Google has everything they need to be successful at creating anything they want: Loads of cash. Talented people. Endless resources. Massive data centers for scale. And yet, everything they create is a piece of crap.
I used to be such a huge Google fan. Until I became an Apple fan, and realized I had been compromising. When it comes to search Google is still king. I don’t understand people who use Yahoo or Bing for search. They are still good at ads as well. If you want more bang for your buck then Google Adwords are the way to go (maybe tied with Facebook ads). But everything thing else they’ve created has been a huge let down.
Now, of course, a lot of you are going to scream that Android is perfect. It’s not. It’s good, but when compared to iOS, it’s a piece of crap. Then there will be those who scream about Gmail. You’re right, Gmail is the best web based e-mail provider and client out there. But that’s only because everything else is a huge pile of crap. Gmail has the worse interface ever, even the new one. Although, I will concede that it’s almost perfect when it comes to spam detection. Ever since Apple Mail 5 came out with Lion, I’ve been using it instead of Gmail, and I’m never going back.
So there it is, Search and Ads are pretty good. Android and Gmail are the next best things they have going for them, yet they both suck. And if you even bring up Google+ I’ll slap you in the face.
This brings me to Google’s latest endeavor. It’s called Currents. It’s pretty bad. Maybe it’s better on Android devices, but it’s not good at all on the iPhone and the iPad. Currents is a news reader. Much like Flipboard, the popular news reader for iOS devices, it has a very beautiful look to it. I will give Google credit for finally putting some emphasis on design in their new products. But when it comes to the functionality of usability of it, the thing is incredible slow and clunky. It takes several minutes to load all the news stories (compared to Flipboard which takes seconds). It’s not intuitive, so it takes some time to figure out how to even navigate it, and when you do figure it out you realize it’s totally opposite of how you’d naturally go about it. It was obviously designed by a team of Android users, not a team of iOS users. Which is no surprise.
Hands down Flipboard is more beautiful, easier to use, and dramatically faster and more stable than Currents. But, Flipboard is not available on Android devices. So I guess Google Currents is the best you’ll get if you are on an Android device. But then again, you’re used to compromising so you won’t even notice.
This just goes to show that Google really doesn’t know what it’s doing when it comes to creating products. Apple’s belief has always been make it perfect and don’t release it until it is. Google’s belief has always been release it fast and just get as much out there as possible. What you end up with is only a handful of Apple products, but they are all beautiful and perfect (albeit expensive), and a ton of products from Google that are all a huge disappointing pile of crap.
