As we’ve noted several times, Google Wave is a service that is fairly hard to explain. And for many people, it’s also hard to understand. That seems somewhat reasonable given that it’s trying to be a new form of communication and that it is still very early in its life span. But just how hard is it to understand? A new website brilliantly takes a look.
Easiertounderstandthanwave.com pits Wave against the other hard-to-understand aspects of life. On the site, you are given a picture of Wave and a picture of something else and asked to click on which is easier to understand. Wave’s competition includes: Metaphysics, the end of Donnie Darko, Ozzy Osbourne, Death, osmotic pressure, cardiothoracic surgery, the health care-reform bill, Google Fast Flip, and even Sarah Palin.
Humorously, Google Wave loses to all of those. As of right now, it is beating very few topics. They include: Women, Scientology, the United States Tax code, Chinese telegraph code, Microsoft Visio 2004, and Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize.
Users are welcome to submit other topics to put up again Wave in the competition. But the best part of the site has to be the elevator music-version of Avril Lavigne’s “Complicated” playing in a loop in the background.
Update: Here’s another awesome tidbit about the site. I have it on very good authority that it was built by a Facebook employee. It’s not clear if this was just one employee acting alone, or if Easiertounderstandthanwave.com can be viewed as how Facebook looks at Google Wave. Which is to say, down on it.
And now we know why we have the little “Not affiliated with any company” at the bottom.
Update 2: Okay, it was just one employee. Conspiracy theorists can rest easy. Maybe.
I know you warned us, but the background music that starts as soon as you load the page still reminds me of a website built in 1995. uugghh…
+1 u r right including the post all are garbage
Google Wave OR Tech Crunch
CrunchWave.
I like that!
Mike should add that to his Tablet!
Google Wave is free open or is beta?
Still on beta so it’s still a little buggy
that’s a classic idea!!!
That first one is like the country. haha
i’m wanting a google wave invite big time. any help me out. hit me on twitter and i’ll thank you big time
I want one too!
Are you good at BJs?
Easier to understand than women? Fkn nerds.
ack, that song’s never going to get out of my head.
They should of called it Google thread.
Google Wave is nothing to be excited about today – much of it is not working…. time will tell
I was thinking exactly the same thing about Google wave and trying to explain it to non techie friends who I had just finished explaining twitter to. Then came across this video http://bit.ly/67F1Y and it kind of does all the explaining for you and even I had a whole new understanding for the product.
Google Wave isn’t one of those cases where us techies get it and non-techies don’t, it’s confusing and complex for even techies as evident from reading the posts of many of those that have the invites and are using Wave.
You’re right, it’s still a little buggy that even developers are having a hard time with it. That’s why they limited it to 100,000 invites. Tried it last night and there are still some errors to fix.
Still waiting for my invite. If anyone has a extra one, please send it to: shockey78@gmail.com
ok, won’t do anything for one. lol
send one to damodt@gmail.com and i’ll be very happy and thankful how about that. looking to do a writeup on our site and use it for a few different projects.
So who wants to create a easiertounderstandthanfacebook.com? Any Google employees out there need a good 20% project?
Done – http://www.fast...m/feud/show/115
needs a URL shortener.
it was built in 48 hours, a URL shortener didn’t make the cut.
KUDOS GOOGLE!
I think it’s great that the GoogleWave guys released a big idea, rather than a product!
It takes nads to put an Open Source partially-developed concept out there for the community to decide how to finish baking.
today morning i finally got the google wave invite and i have no f**ing idea how to use it. i installed the god-damn game on it and there is no way i can play it…. this totally sucks.
LOL, what do you expect when it’s still on beta. Tried it last night and dang, think it was boring if you can’t invite others.
GOOG Wave or (*the appeal* of GOOG Wave to those who don’t have it)
I think the Google Wave coverage is meaningless until everyone can actually try it. Who is your audience right now??
I think Google Wave is at the point where you need to use more creative conceptual thinking and not get stuck on how it’s currently implemented. From what I have seen the vision is about communications with an emphasis on the real-time aspect. So conceptually you can imagine multiple types of communications vehicles (IM, email, SMS/MMS) from various apps on different devices being brought together in a unified way. No longer are these technologies silos with separate communications occurring within each of their own channels. Rather Wave enables users to rise above the specific technologies and apps and communicate across all of them. I’m looking forward to seeing this thing evolve and really what the very smart developers innovate around it.
I’m loving the concept behind that site.
However, not that I’m claiming to be any sort of expert, I was able to figure out how to use quite a few features just by poking around for an hour with another person in a Wave. It’s not that hard. It just looks hard.
That being said, I don’t think it’s ever going to catch on or come anywhere close to beating e-mail. It went too far with the idea. A centralized first message with AJAX style replies would have been quite good enough. This system just goes nuts. I don’t even want to look at Waves that have more than 3 people in them.
This Wave is ‘Quantum Physics’ stuff is nothing more than a negative PR offensive. I hope Google sees it for what it is. Even better, I hope they get what is happening and get more people access to Wave. The concept of Wave is not difficult at all to understand all. Yet, in absentia it is very easy to lambast a product that virtually no one has used.
They are right to make sure its up to serving potential thousands when it debuts to a wider audience. Still Twitter’s sporadic behavior and ‘occasional’ failure, hasn’t hurt Twitter much so, maybe they don’t have as much to be worried about. At the same time, they might want to consider some sort of ad campaign to counter this negative press. Whatever they do, they can’t control their message if they don’t have one.
Yeah, I really don’t see what is so hard to understand about Wave. I’m an artist (with a strong tech background) and my wife is a senior producer for a large website, and by the time we finished watching the original Google presentation on Wave, we had several ideas how it could be implemented.
When I hear this whole line that it is impossible to explain or understand, I often wonder if the people saying this have even tried to figure it out?
wow, very interesting concept, wish i had thought of it! twitter(at)locspoc
Donnie Darko reference +10
Just throwing it out there…if you’ve got a google wave invite, and are feeling like sharing it, please send me one at http://scr.im/saurabh
THANKS!
Really humorous. Obama’s Noble Peace Price had me rolling on the ground.
Funny how it’s a Facebook employee.
It was always easy to understand Facebook: it’s like Myspace, which is like Friendster.
Google succeeds with innovation and execution and Facebook succeeds with execution and stealthy PR.
Time to go to bed, because I’m not going to see anything better than this today!
Google wave may appear a bit complex piece to understand right now. But I am sure in coming times it will be well appreciated and understood.
Google Wave will evolve with time.
ahha Funny to know Google Wave is easier to understand. though I found it bit like “What is this thing” but now its coming handy ! :)
Great parody although I’m now interested in downloading ‘women’ does anyone have any invitations available?!
I love you.
OK, you know easy physics or just checking. Come on, there will be no easy new technology. The latest technology is for advanced people, the no-brainers awaiting a button “press here for you group income report” or “press here for your ROIC” will be happier with mere text i/o, not latest technology. The most loyal customers often don’t want the latest technology, the most loyal customers most often deal with tech nr 2 or 3 who follows the leader copying the successes and avoiding the failures.
i want one too.