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“Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

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Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#171

Post by kuschku »

cromwellian wrote: post #51

"Seems to work" is not the same thing as "Working As Intended". I work on Gmail/Inbox (previously GWT). When we released Inbox, it started out as Chrome only, people discovered they could get it to load and seemingly work on Firefox by spoofing, but the reality was, it was still broken, and would eventually consume all memory, because Inbox relies on sparse Javascript array behavior for protobufs, and something like…

If the Google teams are just focusing on what would get the largest marketshare, then why did we never see Firefox-only launches of Google products?

For many years Firefox was the largest browser that wasn't IE, yet no such launch happened.

Even when Chrome's marketshare was below 5%, Google always launched Chrome-only.

Your argument is nice, but ultimately invalid: Google never cared about providing to the most users first, but only about giving an advantage to their own spyware browser.

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#173

Post by xerophyte12932 »

andosa wrote: post #136
askafriend wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even with all the resources in the world, opportunity cost plays into every decision. To remove that context would be missing my point. And as always, resources dedicated to a project are finite. The “X billion dollar company can’t do trivial Y thing” isn’t as straightforward as it seems and the argument rarely holds up to scrutiny in my opinion. We’re missing a ton of internal context here, and to have a real discus…

At some point you have to stop giving the benefit of the doubt. I draw the line where Google is unable to make a search page (that is making them the "x billion dollar" company in the first place) work with Firefox due to "lack of dev resources". Even though the only thing stopping the page from working in FF is a user agent check. You are making exactly the same argument that Microsoft proponents were making when IE…

I agree. At some point they should stop considering FF users as "well they aren't OUR users" in the cost benefit equation. They have to acknowledge that FF has a big chunk of the market and it should be part of the "Browsers we test on" list.

Considering the features work fine on FF, the actual costs for testing on FF should be minimal.

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#174

Post by cromwellian »

kuschku wrote: post #171
cromwellian wrote: post #51

"Seems to work" is not the same thing as "Working As Intended". I work on Gmail/Inbox (previously GWT). When we released Inbox, it started out as Chrome only, people discovered they could get it to load and seemingly work on Firefox by spoofing, but the reality was, it was still broken, and would eventually consume all memory, because Inbox relies on sparse Javascript array behavior for protobufs, and something like…

If the Google teams are just focusing on what would get the largest marketshare, then why did we never see Firefox-only launches of Google products? For many years Firefox was the largest browser that wasn't IE, yet no such launch happened. Even when Chrome's marketshare was below 5%, Google always launched Chrome-only. Your argument is nice, but ultimately invalid: Google never cared about providing to the most user…

You answered your own question. IE having the largest market share in those days. "Google always launched Chrome-only" -- another unsubstantiated claim. When Chrome was 5%, all their launches were always Chrome only?

I know it doesn't fit your narrative, but we don't launch broken stuff to screw over other browsers on purpose, period. The number one reason I've seen for non-working browsers is reliance on some non-standard browser feature/bleeding edge feature which isn't implemented fully or spec'ed correctly and doesn't have a good polyfill.

And because of the these claims of nefarious intent, I decided to go back and look up Writely (Google Docs) and see what it's compatibility looked like.

Here's a description of how it was based on Content-Editable https://www.theverge.com/2013/7/3/4484000/sam-schillace-inte...

And here's a comment I found claiming it didn't work on Safari nor Opera. https://www.extremetech.com/computing/50680-writely-googles-...

So it seems Google bought Writely, which already did not support Safari or Opera, rebranded it as Docs, and pending a rewrite of the editing/layout engine from the ground up, didn't work with Safari and Opera, most likely due to Content-Editable problems.

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#175

Post by xerophyte12932 »

prophesi wrote: post #73
Endy wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unlike you, it's the open-source parts of Vivaldi I'm most afraid of. I trust them to support their users and I believe they desire to have users who trust & respect them. I don't trust people who are more code-savvy than I am (that's most people) not to insert or exploit weaknesses in open-source software or other open code. With closed-source software, I know the origin point of the software I install, I know the n…

Both open-source and closed-source have their problems. Closed Source: - Team behind it could add trackers, backdoors, etc that are difficult to detect. - Attackers could find an exploit that will go unnoticed and unfixed for an indeterminable length of time. Or perhaps use the team's own aforementioned exploits/backdoors. - Can't tell if their app is well-tested and well-written, which means it could be a buggy hot…

> Open Source = more likely for attackers to find bugs, but less likely for bugs to persist. Don't need to trust the company's reputation for code quality.

But you need to trust the entire community not to insert bugs/backdoors and/or weed out such code. Not to mention Open Source contributors arguably have a lesser incentive than closed-source development being done by a company.

Ofc the above argument assumes contributors are allowed to make changes to the codebase, instead of just reviewing the code

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#176

Post by fauigerzigerk »

zmmmmm wrote: post #120

A lot of words, but it seems to boil down to: In exchange for being reinstated in Google’s ad network, their in-house specialists dictated how we should arrange content on our own website and how we should communicate information to our users. It's impossible to evaluate this without more details. If their web site actually broke reasonable elements of Google's terms and conditions then it sounds like this is complet…

That is a valid point, but the question remains: How come that one ad network is powerful enough to make a customer beg for three months to be reinstated instead of simply choosing a competitor?

Something is clearly out of whack in this market.

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#177

Post by Corristowolf »

breakingcups wrote: post #169
LarryPage wrote: post #27

Google hasn't been my default search engine for 6+ months. In fact the only Google things I use frequently are Android and Chromium (through Opera). I feel better about my internet usage, and I've been having a much better experience. Obligatory "username checks out"

What search engine have you been using? I've tried others but none seem to come even close, unfortunately.

DuckDuckGo works well. Even has those info tiles that google has when you search a store etc.

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#178

Post by knowThySelfx »

klondike_ wrote: post #39

I wish I could use Vivaldi, it seems like a nice browser for power users. Unfortunately it's closed source (besides the Webkit parts). Considering how much sensitive information goes through a browser nowadays, I would never consider something closed source. I'm sure Vivaldi has no intentions of becoming "evil" like Google, but because of its closed source nature it wouldn't be hard to slip a tracker or two in the br…

What about Brave?

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#179

Post by fbender »

askafriend wrote: post #85
nialv7 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interned at Google once. And the first thing they told us at the orientation is that they put the users first. Is that a lie then? Because what you said seems to imply Google puts the convenience of the developers first.

You have to look at opportunity cost. There is significant dev time that is spent supporting those configuration mixes that relatively few people will use. If that dev time could be spent on other features that will be appreciated by more people, then that is a decision you can make while still adhering to the principle of "users-first".

> There is significant dev time that is spent supporting those configuration mixes that relatively few people will use.

The issue I have with this is that too many are looking at percentage/share/ratio only. Yes, percentage matters. But absolute values matter just as much.

Or would you call a couple of million people "just a few"?

And nobody answer with "for Google, yes", that's completely besides the point.

Re: “Google: it is time to return to not being evil”

#180

Post by fbender »

BurningFrog wrote: post #135
andosa wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So a multihundred billion dollar web company doesn't have the dev resources to support Firefox? Even though it already works when you spoof the agent string?

It's still just a team of 5-50 human people working on each team, and they can only to do what they can do.

The only real cost here is processor cycles for increased number of automated tests. You don't even need a part time job to maintain the extra tests (otherwise you'd do something wrong).
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