If they don't use it to collect personal info (for advertisement purpose) or display ads they're going to close it, as simple as that. All their battle tested products are doing that, it's almost as if their features were side effects.

Even more so in this case, where if they discontinue the product you probably risk losing access to your entire game collection.

Aside: Costumers, er prospects rather, love my products until the end when they ask, "so... how many people work there?"

As though that would indicate how likely it is that the product will have a long life. They are telling me with that question they want my software for a long time. But when they hear the answer they bail.

I still don't know how to get over that hump.

You'll have to find some early adopters who are willing to take a risk in order to solve a critical business problem. Once you have those few reference customers, additional sales become much easier and you can afford to hire more employees.

In the short term try offering to put the source code in escrow so that if your company fails the customers can take over the product themselves. This reduces their risk a little, at least for large enterprises with competent IT departments.

My company payed once for an outlook plugin written by, near as we can figure, a single guy and has been using it for over a decade and it continues to get updates for free.

The hump you have to get over, I think, is the one where your product doesn't explode the second you disappear. That's tough with web stuff, but easy for native.

"Most companies are bloated and would require a huge staff of N to maintain this product, but I'm able to do it with N/10 because we've invested heavily in the very best intelligent automation. I've staked my entire life on this project so I cannot afford to let it fail."

>Honestly, as soon as Google announces a new product, my first thought is to wonder how long until it is shut down

Same here. I hesitate to invest any time or money in something they make until it's been around and looks like it's going to stick around.

They shut down Google+ and that was the "new core of the company" or something like that. So I have no problem imaging a stadia shutdown after a year or so.

I think that it's just your (our) bubble's way of seeing Google, most people don't even know what Google Reader was, or Google+. Google doesn't care if a couple of nerds on a forum whine about their killed products. But hey, we can whine if we want to, right?

I feel exactly the same way. Why on earth would I invest any time or money into a product only to have it disappear out from under me?

Lately I find myself putting more and more energy into preparing for my eventual departure from all things Google.

Trying to do that myself. I'm mostly detached these days but there's a few things that do hang around (Google Calendar in particular - haven't found a good enough substitute for it) and we're a little Google heavy at work, so I'm stuck with it there at least.

How much trust in longevity do you need to be willing to play a rented video game?

> Even when they come out and claim that this product will not be cancelled,

When has this happened?

Has Google broken its contracts?

I suppose buying a $130 box that no longer works AT ALL because the cloud backing it and providing all of the functionality is gone isn't a reason to want longevity? It would be like buying a mobile phone locked to one network that fails. If Google were giving this away for free and charging monthly I'd agree. Welp service down, no more $10 a month from me, moving along.

The $130 box gives you a controller and a Chromecast Ultra. You can use both of the outside of Stadia.

They are also optional: you'll be able to play on Stadia without the controller and without the Chromecast (e.g. on a computer with mouse and keyboard).

What else can you use the controller for? Is it a standard HID?

I don't have prior experience with controllers, and I don't know what is standard. But I can play my steam games with the Stadia controller and use it with https://html5gamepad.com/ (on Windows).

You "buy" games for Stadia, you don't rent them.