Well, thank you Google, once again for making another one of your incredible upgrades. This time, I can no longer use Google Reader because the frickin’ links don’t work! The funny thing is, there’s nothing much new functionality-wise going on. All the things that were still are, apart from a few new buttons, and mostly it’s about cosmetic change. And yet, things no longer work in Opera.
I can’t say I’m really surprised. Apparently, Google lately optimizes its applications not to work with Opera. It started with Google Plus, and the new Google Web toolbar, which displayed no notifications. There’s no fancy new technology that would justify it not working in Opera. The only reason it doesn’t work I can think of, is Google doesn’t want it to work. Here’s what I’m talking about:
The right side of Google Web toolbar in IE
The right side of Google Web toolbar in Opera
And this is not because Opera does something bad. Google actually identifies it, and then sends a completely different page to the browser. So it’s not because they didn’t think about Opera. They did, and this is what they choose to do, times over and over again.
I’m honestly surprised I can still access my Gmail. I think Google should look into that too, they must have forgotten some nice feature to disable Opera.
As much as I avoid Google materials, I still use gmail anyway.
They actually fixed it in the meantime, which is good. What I dislike the most with Google is their tradition of open betas. They don’t design, implement, polish and publish their services, and then provide updates and improvements. They do something on impulse and then change it radically and incrementally. Which is a bad thing for users.