2nd
Looking beyond what is to what could be
With the release of Google Wave, Google has unleashed the beast - a new communication paradigm with ambitions to change the way people interact and communicate. The scale and scope of the innovative vision is simply awesome.
But let’s not confuse the vision of what could be with what currently is. Google Wave, as it stands today, is barely a beta product (and maybe more reasonably, it’s an alpha product). It is buggy, the UI/UX leaves much to be desired and I find it overly confusing - I am just not sure how to best use it.
In many respects, it reminds me of the first instantiation of Android. The first Android phone, the G1, was pretty cool. It received tremendous hype and attention as Google’s hailed entry into mobile. Although it worked decently well, it was quite a far cry from a serious iPhone alternative. More than anything else, it offered a glimpse into the expansive realm of possibilities with the new open mobile OS platform. This spark of potential eventually became a flame and then a full-blown fire as carriers, hardware manufacturers and application developers recognized the opportunity and adopted the new platform.
But I digress.
Google Wave in it’s current form is not yet earth shattering. But if you look beyond what is to what could be, the vision is truly remarkable.
To realize this vision, I hope Google eventually open sources Wave allowing the vast universe of distributed intellect and energy to work its magic on the new communication paradigm. This thing is simply too big and too important to be housed internally within any one company.
