Why Does Beta Last So Long?

Carl Bialik writes "Noting that Google News has been labeled 'beta' for nearly three years, and Microsoft's antispyware program for nearly a year, the Wall Street Journal looks at why 'beta' lasts so long these days. The article mentions the usefulness of getting the masses to test the product, but also notices another possible reason: 'Betas also have become a marketing device in a fiercely competitive industry, allowing software and Internet firms to release new products or services sooner and cultivate early buzz. Betas, which once had been quietly distributed, are trumpeted in press releases and at news conferences. "I deplore it as a consumer; I admire it as a marketing professional," said Peter Sealey, a marketing professor at the University of California at Berkeley and former chief marketing officer at Coca-Cola Co. "I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base." '"

Comments

Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Knight Thrasher]

The reason people like products released as Betas, is because it's the most honest software companies ever get about their products. It's pretty much as simple as that; Beta implies under-constant-improvement, and even I as a consumer don't mind imperfect software, as long as the company will at least advise me it's been released in Beta - under construction.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[mmkkbb]

The acceptance of 'beta' as 'final' by many consumers is a programmer's dream. The need for a product is diminished, as consumers will forgive anything from lack of polish to lack of functionality and lack of coherence. All those things you're too lazy to fix can be swept away since it's still in beta!

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[spammyd]

ill trade you 2 alphas for 1 beta

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[DNS-and-BIND]

As long as when I "upgrade", it's an actual upgrade, and not a totally new install. I hate having six different entries in "Add/Remove Programs" for a single program.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[NewWorldDan]

I think it's more about instant gratification. Developing a high quality product takes time. Releasing a beta panders to the impatitent and provides a large testing base for low cost to the developer and often at no cost to the user. Everyone's as happy as they're going to get.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Incoherent07]

Yeah, I was starting to get irritated at Firefox over that. That, and you can't uninstall the old ones because it'll break all of them.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Seumas]

If you release a product that isn't quite perfect, they bitch at you for releasing too soon. If you run in beta until you get the bugs out, they bitch at you because you label it "beta"... Which frankly is stupid, because that's like saying you refuse to drive a Ferari because the name "Ferari" sounds funny.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Threni]

> I hate having six different entries in "Add/Remove Programs" for a single
> program.

I had that with Firefox. I deleted the oldest version and it deleted all of them. Uh...thanks.

Also, I had 2 dummy labels in Gmail which I can't delete - it just ignores me, as does Google support.

Frankly, standards are so low these days (software and hardware) that it's hardly necessary to stick a beta warning - I don't expect stuff to work, and I expect to have to explain what's wrong to clueless idiots in shops when I take the stuff back. Fortunately, they're so used to it too that it's rarely hard to get your money back - they know you're going to have to just take your chances with another one anyway, so why worry about it?

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Anonymous Coward]

Just looks silly when it's spelled wrong

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[at_slashdot]

On the other hand there are people that don't use some software because it's beta, so I guess there's a karma: you gain some customers that don't complain about the product and you lose some that will never try as long as the product is beta (depending on the product and customers there might be more won than lost, but in such a cases probably didn't matter from the beginning if the product was declared final or not).

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[IamTheRealMike]

Not really. If Google News was crap, nobody would use it, "beta" or not. I am totally not convinced slapping a word on your logo makes people more accepting of rubbish.

I really don't know why GN is still labelled as beta given that it's not particularly buggy, probably they just forgot to remove it?

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[flyingsquid]

Which gets rid of a lot of risk for the company. Apple released the Newton before the software had all the kinks out of it. My understanding of that story is that after some work, the Newton actually worked pretty well- a lot of people apparently swore by the thing. But by the time that happened, the Newton had the inescapable air of failure around it, the buzz was negative and they couldn't come back.

You could imagine how, say, Google rolling out a product prematurely could be bad if it fails. It would break that air of invincibility they currently enjoy. With the current scheme, they roll the product out as a Beta, if it succeeds you do the final release, if not, it never gets out of Beta, and you have a perfect score of successes because you never officially release your failures. That's my theory anyhow.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Kjella]

The acceptance of 'beta' as 'final' by many consumers is a programmer's dream. The need for a product is diminished, as consumers will forgive anything from lack of polish to lack of functionality and lack of coherence. All those things you're too lazy to fix can be swept away since it's still in beta!

Or will customers simply redefine 'beta' to mean 'final' and whine and complain until they get the same service and support anyway? 'beta' is after all just a concept, a nametag that we've placed on a product, and it is the same product customers use day out and day in, perhaps come to rely upon whether you call it beta or not. I know there's a lot of power in words, but I don't think you can "define away" delivering a final product.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[pizzaman100]

Maybe it helps them avoid lawsuits?

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[The Warlock]

Blame that on the idiocy of what passes for a package system in Windows. Seriously. That problem is nonexistent on my Debian partition unless I as the user fuck something up really bad.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Neoncow]

While your idea may be true for some** companies, I am not as cynical about betas coming from good companies.

What is happening here is the public has gotten used to software development in the form of the waterfall model. They understand that it takes time to design, produce, and test software. They have become accustomed to updates during the maintainance phase of a product's lifecycle. <CarAnalogy premise="Software versions are like year models">

The source of the misunderstanding is that the development industry has moved on to other models like the Iterative Model, while the general public is still expecting waterfall-style releases. Why has the software industry moved on without bringing public expectation with it? Because we can. You cannot expect the public to keep up with the difference between old methodologies and the new ones. This is true in any industry where there are people with specialized knowledge. <CarAnalogy premise="Car designers know a lot more about cars than you do">

"Beta" is a transitionary device for the public to understand that the software industry has changed. The public will find out that just because a product is released, it doesn't mean that the programmers are done with working on it. Just that they have part of it working. Of course this is possible because of the declining cost of distribution (The Internet gives us this).

Beta shields people who are used to the old model from the truths of iterative development. Software is never done until it's perfect, but we can't hold out and wait until it's perfect, or we will never get anywhere. <CarAnalogy type="Nobody has the perfect car">

*All car analogies are left as an exercise for the reader.
**I agree with parent when it comes to bad/copycat companies. They're doing it because it's hip/they're lazy.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Cassanova]

What if the company decides that the "beta" version was not a viable product after all and decide it close it down after three years? If I scream, the company is going hide behind its "oh, but we told you, it was only a beta" line, while all my emails get flushed out...will they atleast give me all my emails in a cd before they shut down? Just an example...

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Plaid Phantom]

I think Google leaves something in the beta stage until they can figure out how to make money with it. Maybe I'm wrong, but the only thing I can think of that's not in beta is Adsense (other than search, obviously).

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[bdwoolman]

Cool with Google News, Gmail etc, but I hate it when BIOS's and hardware driver updates languish in beta forever. Guess the manufacturers figure that you have the widget so you can twist in the wind.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[bolo1729]

In case of Gmail, for example, the "beta" status is necessary if Google wants to keep the "invitation only" policy (otherwise, how would they justify the resticted access?)

You may call it a conspiracy theory, but I think it might be in Google's interest to keep the "invitation only" scheme.

First of all, they might benefit from the invitation scheme by learning about the ways a product propagates in the Internet.

Besides, since Gmail users are not totally anonymous (they were invited by someone, who was invited by...), the current policy discourages illegal usage of Gmail, which saves Google some trouble.

Of course, it is just a theory, maybe they really are just fixing the bugs and adding some cool new features...

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Seumas]

What do I care - I drive a mustang. I'm not prissy or spoiled enough to drive a Ferrari.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Seumas]

What people in other industries don't seem to grasp is that perfecting a piece of software is very unlike perfecting a car or an oven. They all require some testing, review, QA, etc. However, in a large piece of software you could have MILLIONS of lines of code. You can think of each line of code as a separate "part" since one bad line could cause problems just like one bad part can.

So tell me, which requires more people banging away on it (resources impossible to gather internally for software testing as some problems don't occur until the right person does the right weird thing with the right configuration at the right time when the moon is in a certain phase) -- an AM/FM radio or a car with a few thousand or even tens of thousands of parts or a piece of software with MILLIONS of parts that have to interoprate with other software and hardware and hardware drivers of all flavors (each of which themselves include thousands, tens of thousands or millions of parts)?

People who act like software development should be treated like developing a toaster have not the slightest idea of what is involved.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[el americano]

Perhaps that statement was too sweeping? The consumer will not forgive "anything". In fact, I don't see the quality expectations as being much lower than any free service. That's really the important distinction between what we traditionally recognize as a beta leading to a retail product and these examples. Almost all these extended betas are free services.

For example, Hotmail may be in full release, but it's quality is bad (e.g. features that seem like bugs, usability crippled by advertising) So I chose not to use it. Gmail has the same standards of consumer appeal. If it is truly inadequate, as the Coke guy says, then it does not serve its purpose. That's why bugs *are* being fixed in beta. Furthermore, it's a mischaracterization to say that laziness is the reason not to address product issues in beta programs. Many of these are managed almost exactly as a fully released product would be. I take the beta tag to mean a lack of testing, but also that the product may be altered significantly before settling on its final disposition - which happens to be why I don't use gmail as my primary webmail account.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldn't mind a long beta if the product came out and worked properly. It's the packages that spend 2 years in beta development and then require 5 security patches in the first month of official release that bother me.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[ZenShadow]

I see this kind of thinking a lot, but it all falls apart when you suddenly realize that cars, toasters, and ovens actually *contain* software with potentially millions of lines of code...

Somehow, they still seem to work much better than your average piece of "consumer software".

--S

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[jaseuk]

Yes a toaster, car and oven may contain code. However it's likely to be under 4K of object code and a few thousand lines of assembler / C if that. To top it all off the interactions are limited and the system is running on a known consistent hardware platform. Getting this sort of system bomb proof is far easier than the most trivial windows app. You have no OS to worry about, no 3rd party drivers, no installation routine and more importantly no user tinkering and very clearly defined ways for the user to interact with the system.

Embedded is far easier to develop and get a reliable system for. In addition the code is generally better tested as it's just not practical to upgrade firmware for half a million toasters after the product has shipped.

Jason.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[ZenShadow]

On the first paragraph, I highly doubt that the software controlling my fuel injection, engine timing, and numerous other things is just "a few thousand lines of code." Car computers tend to be fairly complex beasts (and, perhaps unfortunately, some of them even run Windows Embedded!). There is an operating system, it's just an RTOS instead of a general purpose OS. The timing on these things is absolutely critical, too, which means much more required accuracy. You have a point on 3rd party drivers and user interaction, though, and that IS a huge thing.

As far as the latter, the more testing I think is the point. It's not nearly impossible to develop stable GUI apps -- nobody bothers though, because they don't want to spend the time testing.

--S (guilty as charged -- I occasionally develop ugly GUI apps too ;-)

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[ArieKremen]

That's BS - ANY product can be 'improved' ad infinum. Why do you think that software is something special? Only because there are possibly more lines in program than parts in a car? That's stupid. Just imagine the amount of work (design/engineering/documentation/material selection/production) required to get even a small piece of hardware (screw, light bulb, radio,...) to production. The difference is that cars, their development and that of their parts is much more progressed than that of software (approx 100 yrs vs. ~30 yrs, probably less for 'modern' programming). You are shortsighted, just because you don't know/are aware of how other industries tackle their QA/QC issues.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[rizzo420]

google local doesn't say beta. that includes their maps. i'm kind of surprised since that's one of their newer products. the google toolbar is also not beta.

i think it's more the lawsuit thing that they keep news in beta (makes people think they're constantly working on it). google groups is one of their longest running beta products...

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[NaDrew]

Blame that on the idiocy of what passes for a package system in Windows.

Wrong. Blame it on incompetent install programmers. If you use the default settings of InstallShield or WISE, upgrading is handled automatically--including managing the Add/Remove Programs entries. Only when programmers who don't know what they're doing start monkeying around with the uninstall Registry stuff do you see multiple ARP entries for the same app.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[cbiltcliffe]

There's a program called "MyUninstaller" available here: http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/myuninst.html

It will let you delete those extra installed programs from the list, without actually running the installer.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[cbiltcliffe]

There's a program called "MyUninstaller" available here: http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/myuninst.html

It will let you delete those extra installed programs from the list, without actually running the uninstaller.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas

[Ohreally_factor]

**I agree with parent when it comes to bad/copycat companies. They're doing it because it's hip/they're lazy.

That's a FEATURE! Not a BUG!

Sincerely,

Web 2.0

google news was not working a few days ago

[Joe123456]

so thay must just be very slow in geting stuff done

now if only the xbox 360 would do this...

[altoz]

seriously, why wouldn't you do this with dedicated gamers AND still charge them money for the xbox?

Re:now if only the xbox 360 would do this...

[Harrakis]

They did, everyone bought the beta console...

Best of Both Worlds

[Anonymous Coward]

It allows for the company to release the product and have it utilized by the public, but if something were to break, they still have the cruch of "well, it is in beta" to fall back on.

Re:Best of Both Worlds

[PlusFiveTroll]

Sad thing is with most software these days, the new beta is on the same stability level as the previous product. Not always the case as I've tested some unstable beta software, but as where the case, I dont think Windows 95 was ever 'not' beta.

Re:Best of Both Worlds

[BoomerSooner]

That's the truth. My company QA's our software but in new routines (moderatly complex) we were having bugs that wouldn't be triggered for months. To eliminate the confusion of our customers on our new product features all new modules/reports/etc... come out as beta for at least the first month. It's the "take it with a grain of salt" model. I've found our customers like accessing new features (especially the ones they specifically request) earlier and have significantly less anger when a small glitch appears. Programers aren't perfect and end-user design docs are almost impossible to get 100% correct. Beta is a happy medium that should not be abused. That being said Google abuses the shit out of it. However, when you don't pay a dime for their services, can you really complain? (The answer is yes, with very little affect.)

Re:Best of Both Worlds

[Anonymous Coward]

What was the point of that statement? It's exactly what TFA stated. And this is modded insightful?

Re:Best of Both Worlds

[John Napkintosh]

That's along the lines of what I was thinking. But, not only that, if there is no dedicated in-house beta team, they rely on input from users out in public to move it from beta to production. If users aren't submitting input/feedback, they've gotta wait until they get it before they can act on it, which could take time...

Re:Best of Both Worlds

[micheas]

I read some place that Google's definition of beta is: We don't know how we are going to make money on this.

Fact or urban legend I haven't seen much evidence contradicting this.

maybe...

[JavaLord]

why 'beta' lasts so long these days

Because companies are being more realistic with project life cycles?

Re:maybe...

[The_Abortionist]

It seems that organisations like to keep open the option to abort a project.

In a way, it's often similar with prospect parents.

Re:maybe...

[indifferent children]

Or maybe because the entire idea of a 'release schedule' is going away (at least for the open source projects). If a team releases version X, and then 50 security updates over the following 24 months, when was the product really released? Would you say that it was released 51 times? At the very least, marketing-driven releases don't apply.

about that

[sedyn]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base." Doesn't this describe the computer industry in general?

Re:about that

[Tim Browse]

Doesn't this describe the computer industry in general?

Actually, given the guy's previous job, I was thinking that it pretty much described "New Coke".

(I kid! I know they thought New Coke was good.)

Re:about that

[timeOday]

"Flawed" and "inadequate" are relative terms. Take the most reliable, feature-laden car from 50 years ago and release it today. You'd be laughed off the street for its unreliability and lack of "basic" features. A Tune-up and new set of tires every 10K miles, and no seatbelts!? You must be joking!

Sometimes a product falls well below the norm and deserves criticism. But when somebody slams an entire industry comprised of thousands of separate companies, it's a pretty good sign they're just a whiner with unrealistic expectations.

Re:about that

[wilsonng]

Why BETA last so long... I don't know why it is deplorable to consumers -- at least betas I know don't ask us to pay money on it, and it does result in much more stability if it is finally released after so much rigorous testing.

Re:about that

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, no, he's pretty much spot on (are you a programmer perhaps? Feeling defensive?)

My two pet peeves (and what I make my $$$ on consulting) are 1) network security and 2) data management (i.e. databases).

I have seen enough evidence from those two fields that I feel comfortable saying that there is *pervasive* problem in our industry (the IT industry). Most of what makes it out the door from almost every company or consultancy is UTTER CRAP.

Open source, closed source, built, bought, outsourced, customized, Agile, XP, Waterfall, whatever, you name it, something is seriously wrong here. But people seem to (mostly) demand it that way, and it does give consultants a steady source of income (let's redesign our system from the ground up! AGAIN! And let's use $LATEST_BUZZWORD this time!)

The IT industry is mostly incapable of producing reliable, secure, well-designed products, and the practitioners therein are mostly "ignorant and proud of it". and problems solved 30 years ago keep coming up again and again and again, and we are driven by vendor buzzwords and the "bantering of names".

Am I bitter? You bet! Am I a whiner? Guilty as charged! :-)

PS: I don't really understand your analogy at all.. you're saying that cars today are more reliable and featureful than cars 50 years ago? Uhm, yeah, that's because the car industry is PROGRESSING. They are using science and engineering to produce better products. The IT industry (software) is REGRESSING. Stuff like Ajax? That gives your web app maybe 50% of the capability of what programmers were doing 10 years ago on the desktop. Features that were standard on mainframes decades ago are still not present in the computers your business probably depends on. Computers are still susceptible to buffer overflows, which we first saw, what in the 1980's? I still see people talking about XML databases.. in other words, application-centric hierarchical databases.. like the ones used in the 1960's that people stopped using because they were too unwieldy. This is *progress*?

Beta = safety

[mbelly]

If a product is labelled as beta, and they have to completely overhaul it or a severe security flaw is found. Any 'damages' can be shrugged off as "This was only a beta, use at your own risk".

~Matt

Re:Beta = safety

[spammyd]

"Peter Sealey, a marketing professor at the University of California at Berkeley and former chief marketing officer at Coca-Cola Co. " if beta is so good why diddnt he call new coke , Beta Coke, probably of been a better seller

Re:Beta = safety

[Irish_Samurai]

Probably because when they released New Coke to compete with Pepsi's growing market share beta wasn't an established buzzword.

Re:Beta = safety

[gstoddart]

If a product is labelled as beta, and they have to completely overhaul it or a severe security flaw is found. Any 'damages' can be shrugged off as "This was only a beta, use at your own risk".

Yeah, because going out of Beta means that the license actually accepts liability, right?

Oh, wait. Non beta software is still sold as "use at your own risk".

Re:Beta = safety

[darkmeridian]

"Final" software has the same problem. For instance, EULAS already limit damages to a refund.

Re:Beta = safety

[sketerpot]

But adding "beta" to the name explicitly says "use at your own risk", rather than having the marketing people say that it's the most stable thing ever and burying the disclaimers in the license. It's more honest.

knowingly flawed.....

[eggoeater]

where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product...

Heck, that's been Microsoft's business model for 25 years!

Too fancy an answer

[Concern]

We thought we would finish this sooner... but we didn't.

Eventually we kind of gave up trying, but we're too nice to just take it off the website?

Who would have thought?

Or... my personal favorite:

"Beta" as a kludge to workaround users who don't read disclaimers and get hopping mad when things don't work. I swear that accounts for a big percentage of the people who do this.

hmmm

[Anonymous Coward]

...said Peter Sealey, a marketing professor at the University of California at Berkeley and former chief marketing officer at Coca-Cola Co. "I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product...

Can we talk about "New Coke(tm)"?

Re:hmmm

[AndroidCat]

What's in a name? that which we call Coke Beta
By any other name would taste as sweet;

Re:hmmm

[texaport]

Can we talk about "New Coke(tm) ?

Or the upcoming diet colas where Pepsi_One and Coke_Zero become Pepsi 1.01 and Coke 0.1

Beta First Post

[FearTheFrail]

This is a public beta for First Post, and I'd appreciate it if you could report any placement-related or other bugs.

Re:Beta First Post

[Joe123456]

you are not first

Re:Beta First Post

[eMartin]

"I'd appreciate it if you could report any placement-related or other bugs."

Well, you seem to have placed it in the middle of the page instead of the top.

Released products are flawed and inadequate

[sterno]

The thing is, most software that we get is flawed and inadequate in some respect. Labeling the software as being beta reduces people's expectations. Thus when there is a serious flaw, the customer doesn't feel that irritated with it because it was beta. If it was a released official product, then they might have more room to criticize.

Re:Released products are flawed and inadequate

[legirons]

"The thing is, most software that we get is flawed and inadequate in some respect."

i.e. Beta is a fairly accurate description of the quality of all modern software. Far from thinking Google are weird, we should ask why other applications don't have "Beta" on their packaging.

Re:Released products are flawed and inadequate

[SeaFox]

we should ask why other applications don't have "Beta" on their packaging.

I don't see why I should pay for software the company is going label as 'beta' and absolve all responsabilities for. If the software company wants me to beta test their software, they should be paying me.

Re:Released products are flawed and inadequate

[legirons]

I don't see why I should pay for software the company is going label as 'beta' and absolve all responsabilities for.

If any big software company labelled a product as "release", what makes you think that will be of higher quality than a product that some more (discerning|honest|pessimistic) company labels as "beta"?

They'll absolve all responsibility for it anyway. Just read the Microsoft EULAs

"Microsoft and its suppliers hereby disclaim ... reliability, availability, accuracy, completeness, workmanlike effort, lack of viruses, and lack of negligence"

It's just the people who glom onto the Betas...

[FatSean]

You know, those tools you might work or live with who think that kmowing about and running the 'latest' software is some kind of life goal. Gleefully runnig bug-laden betas crashing their systems and reducing productivity.

I must be some kind of throw-back geek. I won't touch it until it ships. I don't do bug-testing for free...and no...none of these 'betas' are really that interesting anyway.

Re:It's just the people who glom onto the Betas...

[x3ro]

none of these 'betas' are really that interesting anyway.

Eh? GMail, dude!

Betas are the best!

[Anonymous Coward]

Alphas have to work too hard, plus they have to think too hard all the time. They don't get to laugh and play. And Gammas and Deltas wear those ugly jumpsuits. I'm so glad I'm a Beta! Aren't you glad you're a Beta, too?

Re:Betas are the best!

[OldSchool]

I'm glad I'm not an Epsilon.

Re:Betas are the best!

[siwelwerd]

I thought we'd all be Tri-Lams around here...

Re:Betas are the best!

[otis wildflower]

Yes, but who is the Master Beta?

Re:Betas are the best!

[shawn(at)fsu]

Well done. +1 for great literary refrence.

Re:Betas are the best!

[Anonymous Coward]

A brave new world indeed.

Re:Betas are the best!

[david.given]

Isn't that a bit high-brow for Slashdot?
</snobbery>

Nice one. Must reread that sometime... it's a fun book (unlike 1984 which is miserable and harrowing and really unpleasant).

Re:Betas are the best!

[metallel]

You'd better hope your Malthusian Devices aren't still in beta.

Re:Betas are the best!

[vain gloria]

Nice one. Must reread that sometime... it's a fun book (unlike 1984 which is miserable and harrowing and really unpleasant).

Fun in parts, but not for the characters as I recall. Unless there's a happy-ending version where the Savage and Lenina drive off into the distance under a voice-over from our Ford (i.e. Harrison).

Re:Betas are the best!

[david.given]

Fun in parts, but not for the characters as I recall. Unless there's a happy-ending version where the Savage and Lenina drive off into the distance under a voice-over from our Ford (i.e. Harrison).

IIRC, Lenina dies happily after finally escaping the hell from which she has been accidentally exiled (i.e., the Reservation). John (the Savage), however, dies because he completely fails to understand that other viewpoints than his own might be valid: that is, he's guilty of exactly the same sin that he accuses the World State of. (In fact, the World State does accept John's views as having merit: that's why they have the Reservation, and the Islands.)

Of course, John got a bum deal because of his upbringing... he's a child of both the World State and the Reservation and doesn't fit in with either. The World State would tolerate him, though, if he'd only given it a chance.

Re:Betas are the best!

[Anonymous Coward]

This is highly coincidental for me, since this is exactly the book that we've been reading for the past few weeks in English class. In fact, I just finished reading the ending today.

In any case, it is Linda, John's mother, who dies from overdosing on the soma. Lenina on the other hand is the girl who Bernard brought with him to the Reservation, and she eventually begins to fall in love with John (or at least as close to love as people are able to get in their society). John however cannot understand the fact that, according to the society's hypnopaedic teachings, "Everyone belongs to everyone else." He casts Lenina out of his life and becomes torn between his love of the woman and his hate for what he sees as her unfaithfulness.

Re:Betas are the best!

[david.given]

In any case, it is Linda, John's mother, who dies from overdosing on the soma.

Oops --- you're right. It's been a long time since I read it... what happens to Lenina eventually?

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas ... except

[jabelar]

Well, there is nothing wrong with Betas, except if their is no real intention of a production/stable release in a reasonable timeframe. Something in Beta for three years should raise questions. The implication is tha by tagging something as Beta, software/service suppliers can absolve themselves of responsibility for defects. This is sort of like an even further erosion of the standard EULA weaknesses regarding bugs and defects. Software that is in Beta indefinitely should be called "abandoned".

I'm curious

[Ohreally_factor]

How's that Windows XP beta been going? The OS X beta I've been involved with has been pretty good. We're up to 10.4.3b, and I'm confident we'll see an RC before the 10.5 beta comes out. =)

Re:I'm curious

[saifatlast]

I hear the Windows 2000 Beta is almost done. Just a couple more years and we'll get a Gamma. Microsoft is pioneering a new product development life-cycle where instead of going from alpha to beta to RC, you just progress through the whole alphabet where Omega is "just get used to it."

The software...

[wpiman]

mentioned in the article is free- both MS anti-spyware and Google News. I think this is a little bit different if it is a product you pay for. Many people had problems recently with Civilization IV and the XBOX 360. Being paying customers- these people have been heard screaming in various message boards.

Drug companies do beta test their drugs. Usually- they pay the recipient to take them.

The point is- you get what you pay for.

Re:The software...

[spejsklark]

I find it strange that it wasn't emphasized more in the article, (nor in other /. comments.)
This is the main reason. Free software (from for-profit companies) has not been around that long.

Support costs money you're not getting from non-paying customers.

Re:The software...

[P3NIS_CLEAVER]

The bottom line is I would rather have Beta News available in beta as opposed to it not be available at all....

Re:The software...

[wpiman]

It is the Wall Street Journal we are talking about here.

Coke of all businesses should know better.

[Mr. Flibble]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

Coke was the first to market, I strongly doubt that Coke as it is now was exactly the same as it was when it was first released (Cocaine anyone?).

The first to market is usually the one who wins. It is rare that the market leader falls off their perch (unless they make an error, like "New Coke", which nearly cost them their dominant position).

Therefore, knowing this, the businesses want to get to market fast, ergo, "beta". With the tag of "beta" if anything does not work as expected, the reply is "hey, well it *IS* beta!" In the case of google it seems that they label anything beta until they can figure out how to make money with it.

So, web businesses use beta to gain a market position - if MSN were not beta, it would have been in design for that year that it is still marked beta - and had no market presence at all.

Re:Coke of all businesses should know better.

[hahiss]

Actually, Dr. Pepper and Moxie were both out about the same time (Dr. Pepper was invented in 1885, and Moxie and Coke in 1886), and Hires root beer was available earlier (1875).

What Coke did was master marketing. They put their logo on just about everything.

Re:Coke of all businesses should know better.

[tm2b]

That's simply not true for technological products.

The first to market is usually not the victor. From PDAs to OSes to MP3 players, it's easy to see that in the consumer technology market, the "first mover advantage" is mythical. It usually takes a second company to come along and learn from the mistakes of the first in order for a new technology segment to take off.

not liable

[nuckin futs]

one of the excuses for releasing something in beta is "it's under testing, we are not responsible for lost data, etc. etc".

Why? That's so easy ...

[Chromodromic]

Because most programmers are male, and most male programmers have a fear of commit.

Re:Why? That's so easy ...

[darthscsi]

Because most programmers are male, and most male programmers have a fear of commit.

Haven't you ever heard of rollback?

Re:Why? That's so easy ...

[Homology]

Because most programmers are male, and most male programmers have a fear of commit.

Haven't you ever heard of rollback?

Nah, he's a CVS user, and besides, only wimps likes atomic commits.

Re:Why? That's so easy ...

[GaryPatterson]

Database developers are *never* afraid of commit!

Re:Why? That's so easy ...

[bgspence]

There is something so satisfying about getting the 'master beta' release.

Re:Why? That's so easy ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Particularly those who have problems with premature punctuation...

Re:Why? That's so easy ...

[fwitness]

"...have a fear of commit."

My god you can't even see it through to the end of the word. That is definetly a fear.

Geek cred

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the developers want to publically show that they are a harmless bunch of Master Betas.

Err, not VHS?

[Lead Butthead]

For a momement I thought the article was about Betamax... (Which I thought was conclusively dead.)

Re:Err, not VHS?

[yobbo]

I still can't figure out how ICQ didn't get a mention in the /. article summary! That's been in beta as long as beta has been around.

Re:Err, not VHS?

[griffjon]

Well, the Beta was superior technology, so it's no surprise that they last longer...

(that, and they don't get much wear and tear)

XBox360 is proof of "quick" betas.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think the world just found out what happens when you rush a product to the shelf. Fortunately, Microsoft has had no real competition for its OS marketshare, so when they released buggy software no one could really do much about it. With the XBox360, people have other choices, and are moving on to the PS3/Revolution camp. Now its up to Sony to see if they can deliver a well tested and stable product that can survive being placed in a typical stuffy AV Rack, on the carpet under some dirty clothes, or on some hyper kids bed like consoles are typically used. Nintendo? Hell, i've seen pictures of melted gameboys from mortar attacks in the gulf and they still work!

What beta - and google's beta specifically - means

[Chmarr]

Google haven't figured out how to make a bunch of money on things like Gmail yet, so, because they ALSO don't want the support hassles if something goes wrong, they mark their product as "beta".

Because, "beta" means "hey, don't bug us if it broke, it's beta, remember?"

*anything* else?

[Anonymous Coward]

"...and former chief marketing officer at Coca-Cola Co. "I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product..." '""

CARS.

No wonder Coke got rid of him. Sheesh.

Quality Assurance, Security

[hubertf]

Beta is there to test a product and with Quality Assurance in place, errors get found and fed back to development, leading to more design and implementation steps, which then go back to QA, which find more errors ad nauseam.

Oh, and if it's not QA that comes up with a problem, then (depending on what you do) the security team raises some concerns, and it's back to the drawing board again.

Sometimes I wonder what there are still any releases ...

Hmm...

[kurt_ram]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

This is like saying,... "Why should there be free software?. I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where you can get something for free".

Arrogance

[mrm677]

I think Google perpetually labels things "beta" because of arrogance. It can always respond to criticism by saying "but it is beta".

Re:Arrogance

[Anonymous Coward]

How is that arrogance? Wouldn't arrogance cause them to label everything release because they're so confident that everything they do is perfect?

What about ICQ?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's been in beta for nearly 10 years ;)

Part of the reason is that they can reserve the option of making it non-beta in the future and charge for it.

Re:What about ICQ?

[Anonymous Coward]

ICQ was the first program I though about when reading the subject :)

I think companies labels programs as beta to have their back covered.

IEEE 829

[Anonymous Coward]

Because that is how they specified it, according to their Test Plan.

At least, this is how things should be done (speaking from experience, on both sides of the coin).

Google News

[FuturePastNow]

I remember reading an article on Wired a long time ago about why Google News will forever be beta: it's all about money and copyrights. As long as it is beta, Google can claim it makes no profit from Google News. As soon as it gets "released," though, every newspaper with a lawyer will try to shut it down.

Re:Google News

[winkydink]

Any good forensic accountant can determine whether or not Google is generating a profit from Google News. The term "beta" provides no legal protection in that regard.

Re:Google News

[damiam]

Google's obviously not turning a profit now because there're no ads. Google doesn't want to officially "release" Google News until they've figured out how to make it profitable without legal problems. That's the problem.

Re:Google News

[generic-man]

Your argument makes no sense whatsoever.

Google Images: no ads. Not beta.

Gmail: Ads. Beta.

Google News: No ads. Beta.

Flickr: Beta. Pro accounts cost money.

Google News is in beta because it hasn't been improved in three years. "Beta" doesn't mean that a product is not distributed for profit; it just means that its creator doesn't want to hear griping from its user base.

Re:Google News

[generic-man]

Google News is a web site which does nothing more than link to other news sources, reproducing tiny portions of a story.

Slashdot is a web site which does nothing more than link to other news sources, reproducing tiny portions of a story and serving ads alongside it.

If Slashdot manages not to get sued, why is Google News stuck in this legal quandary you made up?

Re:Google News

[Lord Haha]

Its all about the money....

Money in Bank of Google billions...
OSDN (owner of /.) millions...

If someone managed to successfully sue OSDN they might get a few million, if they can do it to Google it could easily be half a billion or more...

Re:Google News

[rbarreira]

Yep, that's what people usually say about this, but it doesn't make much sense since Gmail has had ads since forever and it's still Beta!

Re:Google News

[tmortn]

/. has you write the blurb with a link. Google News takes the lead paragraphs whole cloth. Yes some people do the same for /. submission but then that falls somewhat under fair use. For just systematically scrapping initial paragraph and repackaging it the water is murkey.

Re:Google News

[generic-man]

Google also maintains a cache (non-beta, might I add) which serves up entire web pages that Google keeps on hard drives for as long as it likes -- and if you're a webmaster you have to opt out of the program. The cache is ad-supported inasmuch as it is a part of Google's ad-supported web search. How does Google get away with that?

Re:Google News

[Anonymous Coward]

psssst! flickr is owned by yahoo!

Re:Google News

[generic-man]

Psssst! It doesn't matter! Google's not the only company that drags betas on forever; the article also talks extensively about Microsoft!

Re:Google News

[dantheman82]

From the Wired article explaining why Google News will remain in beta and not be ad-based, it's quite ironic that they scrape many news pages in a single location and then go out of their way to send a cease-and-desist letter to Julian Bond, a British programmer who had created customized RSS feeds from Google News.

Ironically, the letter informed Bond that Google does not permit "webmasters to display Google News headlines on their sites."

For shame, Google - it would be nice if you would in fact "do no evil" rather than simply say it.

Re:Google News

[PhiznTRG]

Actually, I think that is incorrect and probably why certain things (e.g. at Google) likely remain in Beta for a long time. GAAP requires different rules between released and unreleased products, not whether or not a "profit" is being made. My understanding is that for something in beta (or unreleased), the cost of goods sold comes from company expenses (e.g. R&D budget) as opposed to revenues. This basically means that unreleased "products" impact the income and not the profit of the company. It also impacts where a company must account for reservations to cover risk (for example, if they were to be sued because of Google News or other "product") required due to "selling" an unreleased product. I do not know the exact GAAP rules for when a product moves from beta to release but it is not whether or not the product makes a profit.

Google's case is a little different since they do not actually "sell" some of the services they offer (notably Google News) but the general rules still apply and are likely why some things remain labeled Beta.

Re:Google News

[seann]

I always forget that google mail has ads.

Re:Google News

[winkydink]

Google's 3 yr beta would never hold up to scrutiny as an "unreleased" product.

Re:Google News

[JediLow]

It actually is the reason why Google News has never gone 'live'. The problem that Google found themselves in is that Google News takes copyrighted pictures and displays them; while Google doesn't make money directly off Google News they find themselves under the definition of fair use - however, once they start making money off the service they open themselves up for copyright infringement.

Re:Google News

[generic-man]

Thank you for explaining why Google News doesn't display advertisements. Now explain why Google can't remove the "beta" tag and admit that Google News is a miserable failure.

Also, how can Google display the entire text of web pages which it didn't write nor was it explicitly authorized to mirror without "opening themselves up for copyright infringement"?

Re:Google News

[Coretti]

While I agree with your counter-argument, there's one slight problem.

Flickr is owned by Yahoo.

Re:Google News

[generic-man]

That's true. Google isn't the only company who uses the term "beta" for long periods of time. The article in the summary also mentioned Microsoft and Yahoo! as examples.

Re:Google News

[ClamIAm]

Well, Windows XP hasn't really been "improved" in 3 (4?) years...

Re:Google News

[tmortn]

Well last I looked there were no ads on cached pages either. Personally I am puzzled as to why this is a problem anyway. After all, a google search is a return of key words with snippets of surrounding context mixed in with keyword advertisements. Not sure why this is any different than say searching for news stories anyway.

Caution

[porkface]

The reason, in the case of the two examples given, is because they both have an incredible pressure on them to work properly and be secure. Meanwhile there is very little added benefit in going from their current beta status to production status because people are already using them in full force.

Not all betas last forever, but if you can release your product without the accountability of releasing your product, then it makes perfect sense. I don't really see it as a marketing ploy because I don't see any added hype either upon beta release or production release. If a product is publicly available without any significant obstacles, and works well, then it has been released...regardless of what they call it. Releasing it again isn't going to generate any serious momentum unless there are significant new features, and that is the same as with a 2.0 release.

welcome to the internet

[Jose]

Welcome to the internet, things move slowly here, and always have...but wait until Internet 2.0 (currently in beta) then things will move really fast!

(yea, yea, I know there is an internet2, it's a JOKE OK?!)

Useful enough

[qaffle]

The reason people don't mind betas is that generally by the time they're released out to the public their main feature set is working. Also, the google and similar betas we've been seeing are not just betas of the next versions of apps, they're betas of new and interesting software.

If the new and interesting software fills a niche, it's primary functionality will be used by people. The primary functionality is generally in the publicized betas, therefore people use the beta.

Re: Look at it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux is a piece of shit and should be considered "beta", at best. Server crashes and installation issues are just some of the problems organisations get from mislabeled products.

Interesting concept.

[GecKo213]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

I had never thought about it that way before, but if you think about it, how many times have you used software and it crashed and you got upset. Now on the flip side, how many times have you downloaded a buggy beta test software and had it crash and been really upset? Interesting concept, someone releases something sub-par, we test it, they fix it and sell for lots of money! Maybe Vista should be released this way, free download off of the MSFT site, fix it and then sell it to me.

Allows customer feedback before final release

[cmorriss]

Betas are indeed helpful to consumers. It allows them to get an early look at a product and guide its final look and feel and feature set. This allows the company to develop a better product and consumers get a product that more suits there needs.

While it's true that using beta software is not for everyone, there are many users who do and make this symbiotic relationship worthwhile. As a software developer for enterprise customers, I see this play out with great success all the time.

the word 'beta' and it's connotations

[thelost]

even the less tech savvy internet users these days may have heard the word beta, associated with new products that are coming out. It is a very calculated ploy on the part of large companies these days to release products to beta first, in marketing campaigns that have if anything, become more complicated and expensive to develop. Truly Advertising is the premier product of the 21st century.

Honesty!

[Chayak]

It means a compay is being honest about developement status. It takes time to make quality software. Thought I still don't believe Windows ME was anything more than an alpha status :P The company is basically saying this is their software, there's bugs in it, help us make it better by giving your feedback.

I can

[TheRealMindChild]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

Think Sega dreamcast! Sure, it isn't software, but the flaw that shipped with it that allowed you to boot CD-rs was what sold most of those systems

Re:I can

[stud9920]

Think Sega dreamcast! Sure, it isn't software, but the flaw that shipped with it that allowed you to boot CD-rs was what sold most of those systems

>What a sad world when being able to boot CD-Rs is a flaw...

Past-beta

[Nikademus]

Does Microsoft releases past-beta software? I mean other than just changing the name and remove beta.

Reduces Liability

[neowolf]

I think the real reason many companies do it is it reduces any perceived liability. If a company releases "beta" software, they are saying up-front that it is in development and may have problems, some possibly serious. That way- if their software destroys your computer or just doesn't run right- there really isn't any recourse. The company can simply say- "Hey, it's in beta!"

As to complaints about why one has to pay for "beta" software in some cases- many companies charge for beta software in one way or another. Some, like Microsoft, force you to pay to be in special groups, like Tech-net or MSDN to get some betas, or you may need to buy another "production" version of the software to qualify for the beta.

bad thing?

[ShaneThePain]

i dont think this is a bad thing. more and more people are becoming aware of how difficult it is to program GOOD software. By releasing betas, it allows people to get their hands on software much earlier than if it had to be absolutely perfect before being released. Besides, by the time software is actually "complete" and stable its often either obsolete or there is something better out. Betas are just realistic, but you do have to draw the line somewhere I think.

Re:What beta - and google's beta specifically - me

[edwdig]

Google haven't figured out how to make a bunch of money on things like Gmail yet, so, because they ALSO don't want the support hassles if something goes wrong, they mark their product as "beta".

Gmail has been making money from the beginning. Ever notice those ads on the side of your email?

Google News is the hard one. The actual content is provided by other companies who are also trying to make money off of it. If Google pushes too hard to get their ads in, the companies providing the content will cut them off.

Beta used to mean something

[Jeremy Erwin]

My dad was a bit of a gamer in the Apple II days-- and every once in a while, he'd spot a bug. Being a programmer, he knew how to document bugs, and because of this, he belonged to a couple of beta test programs-- Omnitrend's Universe II, for one. Every so often, we'd get new releases in the mail, and were told to test the hell out of them. The games were usually feature incomplete, though whether this was by design ("We'd really prefer that you concentrate your efforts on testing this feature) or by omission ("really haven't gotten around to coding that, sorry"), I don't recall.

Now, with the internet ("please download our patch") and open source software ("my box is so optimized that it can rebuild a kernel in 45 seconds"), the exclusivity is gone...

Beta DEFINITION is no known bugs, no defects!

[Anonymous Coward]

Beta DEFINITION is no known bugs, no defects!

A wise and detailed tech note by Darin Adler (of Blue meanie fame) at apple distributed to all apple developers on the definition of Beta, Alpha, Development, and release describes beta accurately.

At the precise mement software is labelled something such as 2.3b (beta) there are NO KNOWN bugs and all features are complete.

It is the idiotic masses that do not understand the meaning of beta.

I shipped millions of dollars of software I proudly labelled "Beta' I only removed the beta mark after it was in the customer base for a few weeks.

The vendors all wanted my latest newer betas... never the older "non beta" labelled software from three weeks earlier.

Do not blame the developers! They are the only honest ones in this matter.

Over 700,000 people used my software and PAID for it. And most of it was labelled "Beta", except boxed shrinkwrapped copies on store shelves.

Darin Adlers Tech note is one of the wises things I have ever seen come out of Apple. I wish it was online (it probably is) so that you all would know what i mean.

BETA means no known bugs and 100% feature complete, at time of designation, and it always has meant that.

You are thinking of alpha software, or development builds if you disagree.

Do Google Betas Put Customers At Risk?

[miller60]

When Google Base was launched, it included cross-site scripting vulnerabilities that could have allowed an attacker to steal cookies and other information from users - which is no small matter now that Google has consolidated services such as AdWords and AdSense under a single login. The flaw was discovered by UK security researcher Jim Ley, who also found security holes in the Yahoo Maps beta and argues that betas are often unveiled without adequate security testing.

As for Google News, one reason it remains in beta is that it has no business model. If Google tries to put ads on Google News, the newspapers and magazines whose stories are listed on Google News would probably file lawsuits, alleging that Google is trying to profit from their content. Google's emergence is a threat to the major media outlets that represent much of the content on Google News, and some folks in the news business believe it will remain in beta untilthis problem is settled.

Re:Do Google Betas Put Customers At Risk?

[dhakbar]

Well, Hotmail's "final" release has suffered from far more serious exploits than Google's "beta"...

Question Asked, Question Answered

[Prospero's Grue]

I tried to check out Slashdot, and get a 503 Service Unavailable error. It finally comes back, and what's the story...

Why Does Beta Last So Long?

Sometimes, the universe is pretty cool.

Noting that Google News has been labeled 'beta'

[Anita Coney]

It's well known that Google News is in beta because the company cannot make money from it. Once it starts making a profit its "fair use" defense will disappear and the lawyers from all of those news sources will start suing it dry. It'll be in beta forever, or at least until they find a way to make a profit off of it without risking a lawsuit.

Coke says...

[Call Me Black Cloud]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

I guess he wasn't around for new Coke.

Re:What beta - and google's beta specifically - me

[Chmarr]

Gmail has been making money from the beginning. Ever notice those ads on the side of your email?

But, are they making ENOUGH money from that to cover the cost of creating and maintaining the service? Now, I know that neither you or I can answer that question authoritatively :)

Perhaps a better way to make my point is that google aren't ready to put their full support team behind the product, so they market it is an "as is" product, and call it "beta" by way of covering their butts.

gold == beta

[homerj79]

I think it's because labeling something 'beta' makes it so that a company can release flawed software publicly without the hassle of providing tech support for it.
Most software released as 'gold' these days should actually be marketed as 'beta', because that's what it is. And now that 'beta' has become a marketing word, I think we'll see more and more of this practice.

how do you boil a frog?

[Thud457]

New Coke was a ploy to change the formulation of "classic" Coke from wholsome cane sugar to high-fructose corn syrup. If they had just directly changed the formula without the intermediate New Coke step, people would have noticed the difference immediately.

Then started the epedemic of teen obesity.

At least that's what THEY want you to think...

To stay out of court.

[CDPatten]

Well sometimes it is so they don't get sued. Google News has been in beta for 4 years, and the consensus is that it will stay that way for years to come.

From this article:
"The reason: The minute Google News runs paid advertising of any sort it could face a torrent of cease-and-desist letters from the legal departments of newspapers, which would argue that "fair use" doesn't cover lifting headlines and lead paragraphs verbatim from their articles. Other publishers might simply block users originating from Google News, effectively snuffing it out. "

Re:To stay out of court.

[ClearlyPennsylvania]

"beta" and "running ads" have nothing to do with each other. It can be in beta and run ads (aka, gmail) or not be in beta and not have ads. Google News is in beta for some other reason.

Re:To stay out of court.

[wsumark]

why would these online publications ever want google to quit freely advertising their products. their ad revenue would be related to that of google news'. google news is a value-adding party, not a competitor. any leagal action would be out of spite that google makes any money off of someone else's publication.

i'm sure this will get shot down, but ever since the google portal came about, i'd think that slashdot has been getting a good amount more traffic than before. hell, anything from the google portal is a free click anyway.

Re:To stay out of court.

[MikeBabcock]

Beats me, but some have already requested to be pulled.

Those are the newspapers I don't actually read anymore ... since I get most of my headlines off Google News now.

Re:To stay out of court.

[Artega VH]

"it could face a torrent of cease-and-desist letters from the legal departments of newspapers, which would argue that "fair use" doesn't cover lifting headlines and lead paragraphs verbatim from their articles"

I don't see the problem. Doesn't that exactly describe Slashdot's business model? J/K

Re:To stay out of court.

[SeaFox]

why would these online publications ever want google to quit freely advertising their products.

Many people only read the first paragraph or so of articles when they get them as RSS feeds, the they don't always go to read the rest. If everyone goes to Google News and reads the first paragraph of the article, the online publication wont get as many people to view the ads on their own article page.

their ad revenue would be related to that of google news'. google news is a value-adding party, not a competitor. any leagal action would be out of spite that google makes any money off of someone else's publication.

And you don't think businesses would do this? They hate the thought of anyone making money off their content besides themselves. Kinda like a guy would hate having a leech drinking off his leg even if it wasn't effecting his health and he couldn't feel it. They don't see the logic of Google's extra exposure.

Surrender to the madness

[Belseth]

I hear the next version of Windows after Longhorn is being called Beta. I guess they figured why the hell not.

PS on a related note Service Packs will be referred to as product "Enhancements" on that version. I fondly call them little dutch boy pluging holes in the Dike.

Re: Look at it this way

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux is a piece of shit and should be considered "beta", at best. Server crashes and installation issues are just some of the problems organisations get from mislabeled products.

Thank you for your input, Mister Balmer.

Now go work on your dance for the next developer conference. Try to find something more inspiring than the Miami Sound Machine for music, and come up with better moves than the "Gunshot-In-The-Thigh-And-Need-To-Pee-Really-Badly Shuffle."

Why does Beta last?

[1zenerdiode]

- Superior picture quality and signal-to-noise vs. VHS
- Widespread adoption by studios and professionals (Beta SP)
- Convenient smaller-sized cassette
- Mfr'd and licensed by Sony, a company known for their progressive stance regarding consumer rights.

Re:Why does Beta last?

[Nethead]

And I thought it was the gain factor on a transisor.

1N4731 call out to homey!

But you DID remove the beta tag eventually

[Urusai]

The problem isn't that stuff is "beta", but that people mislabel their warez as being beta. It's marketing baloney on par with "Professional" or "Enterprise". Where once meaning existed, it all reduces to "1337".

Orgy-porgy?

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless you're wearing an ugly jumpsuit ofcourse.

Gmail is beta...

[Anonymous Coward]

...and I wonder: If they lost everybody's mail, and didn't have any backups, does this mean they would be off the hook? "Hey, we told you it was beta."

Now with more slurm! What a dufus!

[csoto]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

Talk about silly nonsense. In previous marketing terminology, this was called "last year's model." Marketers have ALWAYS used product improvements as a basis for selling essentially the same product again. My '06 Honda Odyssey has newfangled headlamps. Big whoop. Was the previous model "inadequate" because it had a different type?

Beta is simply about calling something "free but use at your own risk." It's better for software companies than releasing Version 1.0 for free, because you can NEVER go back to charging for it once you do that. Ask Netscape.

Google News

[Anonymous Coward]

I use it every day. Couldnt live without it!


__________________

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love it

[gnovos]

I'd much rathar have a product that is unfinished, and gets slowly finished in a way that the featured that get implemented are those that users actually need and want than a "finished" product that has features that a marketing department decides that I need.

all well and good, but...there's more to the story

[Anonymous Coward]

Another real reason when you're a big company to get into beta (or...when software is "viable") is that you can move software development costs from expenses to depreciable long term assets. There is some interpretation that goes on, but there are many cases when large corporations benefit from pushing toward beta sooner, rather than later.

XP Beta going strong!!

[Hellboy0101]

I'm still running WinXP Beta. Oh, no wait a second.....

Re: Look at it this way

[masklinn]

Can't be Herr Ballmer, he hasn't sworn to Fucking Kill(TM) Linux even once.

You keep using that word...

[Dan Ost]

Please get a dictionary and look up the definition for "arrogance". You seem to think that an arrogant person is one who shirks responsibility or likes to have easy excuses. I don't know what word you were really looking for, but it sure wasn't "arrogance".

Is anyone else tired of...

[Wile_E_Peyote]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

Is anyone else tired of every asshat on the planet trying to compare computers and software to every other product in the world; from cars to soda pop?

As long as programmers hear us...

[Spy der Mann]

Being a programmer, I like participating in my favorite products' forums. Like, I report a bug, and a couple of days later, it's "fixed in CVS". I only have to recompile, and voila.

Anyway, one thing that is very needed, is the frequent release of products (release early, release often), which is why I love looking at the latest beta's of a product.

However, what I wouldn't like, is having to widthstand an awful beta full of bugs, specially if i can't contact the programmer.
And it's even more frustrating if said "beta" is actually a finished product, like this one or this one.

Haven't you guys been frustrated by the stupid MSN window re-scrolling whenever your buddy types something and you haven't finished reading what you missed? It's a nightmare!

This is why I like beta. At least I expect bugs to be present, and I'm ASSURED that, since it's beta, those bugs will be fixed soon.

And beta is also where the newest features are implemented, and I can say "wow! you rock!" I think Beta is the best part of a software development.

So, it depends. Beta, for open source products, is a dream come true. For closed source products, it's a nightmare.

Re:As long as programmers hear us...

[qasimzaidi]

I think that is 'Build Early and Build often'. With a Beta, consumers are willing to forgive a few rough edges, but if quality is too low, it may just turn them off. Its all a matter of managing Expectations. The reason why there is no equivalent of Software Betas in real world is that nobody else is giving you/ or can give you a Beta Toaster or a Beta Computer for free, on this scale.

Re:As long as programmers hear us...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't use MSN messenger because it sucks.

You don't

[Mr Guy]

Even frogs notice being boiled alive

Re:You don't

[Anonymous Coward]

Snopes has an altogether noticable political bias and a sloppy regard for the rules of evidence. Hell, they've been outright worng before. Get back to me when Uncle Cecil weighs in.

Re:You don't

[Anonymous Coward]

I mean, come on, "2 degrees Fahrenheit per minute" ?!!! Dr. Hutchinson must do an awful lot of part-timing as the (de/of)fense's "expert" witless. (Err, maybe not, with his all too transparent ignoring of the stated conditions of the scenario.)

Legal or Fiscal Reasons?

[md17]

I wonder if there are any compelling legal or fiscal reasons to keep software as "Beta" for a long time. Could beta software have less liability than production software? Does it matter in corporate accounting if the software is beta or production? I also had read once that Google News is still beta because of potential legal problems around republishing of the news content which for some reason didn't fall under Fair Use.

Reasons to release stuff as beta...

[click2005]

1. You can't afford actual beta-testers.
2. You're more honest than Micro$oft who's beta products are called New Releases. (eg WinXP+SP2 is the *real* finished product)
3. Most hired beta-testers are fairly tech savvy. Public beta allow you to get your releases tested by people who often aren't as clued up. You cant make software idiot-proof because idiots are ingenious.
4. People are more likely to suggest ideas than if they feel it is finished.
5. The users feel as though they are a part of creating it.
6. Someone else is releasing something similar and you want yours 'out there' first.
7. Its easier to type the greek capital letter for beta than gamma.
8. People are usually more forgiving of bugs/flaws in beta code.
9. Your product has been/will be in development a long time and you want people to see it before they lose all interest/forget.

Complexity and the first punch...

[fitten]

Well... aside from marketing reasons and the like, Beta periods are longer these days because the software is typically more complex as well. You'd like a good beta audience to test your code breadth-wise and depth-wise, which may be difficult given some products (think about Microsoft Office and all the features and combinations of features you'd want tested).

Plus, there's always getting your product out in Beta form to let some air out of competitors' offerings. If you can get your game out in a pretty good beta, for instance, you might curb some of the fever for some other competing game has. Just look at the EQ2 and WoW Beta and release times, they were fighting who would release first to get a lot of initial sales.

Perhaps..

[ltwally]

Perhaps the question is not, "why do betas last so long, these days?" Perhaps the question should be, "why didn't betas always last this long?"

Seriously here, how much buggy software might have been avoided if manufacturers had been more concerned about the final product?

As a side-note: while the majority of software has experienced lengthening betas over the past few years, there is one market that has gone the polar-opposite: games. Ever notice how many patches come out for games, these days? Or how many really crappy games get rushed through just to get it out the door? Game companies could learn a lesson by following the rest of the industry, for once.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas ... except

[Trevahaha]

Their "BETA" reminds me of the early 90's where you came across sites with the damn "Under Construction" animated GIFs everywhere. All these new web-app betas are nothing more than the new "under construction" signs.

OSS essentially beta - not a troll

[ServerIrv]

The premise behind a beta is to get the product into the customer's hands to increase the number of testers to improve the product. The OSS model of development uses this as a framework. Although versions are released as "final", it is understood that it can and will be changed quickly if any problems arise. I personally have gotten into several OSS while they where beta and still use them now.

I do find it frustrating when paid-for services are in perpetual beta. If a OSS is broke, I haven't paid anyone any money, and I "could" fix it myself if I wanted.

well, because...

[dr_labrat]

A software beta wont necessarily make you ill, but it may make you sick.
However a foodstuff (loosly stated) can make you both.

Google new and MS Antispyware are $FREE$

[dmh20002]

free as in beer anyway. And neither is flawed or inadequate compared to their competition. So what's the problem? People are complaining that they want their free stuff to be perfect?

Beta = Under Development

[ClearlyPennsylvania]

Beta means under construction, right? It means "here, play with what we have right now, but we're going to come out with a bunch of changes real fast." For software that you purchase in a box, there's a clear line between beta and non-beta software. The software that you purchase in a box in a store has a version number tied with it. You know that you are using v 7.0 or whatever. It had a definite ship date and list of features. You can't magically start using a new version. For web apps, it's a blurry line. Web apps can push out new builds several times a week, and many companies do, in fact, push out changes weekly - and roll them back when things go very wrong. So you think Google News, which has been out for several years, shouldn't be called beta? Why, because it's been out for several years? That doesn't mean anything. As we speak, Google is writing code and putting it into Google News. It's not like you're using the same version of Google News that you were using when it first came out. Every time they push a new feature - which could well be several times a month - it's in beta all over again. Frankly, all web apps that aren't released in "versions" should be called beta. Google's just more honest about it.

"Flawed" or "Incomplete"?

[geekwithsoul]

I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base

This has got to be the stupidest quote ever! Flawed products are constantly introduced and grow user bases . . . in areas where there is not already an established consumer base or need. To go for the prosaic example, look at George Foreman's damn grills. They were introduced and other similar products had not yet hit the mainstream. Where they perfect? No, and I still can't think of a decent use for them. But they were "flawed," as is made evident by mainstream competitors jumping into the market and introducing refinements.

Most new technologies, when introduced, are flawed: cars, computers, planes, building materials, etc. The difference is that on the software side, they are just finally getting a little more honest about it. For material goods, that change will probably never come. Who wants to drive around in a "Honda Civic, Release Candidate 2?" Between the financial outlay for material goods, and the inability to 'upgrade' to a stable release, it doesn't make sense.

However, if someone wants to hand out free software or provide a free service and call it 'beta,' what's wrong with that? It's truth in labeling and I can start reaping benefits from a new technology before it becomes 'stable' or 'feature mature.' So much of software is now open source, the development relies on a community of interested users and developers, and beta software allows that.

And if, as long as it is marked 'beta' the product or service continues to evolve and get better, who can complain about that? It's better than some Redmond-based company that has been charging people out the wazoo for years for software that, if it weren't for corporate mandated use, would have died a thousand deaths by now.

Gmail's pushing it...

[superdude72]

Say... did anyone ever actually manage to use up all their Gmail invites? Every time I got close, they gave me more. Did they start everyone out with a small number on purpose, so they'd feel "special"? Just a hypothesis. I have no proof.

Next Windows version..

[Bega]

I believe Microsoft, too, will jump the bandwagon seriously and label the next version of Windows (somewhat realistically), Windows Beta!

Like comment #14132447 said, "you get what you pay for" -- obviously, this, too, seems to be somewhat accurate in the case of Windows.

In the end, Beta is only good!...

Because it's cheap

[digitalgimpus]

Because it's cheap is the bottom line.

Why Specifically?

• Beta's don't typically get tech support. - Meaning no need to reply to email's, phone, etc. on the topic. Also no need to train support staff. This means lower costs. Cheap is good.
• Nonbinding review - We all know reviews are critical to a products success. Slashdot regularly posts reviews of hardware and software (there's a new laptop HD review just a few below this topic). With beta's, they don't stick, because "it's still in development". A company can get reviews and improve their product several times, and not have a review that's binding. Then when they resolve the big complaints, rebrand it as "Release", and get a real good review

The economics of a beta work out very well. It's cheaper, and gives them the advantage of nonbinding reviews. When you release a bad 1.0, you get bad press, and that image sticks in people's minds.

First use of "beta" as a disclaimer...

[EriktheGreen]

That I remember anyway was Linus Torvalds, because he didn't want people to use Linux 0.2 - 0.9 as production-ready, yet everyone knew it was at least as good as the "production" software everyone else was selling. Better than minix.

It started a (not good) trend... there were already too many excuses and justifications available to sell or publish bad software (including open source) and now there are more. How many freshmeat project web pages include the text "This software is beta" which the programmers include as a cop-out for mediocre or poorly written code? It's your own fault if it breaks, because it's beta.

Open Source software in general is too mediocre in quality. The thrill of release and accolades from users come from making the software in the first place and releasing it, not from the longer and more boring work of making it easy to use, bug free, or keeping it stable enough for production.

This is a major problem with the gift economy of free software... it's too easy for the gift givers to receive praise for giving us something worthless. It also dilutes the praise for those who truly deliver a valuable gift that may not look as shiny as some of the fool's gold projects out there.

Erik

PS: Taco, get Kupu

Re:First use of "beta" as a disclaimer...

[Monkelectric]

I agree ... but would like to add something ... A *LOT* of OS developers develop their software until it works for them... they never really put in that last 10% of effort that makes the program useful for everyone.

Difficult,honest, lazy or bored.

[Anonymous Coward]

Because software development is difficult (at least writing something reliable for a large user base; any idiot can write 100 lines of script).

Because it makes a change from IT over-promising and under-delivering. No citations but add your own government, EDS, MS, project over-run feature-descoped effort here.

Honesty, may be? It's just not finished yet. Or laziness, it'll do - please excuse the errors - we're off doing something more interesting instead.

Again no link but from Uni I recall seeing a survey where users would prefer feature-rich and buggy against limited and boringly stable. (Any MS reference in replies is implicitly redundant, okay?)

It's a great excuse

[Anonymous Coward]

"It's beta". Such a great excuse. Everybody's off the hook. Also: It's true. Everything is beta. When I was interviewing for entry level tech support back in the mid-90s, one of the test questions was "why might Netscape GPF"? I gave a laundry list of standard reasons, but at the end I put "the whole thing is really still beta anyway". The interviewer loved that and I got the job. Netscape had the gaul to take stuff out of beta, but it still crashed quite often. At least now they are being honest, although perhaps not for the right reason. Now, back to my much nicer job...

fashion

[tuggy]

having a web product in "beta" state is simply the new fashion for web2 apps.
it gives a "cool" look, like "beware, you are testing and unfinished product" and at the same time avoids harsh complains about bugs because... "you are testing and unfinished product"

Worse is better is worse

[mentaldrano]

I think this is another example of the "worse is better" philosophy in action. Having just reread Richard Gabriel's article, I'll post a link to it: http://www.dreamsongs.com/WorseIsBetter.html. He is originally decrying the shoddiness of Unix software compared to ITS, TOPS-10, or LISP-M, but the point is valid here as well.

The whole point is that good software takes time to write, but that the last 20% of the functionality takes 80% of the time to write. Different end-users also have different ideas about what that 20% should be, compounding the problem. Why do you think that MS Office has so many useless features? They are trying to please everyone, which gets you nowhere. Far better to release something that is only 80% done and get to market first, because then nearly everyone is 80% satisfied. Otherwise you end up with a product years late, and only 20% better!

As for explicitly calling it "beta," hey, at least they're being honest with us!

Microsoft is awesome!

[Neoncow]

And that's the genius of it all! It explains the real reason behind MS restricting supply of xBox360s. MS knows that we're going to label them as greedy and manipulative if they restrict the supply of xBox260s before the holiday season. MS is really performing a widespread beta test of the system and managing to hide that fact by the perception that they are just really greedy.

Not only are they using you (xBox360 owners) as beta testers, they're using you (xBox360 detractors) to hide their real plans! When MS comes out with the xBox361 just in time to pre-empt any competetor's release, we'll see the true .

All hail Bill Gates, Hero of Capitalism!

10 takes 90...

[Drakonite]

Betas in general take so long because the first 90% of a project takes 10% of the time, and the last 10% takes 90% of the time...

Coca Cola Marketing

[n4wff]

Peter Sealey, a marketing professor at the University of California at Berkeley and former chief marketing officer at Coca-Cola Co. "I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

New Coke!!

libraries

[bcrowell]

From my perspective as a small-time OSS applications programmer, one of the big issues is the stability of libraries. I have one app, for instance, written in Perl, that I've been labeling as stable for years now, and yet within the last six months or so, I noticed that it had started crashing occasionally with a segfault inside one of the libraries it uses (Perl/Tk). Apparently the new version of the library that I've got installed now dereferences a null pointer now and then. The library is OSS, so sure, theoretically I could track down the problem and submit a patch. But realistically that's not going to happen (huge codebase, I haven't programmed in C or used a debugger in 10 years, ...). (Yes, I've tried to submit a usable bug report, but I've failed, due to my lack of C skills and the difficulty of reproducing the bug.)

Whatever bad things you might say about proprietary software, one good thing in terms of reliability is that it's typically statically linked. That means someone who sells a proprietary app can test with a particular version of a library, and then just keep on shipping the app with that version linked in. If a later version of the library comes along that they do want to switch to, they can test it carefully, and then roll it out. But as an OSS programmer, you're at the mercy of your users -- they could install any version of a library, and if it doesn't work right, they consider it to be your fault.

Re:libraries

[Phroggy]

On the other hand, if your app is statically linked against an image rendering library that allows malicious images to execute arbitrary code, it's harder to patch. ;-)

Fine the Way It Is

[Databass]

Google's Gmail works so well in "beta" form I could use it the rest of my life as is.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas ... except

[MobileC]

Software that is in Beta indefinitely should be called "abandoned".

So it's been in Beta a long time, being improved and should therefore be "abandoned"?

Proprietary Bazzar?

[miyako]

I think the move toward releasing beta( of course, I say beta software, what they are really releasing is Alpha software (how many "beta" programs have you used that have not had any features added?) ) software by companies is a move to "embrace and extend" the open development style that has served the F/OSS development communities. While some may argue that they are missing the most important ideological aspects of what makes F/OSS software great, I think that companies are finding that by allowing users to provide real feedback that will actually be used in the development of the application- and by allowing users to use software for free- they are able to make applications that appeal more to the target userbase (or modify the target userbase based on who they see using the application), and they can get people "hooked" before they start to charge for the software.
While I certainly do not have a problem with proprietary software using a modification of a traditionally F/OSS development method, I think that in the end this might have an unintended effect that companies may not forsee.
One of the big hurdles I see to people adopting Open Source software is that many people are uncomfortable using version 0.x of a program. With this big push to label software "Beta" people are going to become more used to the idea of using programs that aren't quite finished, or are labled as beta or development releases. As people get used to that idea, it takes away one more mental obstacle a lot of people have toward adopting F/OSS solutions.

The Boy Who Cried "Beta!"

[sd_diamond]

The reason people like products released as Betas, is because it's the most honest software companies ever get about their products. It's pretty much as simple as that; Beta implies under-constant-improvement, and even I as a consumer don't mind imperfect software, as long as the company will at least advise me it's been released in Beta - under construction.

True, but the problem with this is that, if it is over-used, the term loses all meaning. The whole point of a "beta" period is that, at some point in the foreseeable future, the product is expected to move into a "production" phase. This doesn't mean, of course, that it is completely finished and requires no more improvement. Even the most naive computer user today knows better than that. But when all (or at least the largest) developers leave their product in eternal beta mode, then eventually "beta" will mean nothing.

disagree strongly

[Anonymous Coward]

Look at google news closely. The articles are 90%+ AP, UPI and are the *same exact stories* from a thousand little places, either directly or a step away, albeit some have a word or three changed from the original copy. Whoopedy forking zinggy do there. That's the dirty little secret of newspapers and MSM broadcast "news" today, it's repacked crap they pull off the wires.. Google could just pop for a subscription to those two sources and be their own online newspaper legitimately, yahoo apparently does it already.

Google is just being cheap, and the critics are being ignorant and naieve, and the content owners would be hard pressed to try and counter current US copyright fair use provisions given Google offers an extremely small piece of the content, and gives exact reference and credit.

It's a manufactured non issue. Why? I don't know, but it sure is. In googles case I think it's so they can claim "thousands of news sources crawled by de minute!!1BBQ 11". Whoop! It's a few dozen really at best.

I think the funniest one is online newsrag A makes you REGISTER to go see the SAME AP or UPI crap you can get elsewhere without registering. Why would I want to "register" when the only thing I can't access at newsrag A is the pathetic local high school soccer scores and similar?

Big fat jokeski

What is interesting about GMail?!

[FatSean]

That it is run by Google? Using their special 'searching algorithms'? It's Yet Another Web-Based Mail System. Nothing there that hasn't been done many times before.

another Name . . . .

[The Terminator]

I'm used call it "Banana Software ... maturating at the customers expense"

I like betas

[Junior J. Junior III]

I still remember the mid-90's, when application software widely sucked, and I remember loving betas because they offered a glimpse at the future which might not suck as much. New features, bug fixes, an interface that wasn't complete shit... betas had it all. Sure, sometimes they were crashy, but so was everything, and it wasn't like there were all that many bugs that made an application unusable.

Windows has been beta-quality for years...

[scgops]

...so I wouldn't think the current trend of long-running beta releases has anything to do with whether or not they're ready for prime time. It sure looks like a lawsuit avoidance tactic to me.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas ... except

[jabelar]

Yes, at some point improvements should be captured in a production release and the next improvements can be Beta again. The point is to have something to rely on (i.e. no scripting vulnerabilitites and such) due to testing/hardening of a certain release. Endless improvement != endless Beta

Long Betas, the EASY answer...

[ToxicBanjo]

Simple,

If you're in beta you're likely not to get sued for security issues and other "nasties" of complex developments.

Beta == New and Improved

[Glock-40SW]

Maybe the FTC needs to step in. Throw the "Beta" tag into the "New and Improved" bin somehow. Just as companies can only advertise something as "New and Improved" for so long, software can only carry the "Beta" label for so long..

Of course, OSS is one of the worst offenders. There is an implied "Beta" for software with a version 1.0 IMHO. How much OSS that has been around forever (openSSL anyone?) still has a version 1.0?

Just my $0.02

Flame

[fishlet]

Why you complaining about Beta.... WINE has been in Alpha for YEARS.
(ok maybe they officially just became a beta but still)

My karma's to high, must bring back to reality.

Hmm... this sounds familiar

[submaniac]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

This guy must have been talking about Windows!

so you can be useful, that's why.

[wardk]

Now if a site goes south, and it's production, there is hell to pay.

but it goes south and it's BETA, it's like you are a hero for finding a problem!

Why Does Beta Last So Long?

[Anonymous Coward]

Another reason might be is because you can. Software can be 'shipped' or tested even if not complete. It is dificult to ship a TV or a car that is fully not ready. i.e. you cannot ship a car, and say in a couple of months the engine will follow. In the case of software that almost works, it is easy enought to 'ship' a patch of a more complete product. In the case of server based web driven software it is even easier.

The stories are AP, but the sites are not

[Anonymous Coward]

Look at google news closely. The articles are 90%+ AP, UPI and are the *same exact stories* from a thousand little places, either directly or a step away, albeit some have a word or three changed from the original copy.

You are right that the ultimate provider of the stories are AP and other newsfeeds, but they are on the sites of other news providers (nytimes.com, cnn.com etc), and they have just as much legal basis to get pissed as they would have if the stories in question were locally available content. Just being supplied by the AP does not mean that the same legal strategies that have worked against "deep linking" could not be applied here.

That said, I'm still skeptical whether this was the reason that Google News is still in beta.

Hotmail and Outlook Express

[Timbotronic]

This has got to be close to the record. Hotmail support in Outlook Express been in beta for the best part of a decade. I reported the bug where it downloads duplicates of messages 7 *years* ago! The (automatic) response? This product is in beta (so don't expect us to do anything about it). Microsoft clearly use the term "beta" to free themselves from the obligation of product support.

he's not quite right

[Zebra_X]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base." '"

So says Peter Sealy.

The funny thing is both beta's mentioned by the article are not flawed or inadequite. Todays betas are far closer to an actual realease than previous generations of software.

Also they forgot to mention that betas are typically free. Who wouldn't want free near commercial grade software?

Long lasting betas.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've heard they're very enduring.

But, alas, my daughter's beta always lay at the bottom of the aquarium. It is quite vivid as it recognizes me and starts to swim quickly as I approach to feed it (I guess it must be saying in fish lingo: "I'm not dead yet!").

I already gave it that green medicine but to no avail. Maybe the disease is irreversible, maybe it's no disease -- just age... maybe it's a bummer and wants to lay down all day long -- hey, it must run in the family!

Anyway, any veterinarian in the room by any chance?

We will sell no wine before its time

[steevo.com]

Remember when Orson Wells was hawking Paul Masson wine in the 1970's? "We will sell no wine before its time."

While I may be anxious for software to "go gold", there is a reason why there is a wait - it's not ready.

It may still be crap when it is eventually released, but at least its not as crappy as it would have been had it been shipped early.

eBay = permanent Beta (pig latin for the letter B)

[Chapter80]

OK, so it's not Greek - but eBay is the pig latin equivalent of the English translation of the Greek letter Beta.

is that off-topic or just [+0.5 mildly interesting] ?

"Beta" can mean different things...

[Beek]

... in different situations. Or maybe I just have different expectations for different types of beta products.

As an example, look at a free web app. It should be easy to deploy new features quickly. It should be easy to fix bugs and release them to the user quickly. An extended "beta" period is okay as long as there's constant improvement and the number of defects is kept low. Users will tolerate a bump in the road every once in a while.

With a desktop app where the vendor doesn't have control over the users machines, you can't deploy a new version of your app instantly. That changes everything. I'm expecting a beta release to feature complete (mostly). I'm expecting more defects, but I'm also expecting the focus to be on removing defects, and not adding new features. An extended beta period is bad because it tells me that new bugs are always popping up. But development is proceeding like in my first example (new features and low number of defects), then calling your product a beta may be sending the wrong message.

Then again, if you're continuously adding features and keeping defects low, then "beta" is probably a bad way to describe your product. It's beta, but with a wink or an asterisk at the end.

Unlike MS which never really has beta at all

[gelfling]

What's wrong with being conservative and cautious as opposed to MS which thinks your hard drive ist their sandbox?

Alternate example....

[divide overflow]

>"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

Try this formulation:

• Marketers = Republican Party
• Flawed or inadequate product = George W. Bush
• User base = U.S. Voters

And guess what? The user base for flawed product Bush beta 1 DID grow, resulting in a greater user base for the subsequent Bush beta 2. I can't say whether this trend is going to continue.

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas ... except

[jzeejunk]

not that I disagree with what you said but google news has been in beta for 3 years most likely because of
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/09/29/211424 1&tid=217

the name

[ZhuLien]

Sometimes it's just a name, if a program does what I want and works how I want and is reliable enough for me, it doesn't matter what the name of it is.

Beta as it used.

[bitspotter]

Beta doesn't mean releasing sooner; it means being buggy longer, but with liability protection.

Saying "It's just a beta" generally means that it's still got bugs to work out. This is another way of saying "it might eat your lunch, and we're not liable for that". Though the legalese might say that too, it looks better in court if it's trumpeted with a term like "beta" which most users understand, instead of in fine print which they don't.

Huh?

[SeaFox]

That, and you can't uninstall the old ones because it'll break all of them.

You were supposed to uninstall the old version before you install the new one. That would prevent the duplicate entries in Add/Remove Programs. Your bookmarks/cookies/extensions/ect would be safe because they are stored in the profile folder, which is not removed when you uninstall Firefox.

This guy has to get out more often...

[Edd!3]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base." It seems he's never heard of "Windows"

Re:Nothing Deplorable about Betas ... except

[jcdill]

Something in Beta for three years should raise questions.

The problem with Google's "beta" offerings is that for the most part they aren't really "in beta", they are really abandoned. No one at Google is working on them. There are no new releases planned. They were worked on for a while until their creators got bored and moved on to other projects.

All these Google services have been in Beta for more than a year, have serious bugs, no support, and no signs of development:

• Google Groups (since early 2001)
  
• Google Catalogs (since January 2002)
  
• Orkut (since January 2004)
  
• Gmail (since April 2004)
  

I'm glad to see that someone on Wall Street is starting to take notice. Maybe this will shake things up at Google and get some action. I have 201,322 messages in the trash mailbox of my gmail account (stuck there since August of 2004 when I filled up my 1 GB allocation after just 4 months of use...) and I'd REALLY like the "messages that have been in Trash more than 30 days will be automatically deleted" function to operate as advertised. Deleting them 100 at a time (the only way to delete them manually) is not feasible.

jc

Because someone is *working* on it

[IntelliTubbie]

There's a perfectly good reason why people like beta software. Sure, it contains bugs -- but so does production software. However, beta software is in a state of constant improvement. Actual people, right now, are working on the product to make it better. If you run into a problem, there's a good chance it'll be fixed reasonably soon. Designating software as a final release means that the developers (or managers) think it's "good enough" for now. Still not good enough for you? Well, too bad.

This is part of the appeal of open source software: the software is in a constant state of improvement. If the original developers aren't improving it, you can improve it yourself, or find someone who will. The software is never "final," and never orphaned, as long as it's open.

Cheers,
IT

Post (beta) (Was Re:Beta = safety)

[Waltre]

I disagree with your logic. However, this post is still in beta, and as such, my points are not yet complete.

Waltre cannot be held accountable for whether the punter reading this post is amused, since it is still in beta. My roadmap includes many points of argument, a new sig, and some funny bits.

planned obsolescence

[exacerbated.mango]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base." (emphasis added)

Isn't this how all products work? Sell it, then milk the flaws via repairs/service/replacements.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_obsolescence

"DRAFT"

[Tablizer]

One place I worked I used to stamp every document "DRAFT". That way if anybody complained, I could simply say, "It's only a draft".

[OT] Re:As long as programmers hear us...

[Sircus]

As long as you're posting grammar tips in your sig, it's "betas", not "beta's". "Beta's" would be the abbreviation for "beta is".

Re:[OT] Re:As long as programmers hear us...

[Anonymous Coward]

Possibly, but it is much more likely the apostophe denotes the possesive - belonging to the beta.

Would you understand this, "This Beta's going very well."?

Either way the GP use of beta's is incorrect - as is Googles...

Three letters:

[edunbar93]

ICQ

Mirabilis hasn't released an actual 1.0 version in oh, 10 years.

Why Does Beta Last So Long?

[FukYa]

Isn't it basically a way to save your ass when something doesn't work as advertised?

Perhaps its the food?

[dzfoo]

Perhaps its those little pellets that they eat? Or maybe the bloodworms, they like bloodworms. Or perhaps its because they do not have the same requirements as other exotic fish, such as goldfish or clown-fish; they can live in low oxigenated water, and eat pretty much anything a fish could eat. It also helps not having other fish around for it to fight with (they usually fight to the death!).

I know I have a Beta (his name is Fishy, by the way), and it has lasted so far almost a whole year! (We got it for Christmas last year).

          -dZ.

Surely no product is perfect when marketed ?

[Horus1664]

"I can't come up with anything else in the entire marketing world where marketers knowingly introduce a flawed or inadequate product [and] it helps grow your user base."

Spoken like a true 'marketer' I would say. Surely most manufacturers would admit that they have not 'perfected' their product before taking it to market. In fact I believe it is those very same 'marketers' that apply the pressure on the manufacturing part of the business to release a product to take advantage of 'time to market' when that product may well be far from perfect.

It is also true, as many have said already, that software is somewhat unique in that modifications can be fairly easily distributed, so people still working on the product can improve something that people already have.

The wide use of a 'beta' also provides far better user testing than could be performed in-house and provided the beta phase proves responsive to user feedback then the overall confidence in the company, from its customers, benefits as well.

Don't marketing types call this stuff 'win-win' or something ?

Shareware and betas ...

[mildm8nnered]

I am a budding (Mac OS X) shareware author, currently running an open beta.

I am intending to charge about $35 for my software, but am currently giving away limited duration (three month) licences for free.

Before going public, I ran a closed beta for about three months, with 20 or so users that I recruited from various Mac OS X forums. This helped me eliminate the most egregious and common issues.

My public beta has now been running for about a month - I've had a couple of thousand downloads, and nearly four hundred registered users - mainly finding me through version tracker and macupdate listings.

The quality of the bug reports from my public beta users has generally been fantastic (it may help that I've promised bug reporters free permanent licences) - I have about 24 bugs in my bug tracker, of which 10 are open, and maybe half of these are serious. Generally my public beta users have been far, far more productive than my closed beta users - there are lots of issues that you simply aren't going to hit until you get out to a relatively large number of users, and these bug reports are like gold.

Once I've closed the remaining serious issues, and added one remaining feature, probably early in the new year, then I'll end the public beta, start doing publicity and send the product out for review, and start charging for licenses.

This seems like a very good deal for both sides to me - poossibly even a virtuous circle. Beta users get free early access to the software, but are aware that there may be unresolved issues. They also get a chance to influence the final form of the product - one could look at that in a very cynical way (they're doing the developers work for them), but the impression that I get is that people really appreciate this,

From the developers point of view, the larger public beta base enables a much higher quality final product, which clearly beneficial to both sides ...

Re:eBay = permanent Beta (pig latin for the letter

[wed128]

i think it would be etaBay...

anyway, eBay comes from the name for an auctionhouse, or a "bay"

Re:eBay = permanent Beta (pig latin for the letter

[Chapter80]

i think it would be etaBay...
Actually, no. That would be pig latin for "Beta", not "B".

anyway, eBay comes from the name for an auctionhouse, or a "bay"
Actually, no. It stands for Echo Bay, as Echo Bay was the original name of the Consulting Firm of the founder.