
Google Allo and Duo, new messaging apps - r0muald
https://googleblog.blogspot.com/2016/05/allo-duo-apps-messaging-video.html?m=1
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sgnelson
Can anyone explain the management at Google and why they continue to produce
these products that seem to be copies of copies of programs that have been
failures, before they even launch? Is it like an octopus where the 7th
tentacle doesn't know what the 1st is doing?

I'm very curious about the decision making process at Google these days.

If the world needs anything, it's one more messaging app. /s

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joshmn
But wait, this one allows you to make your own emojis that you can only use
within its app!

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ensiferum
Don't forget the scaling text and emojis!

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lazarus101
Oh look, Google's 67th messaging app attempt. I'm sure it's going to be a
killer this time... Preset responses, seriously??? bwahahahaha, only a
socially challenged googler could've thought of something like this.

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dragonwriter
> Preset responses, seriously???

I'm guessing that they've got some pretty good experience with the reception
the same feature has had on Inbox, where its been around for a while. Just
because its not something that seems useful to you (I rarely use it, but it
has sometimes been useful for quick and contextually appropriate
acknowledgements) doesn't mean it doesn't have value to the broad base of
users Google is targeting.

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Numberwang
No desktop app means it will never be able to compete with Skype. I don't even
see a reason trying out the phone apps.

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exception_e
Similarly, Messenger and Whatsapp have awesome web clients. Very surprised by
the mobile-only strategy.

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paride5745
Whatsapp has also a PC/Mac desktop app since a few days.

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untog
This is absolutely baffling. Not a replacement for Hangouts, doesn't integrate
with SMS... it's dead before it has even started.

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matmann2001
I just don't get it anymore. There are two primary modes for chatting, SMS and
IM. Integrating with both has its challenges, but it can't be impossible. If
someone could just create an app that makes messaging via the two systems
seamless, they'd dominate the market.

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mixedCase
Signal works nicely enough for me.

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Tepix
Only on Android is Signal able to merge its IM with SMS. iOS doesn't expose
this capability so only iMessage does it.

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mixedCase
Well if you buy into a walled garden you can't expect other devs to be able to
get in if the owner of the ecosystem won't allow it.

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profeta
Features only an engineer could think of.

i can imagine clicking even once on the preset responses and then receiving a
barrage of curses from the other side from having used it.

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NathanKP
I use suggested responses on Inbox all the time. People tend to send lots of
email that only needs a one line response, and the suggested responses of
"Thanks for confirming", "That time works for me", etc. are perfect.

Likewise in social messaging apps there are a lot of "transactional" style
conversations where you need to confirm receiving the text message with some
expected response. In an instant messaging program these bot suggested
responses will work fine for all the one line responses like "cya soon!",
"looking forward to it!" , and even "I love you too!"

If anything bot suggested responses mean that the longer form less vanilla
text messages you type out are more meaningful. It will encourage people to
send stuff that isn't so basic and trivial that a bot can form an adequate
response.

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tdkl
Email messages you describe are formal and generic replies can be useful. But
hitting canned replies to my friends and spouse is a bit sad.

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NathanKP
The way I see it there are two types of messages to friends and spouse. There
is the silly little stuff like "Check out this cute dog!" and if Google
suggests "Awwww!" as a response, and that was pretty much what I was going to
type out anyway then I'll just hit the "canned reply".

If its a serious message though like someone telling me that their relative is
in the hospital I'm probably not going to hit an automatic reply like "Sorry
to hear that", I'm going to type out a longer message.

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Nullabillity
Chat and VoIP networks with no desktop clients...? I'll stay with Hangouts,
thanks.

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kinkdr
"Allo is a smart messaging app that makes your conversations easier and more
expressive"

For a moments I though they found the cure for socially awkward people like
myself :)

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profeta
And yet another feature-limited non-standard IM solutions to alienate everyone
even more.

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cuchoi
So I should have 3 different Google messaging apps? Please stop

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ewzimm
If you're on iOS, you should use Google Hangouts to communicate with people
across iOS, Android, and Chrome. But it doesn't integrate with the portable
Google Voice number, so you'll also want that app. And now YouTube has been
relaunched with native messaging capabilities, so you'll want to install that
too to talk with YouTube users. But that won't let you communicate with all
the people on Google+, so you'll need to install that too. But of course, you
won't get all the latest features for all these messaging apps unless you get
the new Allo and Duo, so you should really have all 6. If you're on Android,
you can add a 7th with the native SMS app.

Actually, I forgot that you'll also want to talk in small groups about special
interests, so you'll need Google Spaces. You really only need 8 apps to
message people with Google.

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defiancedigital
End to end encryption ... with bots examining your chat to provide adds. Maybe
we should call this end to _and_ google :-)

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SlashmanX
Have to say, that restaurant booking example is pretty handy. Can't see myself
using this though

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noxToken
Is this supposed to replace Hangouts or be a Hangouts that's attached to your
phone's SMS? Also, where does this mean Voice's SMS capabilities are now
canned?

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Zigurd
Do these have anything to do with Jibe, or is this yet another orthogonal
dimension to messaging at Google?

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Zigurd
It turns out they have nothing to do with Jibe. This is what I was able to dig
up: [http://www.telirati.com/2016/05/telirati-analysis-18-quic-
br...](http://www.telirati.com/2016/05/telirati-analysis-18-quic-brown-
fox.html)

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breakingcups
This is just becoming ridiculous..

