The Wave is Dead; Long Live the Wave

After a year or so, Google has finally decided to stop development on Google Wave.  Why?  Wave was hotly anticipated, desired by multitudes, and bursting at the seams with features.

When it first hit the net, I begged, scouted my list of friends, and tried bribing anyone I knew for an invitation.  Finally, about a month after it went to a public beta, I had one and logged on the first time.  I was dazzled, swept off my feet, and my world was changed forever.  Actually, no.  I was confused, frustrated, and disappointed.

After a couple of months of trying to love Wave and diligently working with my one colleague who also had it, we simply couldn’t find a use for it that wasn’t served at least as well, if not better by existing tools.  On top of that, to even try and explain the basic notion to ordinary users was daunting.  Wave was a product killed by its complexity, unbridled flexibility, and poor introduction.

There are lessons here.  No matter how cutting edge your system is—CRM, collaboration, or anything—if it isn’t easily delivered to your users, it may very well fail.  Just because the developers love it, doesn’t mean the customer will as well.  Google, to their credit, figured this out and are cutting their losses.  I hope they will incorporate the good pieces in other products and make their future offerings better and more easily adopted.

Browser Wars and SaaS—Don’t be a Casualty

Top Browser Share Trend

July, 2009 to May, 2010




Take a look at this table and the graphic.  (Click picture for a larger version.) If it doesn’t make you afraid, you don’t understand the situation.

The basis for software as a service (SaaS), things such as Salesforce CRM, Google Docs, and a whole raft of others, is the ability for a browser to present a fair imitation of a locally installed application.  To do that, the creators of SaaS products rely on certain standards.  If they say, “XYZ” to the browser, they have to be confident it will display, “XYZ” and not “xyZ2”.  Look again at the table.  As of May, 2010, nearly one in five internet users was still browsing with the hoary IE6, a browser never renowned for adherence to standards and now far, far, out of date.

Look over your own user base.  What types and versions are they using?  How is that impacting their experience and how does that reduce or enhance security?  Too often we build to the specifications of the latest and greatest and totally ignore that many of our people may be accessing our SaaS applications with something much older or more obscure.

Is the solution to build applications to the lowest common denominator?  Absolutely not.  Doing so is self-defeating and freezes development at a given point.  The solution is to support a reasonable number of browsers and at least one back from the current version AND to encourage/force end user upgrades.  Easier said than done in some shops, but at the finish, there is no other answer.  Until you get a handle on this issue, the ghosts of the past will haunt your current projects.

Thoughts?  Your experiences?  Suggestions? 

Miracle Cure

Hamlin’s Wizard Oil cures rheumatism, diphtheria, sprains, corns, cramps, lame backs, and diarrhea.  Sounds like some amazing stuff!  No doubt the linear descendant of this patent medicine now claims to, “Create a world class, global, multilingual, CRM system, with integrated reporting and full quoting ability, using only point and click administration and requiring less than a day to setup”.

Let me see a show of hands.  How many of you have felt a tingle of amazement and interest when you hear pitches from salespeople as they explain how version 9.3 is completely different from 8.5 (8.5 being the version that almost destroyed your company) and how the new features change the game?  Be honest.  That’s what I thought—pretty much all of us have.

Guess what?  I’m here today to tell you, “STOP IT.”  Put your big boy or big girl pants on and grow up.  There are no free lunches, no miracle cures for corns, cholera, and cooties, and there are no simple solutions to complex problems.  Get over it.  The sooner you let go of the false hope, the sooner you can move into the realm of real progress.

Don’t worry; all isn’t as gloomy as you may think that I am implying.  There are great products and services out there.  Salesforce is tremendous.  Google offers free and low cost products that have rocked the world.  The difference between reality and marketing exists in expectation. 

Don’t be fooled by demos, ads, or conferences.  Every solution to a challenge is work, and lots of it.  Set your expectations and those of your management and users correctly.  Leave the miracles to Our Lady of Lourdes and concentrate on value, hard work, and progress.  Be skeptical, diligent, and demanding in any technology transaction, but particularly with CRM systems; your career may depend on it.