Google Groups Offers a Home to Online Communities

Features Enable Users to Start and Join Groups, Find and Share

[Shak]

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--Dec. 2, 2004--Google Inc. (Nasdaq:GOOG - News)
today launched the next generation Google Groups on the 'Groups' link
of the Google home page at www.google.com. This enhanced product
enables users to create, manage, search and browse web-based groups, as
well as subscribe to and track favorite groups. Building on the
foundation of the original service that currently includes more than 1
billion searchable posts from the Usenet archive, Google Groups now
offers users the ability to join and follow discussions among different
groups, keep in touch with family and friends, and share information
more easily.

[Sanenet]

Hmm... Just ocurred to me, looking at that, that 66% of Googles services are still in BETA.

Web -> Launched OK
Image Search -> Launched OK
Groups -> in BETA
News -> in BETA
Gmail -> in BETA
Desktop -> in BETA

And that's without getting into the other services such as alerts, answers, catalogs, etc.

Well, better than the MS route of launching without testing - but it's amazing that they can build such a huge empire with so few products!

[kevinpate]

> ... such a huge empire with so few products

Oh, I dunno, Ray Kroc & Dave Thomas each managed to do ok with only a handful of initial products :)

[Josk]

And they to have switched back to the old interface quite quickly. I don't think many people liked the new interface...