Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself • Hacker News Board

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#141

Post by fudged71 » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 4:59 AM UTC

brian_cloutier wrote: post #122

MatthewPhillips wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is Now strategic?

Google's corporate mission is to organize the world's information. Taken from http://www.google.com/landing/now/ > Google Now gets you just the right information at just the right time. Google Now extends the mission to include personal information. The plan is to eventually know what you want before you know you want it. How could that be any more strategic?

Does one mission statement really cover the motivations of a company that has branched out into so many areas? Reader is a huge blow to that mission.

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#142

Post by nickporter » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:00 AM UTC

MatthewPhillips wrote: post #16

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It ties into Google Now. It's already super convenient for me. Swipe up "Google, note to self, pick up milk". Now I have a TODO. Combine that with what Google already knows (that I leave work at 5 and drive within half a mile of a grocery store), think about the intelligence they could bring to my Todo list. (I know lots of people aren't going to like the privacy implications, my comment isn't meant to apologize or t…

How is Now strategic?

Google Now is killer.

The 'aha' moment for me was when I was visiting New York City: A few hours after my arrival, it told me that a favorite musician of mine was going to perform at a venue close to my location. I would have never known if I didn't have the service.

I'm guessing they knew I liked that artist because of my youtube history (my phone doesn't contain any music). That's cool with me. Oh and if they want to show me an ad for his latest album, instead of the latest One Direction single, I'm cool with that too.

Lots of cynicism/astroturfing towards Google. Maybe they were simply giving away their share of the pie to other, smaller businesses? It's not like there's a shortage of RSS readers out there; it's kind of a trivial thing to build.

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#143

Post by fpgeek » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:03 AM UTC

Anyone in the "Just let me pay for Reader" brigade (I'm not sure whether or not Om is a member, though it seems likely given the "How much would you pay" poll I saw on one of his posts) has no basis for complaining about Keep.

Keep, unlike Reader, is a paid service. A big point of Keep is to encourage people to use Drive - a storage service you pay for, once you fill up your introductory tier (keeping audio notes might help with that).

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#144

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:09 AM UTC

Shooti wrote: post #114

DigitalTurk wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, if you'll read the ZNet article that post is based on you'll notice that users who didn't connect their Windows Phone calendars to their Google accounts before February are still screwed! See also http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US//windows-8/use-google-win... : I want to connect my Google account after January 30, 2013 Here's what you need to know: Unfortunately, with Google changing the way it supports EA…

Read the article again. Windows 8/RT isn't the same as Windows Phone (which Google confirmed in the article has been whitelisted). The source of that is the Windows team deciding not to add CardDav/CalDav support to the Metro-style Mail and Calendar apps, so you won't be able to use CardDav/CalDav from any other provider either.

[deleted]

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#145

Post by Shooti » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:10 AM UTC

spinchange wrote: post #131

Shooti wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read the article again. Windows 8/RT isn't the same as Windows Phone (which Google confirmed in the article has been whitelisted). The source of that is the Windows team deciding not to add CardDav/CalDav support to the Metro-style Mail and Calendar apps, so you won't be able to use CardDav/CalDav from any other provider either.

So what about the decision to drop ActiveSync support for anything after Windows 7/Office 2010? If you buy a new windows machine and are a paying apps customer, you are pretty much screwed. Dropping CalDAV doesn't affect this, but it is icing on the cake since it's hardly a guarantee that Apple is going to request whitelisting to make sure it works. (They have iCloud after all & not seeking interoperability will push…

Where are you getting that they dropped Google Apps Activesync support for Outlook 2013?

A search brought up the main support page which says its upcoming (Under "OS and Microsoft Outlook® requirements"): http://support.google.com/a/bin/answer.py?hl=en-uk&hlrm=...

It also brought up a Google groups thread where a Google representative posted last month saying they're working on it: http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/apps/rUd8phVXs...

Also why would Apple have to request addition to the Google Calendar CalDav whitelist on iOS? Google could just whitelist it themselves since its them who decides whether or not it continues server-side.

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#146

Post by andyl » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:13 AM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #130

andyl wrote: post #123

Before Google+ came along, Google had many great products and embraced the OpenWeb. Now Google has abandoned Open Standards like RSS and CalDAV, and I think Google is more interested in building their own walled garden.

Bingo. It's very unfortunate too, as Google were uniquely positioned to be great defenders of the Open Web. Who else has the clout to do it now, as well as the motivation? Does anybody see Marissa moving Yahoo that way? I'm guessing "no" but would love to be proven wrong. It won't be Microsoft, you can bet on that. Red Hat are a moderately powerful company, but they aren't that big and could wind up acquired by Oracl…

> This isn't looking too promising.... :-(

Well, perhaps this is a market opportunity. Many people need products that embrace the OpenWeb.

Google was a good champion. But Google is an advertising company after all, and their primary business is to spy on your datastream in order to sell your attention to advertisers.

So now that Google seems to be abandoning the OpenWeb, perhaps this will create a void that can be filled by others...

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#147

Post by just2n » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:13 AM UTC

signed0 wrote: post #51

ghshephard wrote: post #2

My favorite comment from the post: "And by the way – how is this app strategic for you guys and Reader is not? A little clarity would certainly be appreciated." I too would love to know what Google is thinking here.

Keep and Reader are built for different groups of users. Reader was a niche product used by a small (but vocal) subset of all Google users. Keep is a product built for everyone.

It also turns out that Keep will provide them with a LOT more information about users that advertisers would pay through the nose to obtain.

Reader.. not so much.

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#148

Post by fpgeek » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:14 AM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #130

andyl wrote: post #123

Before Google+ came along, Google had many great products and embraced the OpenWeb. Now Google has abandoned Open Standards like RSS and CalDAV, and I think Google is more interested in building their own walled garden.

Bingo. It's very unfortunate too, as Google were uniquely positioned to be great defenders of the Open Web. Who else has the clout to do it now, as well as the motivation? Does anybody see Marissa moving Yahoo that way? I'm guessing "no" but would love to be proven wrong. It won't be Microsoft, you can bet on that. Red Hat are a moderately powerful company, but they aren't that big and could wind up acquired by Oracl…

Influential or not, Opera surrendered when they switched to WebKit/Chromium. In terms of defending the open web, they're irrelevant now.

However, I wouldn't dismiss Microsoft so quickly. They're a serious problem on many fronts and will probably switch sides once this battle is done, but they have plenty of reasons to oppose a WebKit monoculture, at least. When you don't have many allies, you take what you can get.

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#149

Post by fpgeek » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:16 AM UTC

azov wrote: post #139

mindcrime wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bingo. It's very unfortunate too, as Google were uniquely positioned to be great defenders of the Open Web. Who else has the clout to do it now, as well as the motivation? Does anybody see Marissa moving Yahoo that way? I'm guessing "no" but would love to be proven wrong. It won't be Microsoft, you can bet on that. Red Hat are a moderately powerful company, but they aren't that big and could wind up acquired by Oracl…

Perhaps, Dropbox? They are well positioned for becoming the filesystem of the web, and may have some interest in defending open file formats and protocols.

File formats, sure, but I don't think Dropbox is that interested in open protocols (or at least open storage/sync protocols), for obvious reasons.

Re: Sorry Google; you can Keep it to yourself

#150

Post by AJ007 » Thu, Mar 21, 2013, 5:21 AM UTC

mindcrime wrote: post #130

andyl wrote: post #123

Before Google+ came along, Google had many great products and embraced the OpenWeb. Now Google has abandoned Open Standards like RSS and CalDAV, and I think Google is more interested in building their own walled garden.

Bingo. It's very unfortunate too, as Google were uniquely positioned to be great defenders of the Open Web. Who else has the clout to do it now, as well as the motivation? Does anybody see Marissa moving Yahoo that way? I'm guessing "no" but would love to be proven wrong. It won't be Microsoft, you can bet on that. Red Hat are a moderately powerful company, but they aren't that big and could wind up acquired by Oracl…

I think there is a compelling case Microsoft should move in the other direction. Will they have the right leadership in the future to do this, I don't know. Microsoft is not a lost cause.

I came of age as an active Slashdot reader. At that time Microsoft was seen as an arch villain that could do nothing but evil. Curiously, today Google has a far deeper and more chilling degree of influence far beyond what Microsoft had. Microsoft had a monopoly on an open platform, Google knows everything public about you, a lot of private stuff too, possibly can run facial recognition of you against every picture on the internet, and wants to also be able to predict what you are about to do. And they have a monopoly on online advertising. Unelected regulators and elected representatives are terrified of Google. Google has gotten a blank slate pretty much to do what they want, perhaps from a national security standpoint alone.

Google today, makes the Microsoft of yesterday look like a used child's toy.

I see the attitude toward any dominant government or corporation as a pretty good thermostat toward a group's value of freedom and openness, and quite frankly the free pass Google gets here (relative to Microsoft in 1998) is disturbing.