Lack of “Security” May Hinder Future Google Adoption
I better make this clear: I am not talking about encryption, password, hashes, etc. Not that kind of security.
No, I'm talking about reliability. Something Google has had for a very long time, and one of the many reasons I'm such a Google fanatic.
Until recently, at least as far as I can remember, Google products that existed did not see the end of the tunnel very often. (The question and answer service excluded).
Recently, however, Google has been trying to expand into many markets. From what I can take away, Google wants to be the hub of information exchange on the Internet. After all, knowing all of that powers their search - and their search powers their ads.
Recently though, several Google services have announced that they will be discontinued. Among these: Wave, PowerMeter, and Health.
PowerMeter and Health did not see large enough adoption for Google to continue putting forth the funds for them. To me, this is disappointing. Being able to get this information so easily and readily through Google was really exciting. After all: Google has the technological know-how to keep my data secure and provide at least decent user interfaces to said data. In fact, I used Google Health - although since I don't have many issues it was currently just to store my insurance information.
Now though, these services will be disappearing. Who is to say that other less-mainstream services won't disappear in the future? Buzz? Voice? Google+? Well, there's no way that last one could disappear... right?
If I'm going to rely on Google to provide a service, I'm going to need the security of knowing that the service is going to continue to exist. I might be asking a bit much as a free user, but its still a very important consideration.
If Google loses this trust; this security; this reliability - won't it hinder future adoption of Google's services?
So I Came Up With This Really Great Idea
Not too long ago, Gabor came up with an idea - Throw out IMAP. As anyone that has ever had to fiddle with email settings should know, IMAP is an email transfer protocol. It allows a client to communicate with a server and keep email data synchronized between the two. It was a good idea for its time (1994), but now its old and is no longer as well suited to email tasks as it should be.
Think about it. How much has email changed in the last twenty years? Not a lot, if any. The most revolutionary features are GMail's labels and Gmail/Outlook's server-side email rules/filter settings. To me, this is ridiculous. I was born in 1991, played around on the internet when it was on dialup, and had a free Juno account when I was old enough.
Since then I'd moved through Yahoo, Hotmail, and finally rested on Gmail. But all-in-all, everything is still pretty much the same. It was because of this that Gabor's idea to scrap IMAP really intrigued me. I wanted this. Google and Microsoft had both come up with newer, proprietary synchronization standards, and creating a new, open protocol would be the way to usher in a new age of compatibility and extensible feature sets.
Since this initial bit of intrigue, I've spent some time working on protocol documentation whenever I can get a bit motivated and have some spare time to do so. I continue to push my creativity and find new things to throw in to the protocol, ideas that wouldn't have to be there when the first part hits, but that its extensibility would make possible. Ideas such as receiving push notifications from web services, that could also be synced to mobile devices through the protocol, or using OpenID as a base and creating a new single-login/password system that uses your email address., or even ideas such as being able to query an email server for a person's contact information, and store/update it in a syncable address book.
Once we leave the defining bounds of IMAP and proprietary protocols like Exchange, we can really start work on building something terrific that would allow a flood of innovation that email has never seen before.
Unfortunately, my voice is small - and is very largely unheard. I can't even get Gabor, the original creator of this idea to @mention me on twitter regarding it anymore, and so I've been stuck working on it by myself.
So yes, this is a call to action, and I do so hope that you'll oblige me. I need help revolutionizing email. I can't do it all on my own, and the protocol being open is the important part. I need other people's ideas, not just my own. I need their thoughts and their knowledge. I'm only a college student after all, and as much as I'd like to do this all by myself and use it as my claim to fame - I'd much rather just be a person that helped start and organize it and get things moving.
So please, join me in discussing my ideas, submitting your own, and if you feel like it even work on defining the protocol!
Please join the discussion on 'MSAP' at Google Groups.
Thank you for your time, and I look forward to hearing your thoughts and ideas.
Using Google Voice with Outlook’s Dialer
Microsoft Outlook has this very nifty feature where you can connect your computer to the phone line and use your Outlook Contact List to instantly dial someone’s number. Of course, when they created this they needed to add support for using a calling card, as long distance in the same country hadn’t even begun to be free.
Now if you use Google Voice, you can use this to your advantage with the simple addition of just a few seconds to the call.
Continue Reading for Instructions on how to Outlook up to dial through Google Voice
Oh Apple, You Amuse Me
Apple iPhone Game Center Icon vs. Microsoft Store Logo:
Oh Apple, has anyone told you lately that you’re CRAZY?
Google Voice is still Lacking
I’ve been a religious Google Voice user for awhile now, so it really bothers me that it is still lacking feature wise. Of course, I’ve been helping with some of these missing features (re: Google Voice for Outlook) but there are still plenty more missing as well as some minor issues I have with the service.
Multimedia Messaging (MMS)
For some reason, Google Voice still lacks this functionality. It can’t be THAT difficult, can it? I mean, the iPhone managed to add it before Google Voice, and if you really want to compete in the mobile business, its kind of necessary to have MMS, as SMS is pretty much irrelevant now.
Not only that, but any MMS that is sent to a Google Voice number is just lost. Couldn’t they at least be forwarded to my email address? I don’t like the fact that I could be losing incoming messages to /dev/null, and its even more annoying having to give out two different phone numbers (one for MMS and one for SMS).
Shortcodes
It is all well and good that Google’s own shortcodes work through Google Voice, but not so fantastic that nobody else’s does. I don’t want to be passing around two sets of phone numbers, and I’d love the ability to just set to spam a shortcode that is getting out of hand and won’t let me unsubscribe (if that ever happens). Developers pay tons of money to set up shortcodes, so why doesn’t Google Voice support them?
API
Google Voice is a Service. I use it with my cell, with my home phone, and with my computer. But in order to make desktop apps or things like Google Voice for Outlook possible, an API is almost necessary. I’ve managed to do it without one, but it still pretty much sucks.
Outlook Mobile Service
Companies charge tons of money for people to have the ability to send text messages through Microsoft Outlook. Adding the very simplistic SOAP server to the Google Voice backend would allow anyone with Microsoft Office to send text messages, forward emails, and receive reminders and notifications for FREE, something that is usually charged 10 cents or more per message. (Combine this with MMS as mentioned above, and it gets EVEN BETTER!)
Internet Fax Service
Google Voice already has “Receive Faxes” as a “Suggest a Feature.” Adding this and providing users on computers a way to send faxes would increase productivity and make the service even more useful to small companies and freelancers.
Keep in mind, these are just a few ways that Google could improve Google Voice, there are tons more.
What do you want to see added?