when journalists impute idiocy or malice as a cause of twitter's decision making.
@nk sure but that's bias probably. I certainly think FB/GOOG/apple have done stupid and/or malicious things.
@goldman I dunno. I disagree(d) with twitter's leadership plenty. But it's always calculating and self interested. I assume the same of fb&c
@nk but that doesn't rule out dumb right?
@goldman well serious miscalculations are sometimes made... but they aren't obviously dumb like thinking you can kill Instagram.
@nk yah I agree. Although then there's Plus.
@goldman zing. Plus is somewhat comparable, but that effort was far more ambitious than "just copy one core feature"
@nk which kinda makes it more the folly since the ambition was in part "we want this thing someone else already has."
@goldman note that goog succeeded w android, which was a similar bet. High risk, high return.
@nk @goldman android is more an innovator's dilemma-style "make something worse/cheaper and work up the value chain" than cloning.
@mattknox @nk @goldman I'd argue the same is true of Google Plus. I think the comparison is apt.
@sferik @mattknox @nk @goldman but they bought android, and tried to build plus in-house. they're better at buying than building.
@robey @mattknox @nk @goldman Seems like a bad sign that Google is better at buying than building. See also YouTube vs. Google Video.
@sferik @robey @mattknox @nk also maps, and a lot of docs.
@goldman @robey @mattknox @nk GMail was their last great in-house product. And that was launched in 2004.
@sferik @goldman @robey @nk that was actually a 20% project, right?
@mattknox @goldman @robey @nk I'm pretty sure it was a 20% product but it was still built in-house as opposed to being purchased.
@sferik @goldman @robey @nk Ah! Chrome is a huge success, and sourced in-house top-down. cool!
