Christian Cantrell posted today about MSN's entry into the "Beta Game." This brought up something that I've been thinking about the last few days... what exactly are the timeframes for all of these beta applications to actually go into "final" release mode?
For example - I'm currently using GMail (for my listservs, I use Thunderbird for my main mail), MS Antispyware, and other applications that are in beta. It makes me wonder when these applications will ever hit 1.0 - especially GMail. I would say GMail is pretty darn good now (except for the silly lack of ability to delete an entire folder).
Archived Comments
LOL! Look at ICQ (I Seek You) - still in beta after years!
I suspect that the whole Beta thing has gotten taken over by marketing/sales departments to some extent.
For instance, Microsoft used to have betas, now they have CTP (community technology previews), etc. I think MM has tried a similar tactic to hide the number of betas out there. I'd much prefer if the makers would just make new betas more often and name them the same thing with a # or date after each to signify the sequence. Why do we need Beta 1, beta 1 updates, updaters, fixes, CTP, etc.
So much for a naming convention.
As for the Gmail betas and such...well, it is a great way to get a product out, create FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt) against your competitors without actually having to support the product since it isn't an 'official' release. It also lets your marketing fiends claim it isn't feature complete/bug free whenever a journalist points out flaws.