The numbers were bad, Duncan, because not many people wanted to use it. Your theory that they are "killing off projects based only numbers" is something you appear to have made up.

I think Google's real error was not killing it too soon, but allowing it to be developed in a bubble and then springing it on the world with a giant, "Ta da!" It let them ignore a lot of real-world problems and questions, investing heavily in untested design hypotheses. Once you get to the point of a huge global launch, you've baked in problems in a way that is very hard to fix.