Hey all---I'm the original author of the post, and I wanted to thank you for starting a feisty debate. Really thrilled to see both supporters and critics of my view. One thing I do want to point out tho: The post was really meant to show one, alternative way of thinking. I actually believe that the best results come from some kind of blend of the two approaches. That is what I think Apple is really good at -- and not just making pretty boxes for circuit boards.
Also, in the comments I made about a second mattering, it was exactly my point that while seconds are important to engineers, they may or may not be to users. And a focus on actual user stresses is the essence of design.
I totally disagree with your premise. If I put it in the nicest possible way, you are suggesting that engineers can hit some sort of local maxima for their design decisions with testing, but that 'professional' designers can get them out of that with bold, intuitive changes.
It's nice to think so. It's certainly a possible difficulty in design: many designers have made their names reworking a tired design into something iconic and revolutionary. (This article about Tag Heuer's digital stopwatch is a great example: http://lenovoblogs.com/designmatters/?p=3748).
In this case though, I think you're missing it. If you believe design's God is usability, that is that design is about providing function to actual users of the design, then you're on the wrong side of this conversation: the side with only your opinion, arguing against the side with billions of datapoints.
Since search is the only way Google makes money, let me ask you a rhetorical question: how long do you think Google Instant will stay turned on if it worsens the user experience? By worsens, I mean that empirically users demonstrate less advertising engagement, or show that they are getting worse search results?
So on the seconds conversation: seconds matter to USERS. Seconds only matter to google's ass-kicking advertising engineering team because they matter to users. Google is accidentally leaking some proprietary search information to you in those videos -- they're telling you: ultra-ultra-fast search makes Google more money because users like it better.
Where good design is less easy to statistically evaluate, say with Google Buzz or News, this approach falters, but I think picking on Google Instant/Homepage search is choosing exactly the wrong section of the company to complain about: these guys are the absolute best in the business in the search results / advertising world, it's their bread and butter, and they test the hell out of stuff like this before it launches.
As to the matter of personal speed preferences, a counterpoint: speed matters to me a lot, and I want to use a search engine like it's an extension of my brain. Case in point: one of the computers on my desktop uses duckduckgo for its search bar. It's noticeably slower than google for searches. Maybe .2 or .3 seconds vs .05 seconds. That's annoying. I notice it every time I search with DDG; it takes me out of the flow of whatever I'm doing that required some searchable information. I would guess that I'm not alone.
Also, in the comments I made about a second mattering, it was exactly my point that while seconds are important to engineers, they may or may not be to users. And a focus on actual user stresses is the essence of design.
Anyway, thanks for reading and commenting!