Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

blog.google

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

351–360 of 475 posts

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#351

Post by justinclift »

salvar wrote: post #312
justinclift wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

k, wasn't sure. I don't track the Chrome release schedule at all, so figured it was probably quarterly. Sounds like it's monthly then. Looking again, yep mid-October. So, no rush then. A couple of weeks worth of extra data collection it is then.

Yes, I'm sure the code is ready but some evil mastermind twisted their mustache and said "No... let's collect two weeks more of data! Bwahahahaha!"

As dumb as it sounds... that's kind of what their actions are indicating. :(

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#352

Post by souterrain »

chippy wrote: post #329
TekMol wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t want to be logged in in my browser at all Same here. Why does Chrome log you in in the first place? I mean I know it from the companies perspective of course. They want to consolidate as much data about you as possible. And tie you into their ecosystem. But what is the user facing benefit? Syncing your bookmarks across devices?

They want to be the next AOL browser internet appliance. It's called Chrome OS

With a blog named “The Keyword” is there any surprise they want to be AOL?

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#353

Post by crummy »

nailer wrote: post #344
StanAngeloff wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This same change to Google Chrome forced me to go to Firefox, too. After about a week of pain, I'm now much more comfortable about my choice. I do have a Firefox account which syncs up my passwords, history, etc. so in a sense I'm still logged into the browser. I do trust Mozilla more than I do Google with my personal data, though.

Mozilla don't have access to your data even with Sync turned on! They've confirmed it multiple times this week. One more reason to go with Firefox.

why do we trust them when they say this, when we don't trust google when they say it?

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#354

Post by mirko22 »

wbl wrote: post #321
grey-area wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How did you expect them to announce a change they probably perceive as a minor UX improvement? Just because you split a large change into a set of minor UX improvements and have different excuses for each individual change, that doesn't make the direction of travel any less damaging. To be clear, the direction of travel is for Google to abuse their de-facto monopoly on search and browsers to own SSO across the web an…

The competition to their products is a click away. People use google products because they find them more useful. If that's a result of the data they have, who cares?

It’s not the result of data they have but the other way around.

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#355

Post by Aaargh20318 »

fermienrico wrote: post #117
romed wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my experience at Google, "people at higher positions" do not really make these kinds of decisions. Someone at the leafmost position in the organization comes up with some research and recommendations and if nobody stops them, they go ahead and do it. It's actually really disorganized.

I feel like integrating auto sign in, tracking and Google cookies is less of a disorganized decision and more of a premeditated, carefully snuck in effort for their ads business. All the stars align for the bottom line. Just look at the state of Android. Try being a cell phone OEM who wants to use Android but without Google integration. Impossible.

Fortunately, the EU is starting to do something about that: https://www.theverge.com/2018/7/18/17580694/google-android-e...

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#356

Post by evrydayhustling »

cm2187 wrote: post #275

Won’t change my mind and will stick to Firefox after having switched because of this. First I don’t want to be logged in in my browser at all. Second, and probably more important, software is about trust. Even for an open source project, no one has the time to review millions of lines of code. So unfortunately one has to rely on what one believes is the behavior of the authors of the software. And what google did is…

Yes, opt-in is the beginning, middle and end of the problem here. Google has plenty of tools to inform users of these capabilities and allow them to turn them on or off. I wouldn't even mind if they nagged me a couple of times with a pop-up about browser log in, or a confirmation that I want to keep or delete Google cookies. But on-by-default features have a special responsibility to be conservative with a user's privacy.

I actually value and use sync. Google sees most of by browsing through page-hosted GA anyway! But at best, this was really lazy product management that smacks of condescension about less technical users (don't worry your head about these cookies). And at worst, it's testing the waters on some really nefarious strategies.

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#357

Post by bogomipz »

I think the larger issue is the culture that not only thought that these changes were OK in the first place but also thought the sneaky manner in which they were rolled out was OK too.

Trust and good will are finite resources Google. There will be no switching back. The horse has already left the barn.

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#358

Post by wild_preference »

srazzaque wrote: post #340
spondyl wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That "Save this login" stuff in Chrome drives me up the wall. I understand you can disable it under Settings (and I do) but I see it on other people's computer too and I feel a bit of me die inside when they click "Save login" just to make it go away.

Completely agree. It's ironic that users who click "remember my password" are 10x more likely to forget their password. The next step in this equation is even more frustrating - people who's default workflow to signing in is to click 'I forgot my password', and proceed through those steps to instil a new password. And then the cycle continues.

> It's ironic that users who click "remember my password" are 10x more likely to forget their password.

How is that ironic? People who can't remember their password would have the most reason to let an external apparatus save it for them.

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#359

Post by nailer »

crummy wrote: post #353
nailer wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mozilla don't have access to your data even with Sync turned on! They've confirmed it multiple times this week. One more reason to go with Firefox.

why do we trust them when they say this, when we don't trust google when they say it?

Have Google said they can't see your data when syncing?

Re: Product Updates Based on Your Feedback

#360

Post by joshuamorton »

ThePhysicist wrote: post #296

I don't see how having the sign-in sync turned on by default can be compatible with "privacy by design and default" as mandated e.g. by the GDPR. I wonder if they will have to offer a EU version of Chrome soon therefore. Anyway, 90-95 % of users will probably just stick with the default value because they either don't know about the option or don't care enough to change it, hence from Google's perspective introducing…

Sync isn't turned on by default. Sign in is. They're different settings.
Post reply on HN