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Show HN: Bloom – A free and open source 'Google'

kerkour.fr

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Re: Show HN: Bloom – A free and open source 'Google'

#131

Post by neospice »

z0mbie42 wrote: post #18
brandonhorst wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, I work for Google (not on google.com), and would definitely fit into the "geek" category, and I still assumed you were talking about an OSS search engine.

Hi, currently we absolutely do not plan to create a search engine: it requires too much resources for self hosting, I think we currently have great option for all the spectrum (From Google search to DuckDuckGo), and because an open source search engine will be tricked by all kind of nasty SEO Experts and it will be very hard to promote actually good Content. I dared the Google comparison thinking about it's productiv…

I think it's clear after reading your exchange with OC that you're not planning to take on Google search with Bloom. However what I think the commenter you're replying to is suggesting is that by calling yourself an open source 'Google' you're giving people the false impression that you are focused on search because when people think of Google the first thing they think of is search.

Perhaps you might consider something like free and open source 'Google Suite' or 'Google Apps' instead?

Re: Show HN: Bloom – A free and open source 'Google'

#132

Post by ldubost »

Animats wrote: post #72

"Bloom Drive" is a paid service. 30GB free, then it starts to cost. "Secured by SSL", which probably means the data is not encrypted against access by them. The Bloom Drive site is one of those sleazy "sign up and then maybe we'll tell you something about what we're selling" sites.[1] You can almost hear the sucking sound of the onboarding funnel. [1] https://bloom.sh/drive

Disclaimer: i'm part of the cryptpad team.

If you are interested in a similar alternative but which is adding the challenge of end to end encryption to the table, check out cryptpad.fr It is Open source and has now 3 years of developpement to bring realtime encrypted documents.

Tackling Google's non open source business model is an important task. There are already quite a few products that are going after that, including NextCloud, OnlyOffice, etc. Most of them target the enterprise where there is money.

To go after the end consumer the main problem is the "surveillance capitalism" issue which you cannot just tackle with the promise of not looking at things and just be open source. End to End encryption is needed, which is what we are working on at CryptPad (on hackernews Time to Encrypt the Cloud https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13692856). Other products are proposing zero knowledge email or drives. End to end encryption is key, because it guarantees that the surveillance business model won't be activated down the line. It also protects the data from cloud hacking.

From there the biggest challenge is funding. Without revenue from reading the data like Google, or selling super expensive devices like Apple, or selling to the large Enterprise like Microsoft, how do you provide a good service to end consumer. Open source can help solve the hosting part by distributing it and by self hosting but it won't solve the R&D issue. To fund this level of R&D help is needed. At cryptpad we have subscriptions and Open Collective.

Ludovic from CryptPad.fr

Re: Show HN: Bloom – A free and open source 'Google'

#136

Post by ubercow13 »

blurbleblurble wrote: post #80

I don't know if you want to go into it, but have you considered tackling the "search" problem by creating some kind of advanced bookmarking/local indexing browser extension? I find that I use google for stuff that I've already discovered . I believe that Chrome has intentionally impeded its bookmarking tools to make users more reliant on search... I realize that Chrome lets you search for stuff you've bookmarked in t…

The Firefox address bar works like you want basically. Searches bookmarks (and history) and generally prioritises them above other results.

Re: Show HN: Bloom – A free and open source 'Google'

#139

Post by ldubost »

z0mbie42 wrote: post #65
shmerl wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought Mozilla is relatively well known, due to wide usage of Firefox.

Unfortunately, I do not share this point of view. At least in France. My friends from CS school know it well, but my friends from Business schools does absolutely not.

I'm from France too, and Mozilla is already more known than many others in the Open Source space, and their user base is still huge compared to anything else.

Z0mbie42 is young and did not see when Mozilla was the browser alternative before Google Chrome and stole the show. It is coming back today though because users start to realize the "Google problem".

Now Mozilla is a browser alternative and not a services one. But this is a good example of how unrealistic and not so good it is to want to be a "google" alternative. Today Google is everywhere from search engine (the original google) to collaboration, music, pro apps, video, browsers and so on.

Building an alternative as open source is good but it should clearly not be as monolithic as Google is.

Now it's complicated because users want a more integrated experience and open source developers that manage to grow their tool in a specific area dont have that much time and funding to better integrate so it's slow.

Also copying as is Google as Open Source is also not the solution. What about privacy. I believe end to end encryption is key. There are advancement in this area (the project cryptpad.fr we work on is one of them). What about decentralization ? There are tools building up in this area like mastodon or peer tube.

I wish Open Source can come out with an alternative, but it will need to be an integration of solutions, and not only a monolithic solution. Check out Framasoft.org for an incredible list of open source services they host.

Ludovic

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