[andybak]

"Starting to roll out today" - does anyone versed in traditional PR have a say in this new trend in slow roll-outs?

I can see how it makes sense from an engineering point of view but I just installed Allo to try it out and it hasn't rolled out to me yet.

I'm rather unlikely to remember to try again in a few days/weeks etc.

This has happened multiple times in similar scenarios. I dug out my Gear VR to try the new Oculus browser. I didn't get it for 4 weeks (only a particular interest in WebVR kept me coming back to see if it was there).

Surely this is squandering good press and good will?

[derefr]

In most client apps that obey backend-account feature-flags, the app will introduce (advertise) the feature to you itself when your account gets the switch flipped.

AFAICT, they don't expect this announcement to reach or sway anyone who's going to use the feature; this post is more there to serve as genuine news—i.e. it's written to provoke water-cooler "what Google is up to" conversations among developers. (It's on the Google Research blog, after all; what consumer would even see it?)