OnHub • Hacker News Board

Re: OnHub

#441

Post by curun1r » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 9:52 PM UTC

endtime wrote: post #224

mtgx wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To understand why certain products, which are seemingly unrelated to Google's core competency, have stayed with Google and haven't moved on to Alphabet, or why Google created a product such as OnHub and not Nest, you have to realize why all of these product are under Google - to track all the data that goes through them under the same generic/unified "privacy" policy, and then feed it into its advertising system. Tha…

I hate to burst your bubble, but it's actually just a branding thing, and has been in the works for much longer than anyone involved knew that Alphabet was going to happen. The team that built this is part of the same company as Google Fiber (disclaimer: for which I work), which is in fact no longer part of Google Inc.

> but it's actually just a branding thing

I've heard it's mostly a liability thing. When projects like the self-driving car were directly under Google, Google's assets were fair game in any lawsuit over that technology. With the current setup, liability is siloed in each legal entity which gives the cash cow, Google, more protection.

More here: http://www.theverge.com/2015/8/13/9149431/alphabet-google-co...

Re: OnHub

#442

Post by arihant » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 9:58 PM UTC

OK, I'm trying really hard to figure out the $199 price tag. My cheap as dirt N+ router works pretty darn well connecting 12-15 devices at my home. I almost never had problems in years with it.

All the smart services Google offers, work through cloud, like Cloud Print. Not through a router like Airport express. Even Android Wear now supports Wifi so having BLE isn't that attractive to me. All the smart features that can happen with BLE and Wifi combined are always better offered with phone. So I don't see home automation/IoT benefit here either. Phone is a better hub. So what's exactly the point here? The only thing I can think of is security patches from Google. But $199 is very steep for that.

I know it has a bunch of smart engineering and more antennas. But I don't know anyone having connectivity problems that are related to their routers.

Re: OnHub

#443

Post by endtime » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:01 PM UTC

curun1r wrote: post #441

endtime wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to burst your bubble, but it's actually just a branding thing, and has been in the works for much longer than anyone involved knew that Alphabet was going to happen. The team that built this is part of the same company as Google Fiber (disclaimer: for which I work), which is in fact no longer part of Google Inc.

> but it's actually just a branding thing I've heard it's mostly a liability thing. When projects like the self-driving car were directly under Google, Google's assets were fair game in any lawsuit over that technology. With the current setup, liability is siloed in each legal entity which gives the cash cow, Google, more protection. More here: http://www.theverge.com/2015/8/13/9149431/alphabet-google-co...

I wasn't commenting on why the Alphabet thing happened (I've heard all sorts of explanations but nothing official except what's been said publicly, and I don't personally have any insight). I was talking about why things in Access & Energy are still getting the "Google" label, e.g. "Google Fiber" or "OnHub by Google".

Re: OnHub

#444

Post by piyush_soni » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:01 PM UTC

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #285

andresmanz wrote: post #266

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks, but shouldn't these features be optional? I still don't get why I need a Google Account.

The router is cloud configured from your mobile device, that is how it works. Some cloud services for the device are actually optional. But AFAIK you still need a Google Account. Here is the help page on the topic of data collection and privacy: https://support.google.com/onhub/answer/6246642?hl=en&ref_to... And see also, how to set a whole bunch of privacy settings: https://support.google.com/onhub/answer/6279845?vi…

>> that is how it works.

That's how it's "made to" work (needing a google account).

Re: OnHub

#445

Post by pibefision » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:02 PM UTC

thrownaway2424 wrote: post #90

dazbradbury wrote: post #76

Interesting - but I'm not sure what this gives me over something in a similar price range, for example: http://www.amazon.com/RT-AC68U-Wireless-AC1900-Dual-Band-Gig... Presumably either you know something about routers and want to enable QoS, install your own firmware, or use some other advanced feature - and you spend money on a decent router. Or you don't, and use whatever your ISP provides (which if it's bad, you…

The AC68U is the perfect AP for the discerning user who enjoys going into the basement every two weeks to reboot things.

7 months, and never needed to reset it. 5 computers and 5 smartphones, and IPTV 12hs a day. Works well, without any problem.

Re: OnHub

#446

Post by BufordTJustice » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:04 PM UTC

astrocyte wrote: post #321

My biggest issue with this is that Google wants to inject a piece of hardware into my home that acts as the gateway to my data. A device through which all : > Incoming data runs through > Internal data runs through > Outgoing data runs through And then wants to be vague about what data they will be pumping to their back-end for analytics/data mining. I have had a long standing proposal for home automation and I'm cur…

I would be very interested in helping write some code or contributing money towards making improvements to lock down phone home and other unwanted behavior. I think an excellent starting point is to see if you couldn't take a Mikrotik or OpenWRT/Tomato router and bake a lot of this extra filtering and functionality in. For some of the things that Google advertises like speed checks or choosing an optimal channel or whatever, should be do-able in open source firmware, so I think it would be hugely beneficial, at least for me (and probably many others).

Re: OnHub

#447

Post by zadjii » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:04 PM UTC

mrmondo wrote: post #440

I don't know how I would feel about Google having a device in my house that monitors all my internet traffic, I think they already know enough about me and I'm not sure I'm in a position to I trust them. Made me think of a funny comparison: I wouldn't buy a car or condom from Microsoft.

What about a car from Google? Perhaps one that drives itself?

Re: OnHub

#448

Post by zobzu » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:05 PM UTC

199 in exchange of google having another active spy system directly at your network edge, in case you run non google devices.

What a privilege. Think I'll pass thanks.

Re: OnHub

#449

Post by BufordTJustice » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:06 PM UTC

Just as a note, if range is really one of the selling points, I have found Mikrotik's RB951 class routers to be relatively affordable and have excellent range and features, for significantly less than OnHub ($20-80 for a good home router). OpenWRT routers with a lot of the same features, and the ability to boost range can also be sourced for even less.

Re: OnHub

#450

Post by endtime » Tue, Aug 18, 2015, 10:08 PM UTC

otis_inf wrote: post #335

endtime wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Disclaimer: I work for the same former-division-of-Google-and-now-Alphabet-subsidiary that built this, though I don't work on OnHub.) I think you need an account for cloud-based configuration, credential sharing, etc. Maybe it's not for everyone, but I think it makes sense as a product. I highly doubt they added a Google account requirement to improve ad targeting.

> I highly doubt they added a Google account requirement to improve ad targeting. Ad delivery networks, and google is one of the biggest, have one core business: delivering ads. Everything is setup to make that as big and as solid as possible. Whatever it takes (and we all know how far ad delivery networks will go: almost infinitely far). Now they ship a piece of hardware, require signing up with an account, and it's…

Believe it or not there are a lot of teams at Google that don't think about ads. I worked on Geo for over three years and had plenty of discussions about how various things should work, and ads never came up. (There was one case where we pushed pointless login requirements on the user, gating Zagat reviews behind a G+ login, and I (along with many others) argued against it.) Like I said, I'm not on the OnHub team, but knowing how these sorts of things work my educated guess is that they did some market research and found that the best way to have the best UX for the median user was to do cloud-based configuration.

On top of which, the privacy policy (linked elsewhere in the comments)_ makes it clear that your actual web browsing data isn't tracked.

At a strategic level, if we make wifi better and people use the internet more, sure, we can show them more ads. Maybe that and/or other strategic concerns are part of why the project got funded in the first place. But the people actually designing the features are probably a disjoint set of people from the ones thinking about that kind of strategy.