They were absolutely pitched as huge ideas that would change everything we know about email and social networks. Bearing the scars of their public failures, Google started calling new projects moonshots to shape perception of the programs as chasing ideas, while preemptively deflecting any criticism of their readiness or desirability to large markets. They are not materially different from moonshots except in presentation.
What huge ideas? Social network inside a browser was never a new idea, no matter how hard Google was pitching.
Circles for different messages to different groups, as well as the universal profile for logging into all your favorite Google services. It's not my fault these were harebrained ideas, but they were presented as revolutionary. The ideas are still arguably revolutionary (Slack delivers where Wave failed) but Google's execution was lacking. Same fundamental issue facing so many of their other programs.
Hyves in NL had the 'circles' thing before Facebook even existed, let alone before Google went public with G+.
And the Russians dreamed of going to the moon but that's the rub with consumer products - the market has to accept them for it to be an accomplishment. Google thought they'd found the magic recipe and pitched it as something for everyone that was a huge breakthrough. Being first with features or flows doesn't matter at all. The only thing that matters is making it relevant to users' lives, which all parties failed at. Circles is a bad model for a mass market.
Hyves had big acceptance in NL at some point it was one of the largest websites here, Facebook ate their lunch.
They were absolutely moonshots. Reforming the entire way we do realtime communications? Reforming the entire way we do social interaction? Total moonshots, they just failed, but if they succeeded they would be billion dollar businesses.
BTW, the best result of wave is hackpad, IMHO.
Wave was supposed to completely blow away email.
Plus was intended to eat Facebook's lunch.
They were both huge moonshots.
I think the implication about a moonshot is that nobody has been to the moon before the moonshot. The thing about Facebook's lunch is that lunch happens ever day at noon.
> They were both huge moonshots.
Unfortunately, they used https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N1_(rocket) for the rockets.
It would be a good thing explain why the downvotes