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Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

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Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#121

Post by junon »

worrycue wrote: post #47
rplnt wrote: post #25

Google might have pretended to stood for something, but they have been an evil corporation since they have been a corporation. That's what corporations do by design. One relevant example is that they've been doing the "only for ie5+" with their services for 10+ years now. They killed most of their browser competition not by having a good product, but by having or buying up good services that they used to force chrome…

That’s not how I remembered it. Chrome really was a good browser and I would argue is still a good browser (for now). IE got displaced by Firefox’s predecessors because MS got caught napping - they disbanded the IE team thinking they have won. Firefox simply got outcompeted by Chrome as Google went crazy making it faster and faster. Firefox fell behind often enough that Chrome managed to take almost all of its market…

This is also how I remember it. "getfirefox.com" is burned into memory from ages ago, the first real competitor to IE. Everyone wanted to switch to it.

Then chrome came along and people reluctantly switched at first, then enthusiastically. Firefox had the reputation of eating RAM like candy.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#122

Post by npsomaratna »

fuzzy2 wrote: post #74
worrycue wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not how I remembered it. Chrome really was a good browser and I would argue is still a good browser (for now). IE got displaced by Firefox’s predecessors because MS got caught napping - they disbanded the IE team thinking they have won. Firefox simply got outcompeted by Chrome as Google went crazy making it faster and faster. Firefox fell behind often enough that Chrome managed to take almost all of its market…

That’s the “nerd history”, which I mostly agree with. Normal users however don’t care much about performance and whatnot. Their PC came with Chrome, so they use it. If you give them some other browser, they probably won’t be able to tell the difference. Chrome didn’t “win” because it was good. It won because of Google’s hyper-aggressive marketing on all channels. They basically did was Microsoft was fined for by the…

I adopted Chrome almost as soon as it was released. Chrome was better than the other browsers available at that time. Firefox was a mess, and Internet Explorer... well, best left unsaid.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#123

Post by nness »

DeathArrow wrote: post #34

My conjecture is that Google just pretended to stand for freedom, when they were a smaller company and they needed goodwill to be able to build an empire. Now they don't need that goodwill anymore.

The freedom Google stood for was also a trend of the time — tech start-ups were trying to break out in the burgeoning internet against established giants — and naturally the companies ideologies reflected that rebellion against the norm.

They a few billion dollars later and you realise that morality and stakeholder profits can never be aligned...

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#124

Post by saagarjha »

IshKebab wrote: post #35
colordrops wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

crazy that they just unashamedly removed it.

I doubt their motivation was "now we want to be evil". Probably more like "evil isn't actually well defined and people keep pointing to this and having dumb arguments about it".

Ok but people still do that.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#125

Post by m_rpn »

bob1029 wrote: post #104

Back when I was working at Samsung, I had a manager who was absolutely convinced that google is an intelligence/CIA operation. At the time, I found it to be a mockable suggestion, and never really thought much beyond it. Seemed like harmless IT/nerd banter back then. About a decade later I started to reflect on what he said and began feel like I might have been working with a time traveler or other inside person. It…

It is safe to assume that every big internet/data/telco company from big nation states has some kind of relationship with national intelligence agencies, dating back from the 60s at least, if we just talk about the modern information age.

Nothing strange or mind blowing really, for example Crypto AG, a famous swiss crypto vendor was secretly a joint USA-Germany operation from the 70s onward.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#126

Post by vineyardmike »

mrweasel wrote: post #91
DeathArrow wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's wishful thinking. Politicians will never break up Google since they benefit from it.

It's like banks, it depends on your logic. We have systemically important banks, banks that will always be bailed out. You have two ways of dealing with that scenario, either prepare to save these companies when they fail or make them non-systemic so we can afford to let them fail. What I fail to understand is why it's better for society to support these "to big to fail" companies. Why not break them up. Why not plan…

There’s reasoning if you can actually see what’s happening. Does it outway the costs? It’s a political question, but there’s some benefits.

For example, JPMorganChase is “the” big bank lately. It was able to handle the acute financial crisis this year by providing liquidity and a buyer as needed to keep the system from ever losing a deposit. That was likely bad for them as a business, short term, but it happened because the regulators can call up a single organization and get what they want.

Big tech has similar (unrealized) opportunities to keep strategically important things going. One possible example is the ease of releasing the Covid contact tracing system. If there were 20 fragmented parties they may never have aligned.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#127

Post by dizhn »

bombolo wrote: post #99
samwillis wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This may seem like a good idea but so much of Google's power comes from the Search + Search Ads monopoly. That is where they are anticompetitive to the max, that is where a change needs to happen. Splitting everything else off doesn't solve the core problem. Within Search + Search Ads you have a platform where Google are/have: - the sole vendor of a digital asset - ads - the sole marketplace for that asset - a closed…

Let's not forget maps, where they arbitrarily decide to show you a shop/hotel/restaurant 5km away when there is one 200m away.

I am kind of surprised none of the navigation apps divert your course slightly to pass in front of a large store or something yet. It could even announce the place. "On your right is such and such store where using the code Maps will give you a 10 percent discount."

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#128

Post by WithinReason »

youngtaff wrote: post #93
komali2 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No need to proxy, you can just use https://brave.com/ . Add a pihole to strip it from other devices and non-browser web traffic.

That would be the same Brave that was replacing ads on sites with their own ones?

Nope, that never happened. You must be thinking of a different Brave browser.

Re: Google’s Plan to DRM the Web Goes Against Everything Google Once Stood For

#129

Post by abwizz »

jkingsman wrote: post #86
rapnie wrote: post #60

We all let it come this far, because of how we treat the services Google provides: As nice free and helpful tools. Talking about "Chrome this and that" all the time we forget what that really means, namely: Using the strategic tools of the largest Advertising Agency in the world, that allows them to ever grow their dominance. Chrome, GMail and all that jazz all fit into a global-scale ad-tech framework to push shady…

> Give them a support call. Act like a noob and keep them busy for as long as possible with "It isn't working". I'm all for grassroots change, but I really don't think that doing this to Tier 1 support staff is going to effect any real change. With all love to my helpdesk folks, what matters is ticket closure metrics and call duration -- an emotional outburst isn't going to change a thing.

seems like an emotional outburst is not the worst way to have a long call with no actionable outcomes.

my sympathies for the call staff thou

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