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Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

nytimes.com

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Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#261

Post by BalanceMarx »

kobeya wrote: post #219
guelo wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give me a break. Nobody is even censoring anybody's speech here. The real evil here is the lobbying organization itself. Corporations and billionaires buying our politicians and distorting the public debate is a much bigger threat than some lobbyist's freedom to argue against his boss's interests.

The real evil is people willing to pivot any discussion to whatever topic they think is more important, destroying a platform for open discourse.

Do you mean that analogies are evil?

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#262

Post by actuallyalys »

waisbrot wrote: post #222
659087 wrote: post #176

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Schmidt was pretty clear in his book that he believes his business success is an indicator of virtue, and that he believes he should use Google and his wealth to intentionally seek to manipulate modern culture. It's a disturbing notion and I've never understood why people weren't more concerned about it. Google proved that all you need is a colorful logo and a stupid catch phrase ("Don't be evil") to get people to…

> Google proved that all you need is a colorful logo and a stupid catch phrase ("Don't be evil") to get people to treat you as an infallible, altruistic entity - regardless of the fact that your actions tell a completely different story. I don't think the logo or catch-phrase have much to do with it. Google's search engine was orders of magnitude better than anything else when it came out (that's how they won the mar…

I think you're mostly right. After all, the most hated companies tend to be ones with poor customer service, not ones who do the most harm.

I do think Google cultivating an image of being just a quirky group of nerds (rather than a profitable and influential company) contributed to them seeming benign, and their logo and slogan are part of that.

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#263

Post by 659087 »

actuallyalys wrote: post #262
waisbrot wrote: post #222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Google proved that all you need is a colorful logo and a stupid catch phrase ("Don't be evil") to get people to treat you as an infallible, altruistic entity - regardless of the fact that your actions tell a completely different story. I don't think the logo or catch-phrase have much to do with it. Google's search engine was orders of magnitude better than anything else when it came out (that's how they won the mar…

I think you're mostly right. After all, the most hated companies tend to be ones with poor customer service, not ones who do the most harm. I do think Google cultivating an image of being just a quirky group of nerds (rather than a profitable and influential company) contributed to them seeming benign, and their logo and slogan are part of that.

> the most hated companies tend to be ones with poor customer service

At Google, they avoid this by providing no customer service at all.

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#264

Post by scott00 »

chaostheory wrote: post #173
fowlerpower wrote: post #17

The thing is that Google has absolutely gone down questionable path from their early days. It is a little unfair to think this problem exists only within Google. Time and time again we are reminded why corporations will evolve to become as greedy and as protective of their turf expansive of their power and monopolistic as they can get, even if good people are running them. It is the system itself that does this, corp…

> The thing is that Google has absolutely gone down questionable path from their early days. This is the price for being a public C-corp. There are very few people in history who can withstand the short term mob mentality of shareholders - in my mind only Jobs, Bezos, and Musk could do it... and survive. (imo Not even Bill Gates or Edison could do it) Maybe for other companies this can be mitigated by becoming a B-co…

Larry and Sergey own super-voting shares and can outvote all other shareholders combined.

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#265

Post by hsod »

jonbarker wrote: post #231
jcoffland wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great story but I fail to see the connection. This is a case of don't shit where you eat. If you want to speak out against Google then don't belong to an organization funded by Google.

Its becoming much harder to be an organization that in some way does not benefit from larger corporations. Asking anyone to first get their funding right then get their free speech right is not the right order IMO although in an ideal world it would be great. What if the funding takes a long time to sort out? Don't do free speech until then?

How is this a free speech issue?

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#266

Post by bllguo »

jonbarker wrote: post #231
jcoffland wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great story but I fail to see the connection. This is a case of don't shit where you eat. If you want to speak out against Google then don't belong to an organization funded by Google.

Its becoming much harder to be an organization that in some way does not benefit from larger corporations. Asking anyone to first get their funding right then get their free speech right is not the right order IMO although in an ideal world it would be great. What if the funding takes a long time to sort out? Don't do free speech until then?

Pray tell how this is a free speech issue. Open Markets is free to go say their piece elsewhere. Why are they entitled to speak freely under New America?

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#267

Post by rhizome »

root_axis wrote: post #256
kobeya wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real evil is people willing to pivot any discussion to whatever topic they think is more important, destroying a platform for open discourse.

Castigating someone else's opinions as the destruction of open discussion is the height of irony.

It's condescending to plainly try to change the topic to what the poster thinks the issue "really is." As a bald assertion, it's threadshitting.

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#268

Post by geodel »

sreenadh wrote: post #242
jcoffland wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great story but I fail to see the connection. This is a case of don't shit where you eat. If you want to speak out against Google then don't belong to an organization funded by Google.

If Google cannot handle some criticism from a "supposedly friendly entity" (since they are bank rolled by Google), this shows their level of arrogance and the unwillingness to change their ways. You need to evolve with time. Especially a tech company like Google failing to understand that is rather sad. Now Google has set precedence that they will not tolerate anything critical. So, the consultants & advisor will jus…

To me it seems mooching off Google while criticizing their policies is not tolerated. It is not too dissimilar than Damore's firing from Google which was unsurprisingly justified as policy matter.

The only difference I see is last case was of some hated conservative chump but this time it is of "independent intellectual"

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#269

Post by fh973 »

DannyBee wrote: post #147
2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google was never good. They only ever did what they thought fit their strategy at the time, to allow them to grow and make more money.

Whatever may be happening now, this is super-revisionist history. Google fought a large number of very lonely fights in the early dates, all in the name of consumers, the industry, and doing the right thing. It took a very large number of lumps and made a lot of enemies for doing so, but did it anyway. I was there, in the DC office, working next to the policy director (I started the engineering side when he started t…

I found Adwords for Domains a pretty questionable way to make money, as it subsidized the domain grabbing industry, and I find it hard to find the value for either advertisers or users that they otherwise claim for search ads.

Re: Google Critic Ousted from Think Tank Funded by the Tech Giant

#270

Post by rhizome »

metaphorm wrote: post #234
guelo wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give me a break. Nobody is even censoring anybody's speech here. The real evil here is the lobbying organization itself. Corporations and billionaires buying our politicians and distorting the public debate is a much bigger threat than some lobbyist's freedom to argue against his boss's interests.

Corporations (like Google) and billionaires (like Eric Schmidt) buying our politicians (by influencing them with sponsored think tank studies)

Or, first you buy the politicians through lobbying, then you buy academics by attaching strings to donations to their organizations.
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