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

Web by Google (TM)

landshark.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

361–370 of 496 posts

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#361

Post by mvn9 »

cheph wrote: post #299
mvn9 wrote: post #145

>I think it’s safe to say that Google’s AdWords is the dominant advertising platform on the open Web, which means it holds a commanding position in the Web’s finances. That's a very interesting observation. Google will thus prevent a native payment option at all costs, which leaves a huge opening for Brave or another payment provider. (Which is enhanced by content providers being threatened by AMP.) I don't see Googl…

> That's a very interesting observation. Google will thus prevent a native payment option at all costs, which leaves a huge opening for Brave or another payment provider. Can you elaborate on what a native payment option would entail? How would it be different from non native payment options? How would it be different from crypto or other payment options that already exist?

Like barrenko said in another comment [1]:

>Wasn't it that the creators of Netscape wanted to put some kind of payment protocol similar to crypto in the original browser but ran into trouble with the government, can't remember anymore. 402 error was famously reserved for money trouble.

You could have one standard, in the same way that webpages are standardized. Then you could use your preferred option on any webpage. It would come with your browser, so no need to install anything. Unlike the Apple app store, you wouldn't have one player controlling everything, so the payment network wouldn't take 30% of all profits.

Of course, whatever is feasible as a standard is also feasible as a plugin, or at least, like Brave, as a new Browser, if Google limits the plugin api. The difference is that nowadays, every payment option tries to be the winner, preventing every other player from advancing. With a standard, those fights would be over and users could start paying for everything.

I think the biggest difference would be that people would pay for single articles and videos from obscure sources. Nowadays you have to hand out your credit card or register for an obscure payment network like Brave or patreon. People register for Netflix, but not for a blog they visit one time in their life. It's very likely that a webpage and a visitor use different payment options, thus payment is not possible. As a consequence, everything is paid with adverts, like the article states. With a standard, that would shift and the default option would be a clean article without ads.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24177888

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#362

Post by gego »

Well, the EU should just fork or support existing open source Mozilla projects and pay developers... but looking at the budget there seem to be a lot of... unnecessary... money sinks. 80 Mil for management... 200 for dev... but the security team had to be downsized... yeah right. https://assets.mozilla.net/annualreport/2018/mozilla-fdn-201...

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#363

Post by throwaway45349 »

respondo2134 wrote: post #350
throwaway45349 wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Youtube is a sewer giving outright conspiracy nutcases a platform, they continuously promote Breitbart, infowars and other despicable websites Well, glad you're not in charge, then. If these publications really are crackpots then surely people will stop reading them? Freedom of speech and all that. Disclosure: Googler.

Googler but still throw away account? You must not feel too strongly about your convictions. You also obviously don't understand what free speech means, which is depressing of someone skilled & intelligent enough to work at the big G. Free speech is not the right to say what ever you want. It's the responsibility to stand behind and defend what you speak with real evidence.

I advocate for my beliefs on public accounts as well as internally - this account just happened to be what I was logged into is all.

The simple fact is these publications are promoted because they are popular, making no comment on accuracy. A massive corporation, even if I trust them as my employer, should never have such massive influence on our public conversation.

Popularity is a poor metric, but at least it's not censorship. I think even putting the thumb on the scales is dangerous.

Edit: I do see what you're saying, and I'm not advocating for a society where anything can be said without social consequence. I just think it's far too dangerous for FAANG companies to have that power all to themselves. The most well intentioned people can do terrible things...

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#364

Post by Abishek_Muthian »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #103

A lot of talk in this article about Google capturing the whole web, all valid points, but I find the Facebook walled garden even more terrifying. I see people now, often in online school parent groups I'm a part of, etc. who cannot even use email anymore, who don't use web pages at all, they get all their information through Facebook groups and Facebook, and only talk through Facebook messenger or sometimes SMS. E-ma…

>but I find the Facebook walled garden even more terrifying. I see people now, often in online school parent groups I'm a part of, etc. who cannot even use email anymore, who don't use web pages at all, they get all their information through Facebook groups and Facebook, and only talk through Facebook messenger or sometimes SMS

Replace'Facebook' with 'WhatsApp', outside U.S. especially for developing economies, your comment would be completely valid but even more dangerous as unlike Facebook's content WhatsApp's content cannot be put under public scrutiny and much of its users haven't even used a browser before let alone email.

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#365

Post by Taek »

true_religion wrote: post #337
prox wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am always amazed that being negative about Amazon is stomped out quickly in general. Just my experience where I wonder if this is by a team or they just have a lot fans.

Probably fans. It’s not easy to get support against Amazon when they are still delivering the majority of people‘a packages.

I don't think we need to be that charitable. Seems well in line with the Amazon ethos to proactively control the narrative around them in online discussions.

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#366

Post by andrewkdinh »

ramon wrote: post #335
andrewkdinh wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate when websites do this. I don’t use anything Google unless I’m forced to (work email, Google Drive for my school, etc.). And unless I absolutely need to use your site, I will avoid it like the plague. It’s not just limited to Google; it’s for any site providing only third-party OAuth login. I can never remember which one I signed in with, and if that service ever shuts down, it’ll be a pain to figure which of t…

I just don't understand where all this hate is coming from I don't hate Google for giving me free stuff and collecting my information I'm not doing anything wrong so I don't care. I understand that people might feel bad about being monitored and all but what can we do we live in a society full of internet connected stuff we're going to be monitored no matter what anyways I don't hate companies for it at all. Imagine…

> I'm not doing anything wrong so I don't care

I’m not going to try too hard to convince you of digital privacy, but would you really be fine with me just browsing through your browsing and search history, INCLUDING whatever you do in incognito? I’m sure you’ve made at least one anonymous account before. Why’s that? And what’s right today may not be so right in the future. Are you ok with everybody from your boss to your children knowing everything you’ve ever posted? Shouldn’t we have a right to be forgotten?

> what can we do we live in a society full of internet connected stuff we're going to be monitored no matter what anyways

We live in a democracy, well I assume you do too. Just because it’s the way how things are today doesn’t mean it can’t be changed in the future.

> I don't have anything against them or any other huge IT company if they're doing stuff good for us let it be

I’m not saying they’re not doing great things for the world, but it all comes at a price.

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#368

Post by AJ007 »

beagle3 wrote: post #128
simias wrote: post #84

The problem is that, IMO, centralization of the internet is simply the natural course. Especially when people seem to care so little. Centralization is cheaper, easier to monetize, easier to control, easier to update and upgrade. That's why people prefer Discord to IRC, that's why people prefer Slack to SMTP or Jabber, that's why for many people these days the distinction between git and GitHub is blurry. I suspect t…

That’s why we need a regulator. The old AT&T monopoly was dismantled. Based on talking to IBM insiders, IBM actively neutered itself fearing a similar fate in the late 1980s and early 1990s. But then, with Bush Sr and then Clinton, the rules changed; Microsoft started playing the political game, and essentially avoided a similar fate. There is no antitrust enforcement anymore. Breaking a company once indeed only buys…

Google is both the most dominant it every has been and the most vulnerable it has ever been, at the same time.

From what we've seen with GPT-3, we can train one machine learning model by ingesting the entire scraped web and a whole lot of (online/offline?) books, and it can often produce correct answers to questions. The accuracy of those answers, presuming the questions are not subjective ones, is only going to increase. Google's status, as a search engine, in 2025 is not something I would bet money on.

The iOS/Safari thing is another issue, which perhaps other anti-trust regulators will address in Google's favor. Assuming they do not, consider that if Google stops paying Apple many billions of dollars a year and another company (or Apple) replaces the default iOS search, Google's search ad business will be severely and irreversibly damaged. Removing iOS defaults would not only remove a large chunk of Google's US mobile search traffic, it would be the more affluent chunk. Everyone who knows about marketplace dynamics knows how damaging that would be to Google if that inventory ended up with Microsoft or Facebook.

Even without regulatory intervention (which is almost 100% guaranteed at this point, barring some act of god, though I don't know how large that intervention will be) Google's days atop the mountain are certainly drawing to a close. Perhaps the ground has already given way, they know it, and the maniacal stupidity of trying to coral the web into some AMP graveyard is a reaction of desperation.

To address the original blog post, I think the author is way off the mark on video. Youtube is big, but far from the king. Google has repeatedly flopped on the social side, and isn't going to be allowed to buy TikTok. They don't appear to be taking any ground paid streaming services like Netflix or Amazon. They are big, but no where near as important relative to their dominance in search.

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#369

Post by oarsinsync »

speedgoose wrote: post #65
jstanley wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electric companies can switch off your electricity, and not much else. Amazon can read your secrets.

I know that in practice nobody at AWS reads customer secrets and if someone does, it will be logged somewhere but I always find it funny that you can encrypt things in AWS with secrets fully managed by AWS. It's just a checkbox to check the box for encryption in technical requirements but it doesn't really matter if you really care about privacy when the keys are stored in a very safe box accessible by AWS and the US…

> I know that in practice nobody at AWS reads customer secrets and if someone does, it will be logged somewhere

Can you share how you know this to be true?

I certainly hope it's true, but I have no way of knowing myself.

Re: Web by Google (TM)

#370

Post by Jerry2 »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #103

A lot of talk in this article about Google capturing the whole web, all valid points, but I find the Facebook walled garden even more terrifying. I see people now, often in online school parent groups I'm a part of, etc. who cannot even use email anymore, who don't use web pages at all, they get all their information through Facebook groups and Facebook, and only talk through Facebook messenger or sometimes SMS. E-ma…

Hi cmrdporcupine, you should also disclose that you actually work for Google.
Post reply on HN