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

Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

cnbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

731–740 of 784 posts

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#731

Post by gandutraveler »

behnamoh wrote: post #591
gandutraveler wrote: post #527

Expect the Google fit app to have these branding changes over the coming years : Fit - > Fitbit -> Google Fitbit -> Android Fit -> Finally back to Google Fit in 2023

Is this really the main takeaway from such a huge event? How about the fact that millions of users' data is just acquired by the company that already knows literally more about users than themselves?

I've made terms with fact that once my data is out there, I no longer have control over it. We need a major law change like GDPR that should allow users to control who has access to data and how it will be used. Until that happens. I'm surprised at the reactions from hn community on this. Do we really think Fitbit or any other company where we share data can never be acquired by some evil corp.

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#733

Post by twobat »

sundvor wrote: post #727
runn1ng wrote: post #721

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and spamming users with ads left and right, Google style, too

Hmm. In Chromium Edge, my new default browser, AFAIK the UO plugin will still work perfectly unlike in Chrome, meaning I rarely if ever see any ads. The closest thing to an ad in VSCode or for that matter Terminal would be .. I guess hints at ease of Azure cloud services? Never found it intrusive myself, and I do AWS.

It's hard to understand your message, but... ads in VSCode? Is that a thing now?

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#734

Post by yusi-san »

sundvor wrote: post #727
runn1ng wrote: post #721

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and spamming users with ads left and right, Google style, too

Hmm. In Chromium Edge, my new default browser, AFAIK the UO plugin will still work perfectly unlike in Chrome, meaning I rarely if ever see any ads. The closest thing to an ad in VSCode or for that matter Terminal would be .. I guess hints at ease of Azure cloud services? Never found it intrusive myself, and I do AWS.

You can use VSCodium, it's a fork of VSCode without Microsoft's telemetry.

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#735

Post by Entalpi »

1000units wrote: post #725
w1nst0nsm1th wrote: post #724

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The last time I heard this stupid argument, that was from a literal neo-nazi who has a svatiska tattoo on his chest. You elect you president ; you elect your representatives to congress and senate at federal level ; you elect your representatives and governor at state level ; you elect your mayor and your city council at local level. That's the definition of democracy.

I'm sorry to break this to you, but you're in the wrong country if you don't like constitutional republics, because the United States of America is in fact a constitutional republic. I very much dislike neo-nazis, but I have to applaud the gentleman for at least understanding the simplest nature of his government and attempting to educate his countrymen.

I am pretty sure a constitutional republic can be fall under the label representative democracy (which in the case of the US).

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#736

Post by Hippocrates »

cletus wrote: post #409
taurath wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don’t care about the product in so much as they care about the avenue to suck up more data, no?

Actually, no. I find this whole "they're selling your data" trope to be trite and just annoying at this point. I actually expect this more a reaction to Apple's pivot into health with the Apple Watch (people seem to forget the ex-Burberry CEO positioned the Apple Watch 1 as a luxury product--anyone remember the Apple Watch Edition for $10k?--health came later).

Google’s core business is ad targeting, the cornerstone of which is personal data used to target better. While it is (hopefully) untrue that they literally sell your data, they do profit from it indirectly (and massively, it’s 85% of revenue). Google has many great products and some bad ones, but almost all have vacuum hoses up against your personal data... Now, Fitbit makes a really mediocre and pedestrian tech product that captures a wealth of deeply personal data. I’ll go ahead and connect the dots on this one.

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#737

Post by malux85 »

trimbo wrote: post #712
quickthrower2 wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perfect, except no refund offered!

The company would have had to carry a reserve to refund everyone who ever bought the app (which is equal to their total revenue). Or the buying company would have cover that. Either way it'd be an impossible liability.

It would be an impossible liability if everybody refunded. In realty I’d bet less than 5% would

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#738

Post by nitin_flanker »

notatoad wrote: post #711

to everybody worrying about "the data", what do you actually believe google could possibly learn about you through your fitness data? as far as i can tell, the most valuable piece of data they could harvest through a fitbit acquisition is whether or not you're the type of person who uses a fitness tracker (and they already know whether or not you installed the fitbit app through the play store). It seems insane to me…

That data potentially tells them about the health habits of people. How much of the users work out everyday, go for jogs, or bicycle rides, all these numbers can tell help them target specific health products to these people.

This health data is a gold mine for medical and pharma industry as well.

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#739

Post by Razengan »

geerlingguy wrote: post #267
Razengan wrote: post #78

So, the concerning thing is, if Company A has been collecting data on users but not doing much with it, then gets absorbed by Company B who is notorious for infringing on everyone's privacy, do users even get a choice to prevent their data (that was collected by Company A) from being seen/used by Company B?

Refer to what has happened (albeit slowly) with Nest... basically as an end user you get no say or choice in what happens to your data, and you can either give up on it or accept the new terms.

This is why I prefer to stick with Apple; even if their commitment to privacy is just PR, at least their stuff won't get bought out by the likes of Google or Microsoft.

Re: Google Buys Fitbit for $2.1B

#740

Post by scarface74 »

tooltalk wrote: post #618
OnlineGladiator wrote: post #469

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All in all, Google ended up paying less than $4B for what they had previously valued at $5B. A month ago WeWork was valued several times higher than it is today. It doesn't matter if you got a good deal on paper - what matters is if you got a good deal.

Sure, they got a good deal. Moto's wireless patents were second only (or maybe third) to Qualcomm's in term of quality and they generated a steady stream of licensing revenues before and after the acquisition. Unlike WeWork's unproven business model, the wireless industry's successful revenue generating licensing practices were in place for a decade and Moto's patents were worth quite a bit. Now let's not forget why…

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110831/01030115745/are-a...

Still, the folks at M-CAM decided to put the Motorola Mobility patent portfolio to the test by using a variety of scoring techniques, and believes that the portfolio isn't all that valuable, both in the aggregate and at the specific level. It basically found that about 48% of the patents are probably worthless. At the specific level, the company looked at the 18 patents that Motorola Mobility had asserted against Apple, suggesting that these particular patents may be the "stars" of the bunch -- but, again, found that nine of those patents were "impaired," and were unlikely to be very strong or valuable.

Post reply on HN