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Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

blog.usejournal.com

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Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#301

Post by Pocketknife »

mrhappyunhappy wrote: post #210

Isn’t it about time we have a review of the legality of tos agreements? It seems anyone can put anything into this thing nobody reads and just point their finger at it “see, says here you agree you’re an idiot”. There should be some limits as to what you can and cannot put into TOS.

Ah, but you forget the age old problem of government regulation:

Regulatory capture

I guarantee if you got such a law passed, Google, Apple, and Microsoft will be the ones actually writing the law, and running whatever organization is supposed to enforce it.

And I guarantee they will make it extremely hard to comply with simply to drive up costs to competitors.

It won't actually do anything useful, or there will be one good aspect left in as a fig leaf. It will, effectively, be a very expensive to comply with pile of empty words.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#302

Post by tedivm »

bdibs wrote: post #50

I actually just got my Google Ads account suspended because I forgot to update my billing address before adding a new card. The suspension was for "suspicious billing activity", tried appealing twice with the correct billing address, and was told the suspension is final (some automated email) both times. They won't take my calls because the account is suspended, which leaves me not being able to advertise on the #1 s…

When I was in college I ran a forum that got some decent traffic. I put Google Ads on my site and after a few months had enough money to pay for school books. I went to cash out and they suspended my account claiming click fraud and stole the money.

This is how google has always operated, and it's one of the reasons why their near monopoly on advertising is horrible for everyone.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#303

Post by tedivm »

w8rbt wrote: post #240
sheeshkebab wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

no gsuite is probably key - I'm thinking of terminating all my gsuite accounts simply due to no desire of having my business basically be terminated due to some stupid algorithms maintained by google's idiots.

Keep G Suite, but buy your own domain (whatever.com) so you are in total control. If they ban you, just change DNS records to point to zoho or some other provider.

This also requires maintaining decent backups of the gsuite emails, calendars, contacts, and drives that people are using.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#304

Post by benologist »

aikah wrote: post #258
jedberg wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My google ads account has been suspended for 19 years. I'm still waiting for the results of my appeal...

Don't hold your breath, you're not the only one. They claimed I clicked on my own ads which was never the case, of course there is no way to appeal. They stole my money because yes, they still owe me money, these punks sent me a 25€ voucher to buy ads, like it solves anything.... I will never ever trust them or rely on any of their services like the Google Cloud Platform.

Google settled a case like yours for $11m on the grounds that it would be too expensive, after four years of fighting, to prove they didn't steal your money lol.

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/adsense-lawsuit/248135/

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#305

Post by topspin »

manigandham wrote: post #114
ezoe wrote: post #57

The moral of the story is, don't relies on monopolized software distribution platform.

How exactly are you supposed to distribute your app then? All the app stores are monopolized.

I use a PC. Amazingly it can host software from many sources. Some of those sources include boxed software I ordered from various retailers, software aggregation and distribution services like Steam, the operating system vendors own proprietary software distribution system and a large number of unaffiliated software vendors that operate their own web sites.

It seems that we had long since solved the 'problem' of software distribution before Apple and Google decided to correct it.

And no, my roughly used and crazily effective PC system is not riddled with malware and viruses despite the claims of walled garden purveyors that insist this is inevitable.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#306

Post by benologist »

JetSpiegel wrote: post #269
FireBeyond wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those app developers who have been dutifully paying fees to Google may be surprised to discover that they are somehow not also paying customers...

Ancillary customers that Google throws some crumbs to, not the raison d'être of the enterprise.

They have collected billions from developers via their 30% commission on sales and IAPs on their app store, plus the massive volume of advertisements shown in their customers apps for which their split is much more than 30%. Many developers are paying thousands or more a month to Google.

Google's customers include advertisers, and they include people paying them for hosting, and people paying them to buy apps, and people paying them to publish apps, people paying them for online services, people buying their hardware, etc.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#307

Post by Operyl »

docker_up wrote: post #293
Animats wrote: post #193

The real threat to Google will come when someone sues over this behavior as an antitrust case. This is part of "supply chain" antitrust law. It's sometimes called a "refusal to supply", where a manufacturer refuses to sell to a retailer. That's legal if it is not "part of a predatory or exclusionary strategy to acquire or maintain a monopoly."[1] If you're the only supplier of something, antitrust law starts to apply…

Why hasn't this happened yet? It seems like Google has been behaving this way for a very long time.

The people big enough to do so, with the pockets to do so, aren’t subject to the problems faced here.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#308

Post by megous »

crazygringo wrote: post #224
makecheck wrote: post #127

Even in systems with automated processes, the bare minimum for communication should be a log of activities that is visible to all parties (e.g. account owner and company). The log should remain visible for quite awhile even after a severe action such as a ban. And in such a log, every action taken by an employee should be marked with an employee number, even if it is a number that only means something inside the comp…

The piece of the puzzle that you're missing is that people use accounts for fraud, and if they find out why an account got banned, they'll know which behavior triggered it and will learn to avoid that behavior in the rest of their accounts and future accounts. It sucks, but automating sharing reasons for flagged actions will be self-defeating. Ultimately it needs to be reviewed by a person at the company who is equip…

> The piece of the puzzle that you're missing is that people use accounts for fraud, and if they find out why an account got banned, they'll know which behavior triggered it and will learn to avoid that behavior in the rest of their accounts and future accounts.

Compliance is the goal, no? How's it self-defeating if you ban non-compliant behavior and only way around it is to basically get more compliant with the rules?

How will you get compliance if you don't share details with clueless violators, so they can avoid the mistakes in the future? That seems self-defeating, because this gets rid of clueless, but potentially valuable developers.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#309

Post by gregmac »

sbov wrote: post #270
reaperducer wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real problem is when you can't reasonably choose to do business with someone else and move on, as they are free to do with you. Something I learned the hard way when I first started out in business is to never make your business dependent on a single entity. Whether it's a supplier, or a publisher, or a telco, or whatever. They are all single points of failure, and unless you're a huge business, one failure can b…

> Something I learned the hard way when I first started out in business is to never make your business dependent on a single entity. Seems impossible. Assuming you're an internet business, how did you make your business not dependent upon your domain registrar?

Typically, a registrar is not irreplaceable. They could terminate your account so you'd have to transfer to another registrar, but unless their TOS says they can seize your domain they shouldn't be able to completely block you. Even then you have the ability to sue then if they break the contract terms.

This is in contrast to the app store gatekeepers, where there are effectively two, each serving a non-overlapping chuck of market, and you can't shop around for better terms or an alternative.

Not an ideal situation if something happens with your registrar, of course, but at least there is some possible recourse. The risk of this leading to your business closing is significantly lower.

Re: Google terminated our business via our Google Play Developer Account

#310

Post by Pocketknife »

solarkraft wrote: post #43
DiabloD3 wrote: post #26

This is why PWA is important: Google cannot ban a website! Also, the author should make sure to publish their app on non-Google App Stores and remind users that they still have a choice. And for those questioning on why the author is upset if they're still on the iOS store: Android is about 85% of the global market, and about 2/3rds of the US devices. iOS is this weird dying phone OS that Apple is keeping alive even…

> iOS is this weird dying phone OS that Apple is keeping alive even though there really aren't that many users I don't think it should be given the priority developers give it, but 15% globally and 30% in the US are a lot of people. They're also far more eager to spend than Android users.

yeah, but Apple has always been it's own worst enemy. Jobs and it had this co-dependent relationship, and I think they are in long term decline now that he isn't there to rein in their worst excesses and insist on certain things.
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