171–180 of 261 posts
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> Just who the fuck do they think they are?? One of the leading services targeted by account generation farms to launch spam.
Go on, tell me how you send spam e-mail through Google+.
No means no. They really ought to figure that out by now.
No means not now. If they really didn't want to take no for an answer, they could just merge the accounts without asking the user. Instead, they keep reminding the user with gradually increasing frequency to make sure that the user has all their shit in order before the merge actually happens.
If you register a new account, verifying by mobile is mandatory now :(
Dear user, stop using google.
There's also the question of to what extent you can opt out in the modern world. Got a mobile phone, pretty much essential to work or life these days? Your life is now beholden to Google or Apple. So yeah, people damn well do have a right to complain, and "just don't use it" is a fatuous thing to say.
Useful reading from a real-life example: https://plus.google.com/u/0/115668950429167517685/posts/JcPQ...
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I think you're wrong there. I remember using the web back then. Search sucked before Google. Altavista was a bit better than what came before it, but Google really was the first search engine that was any bloody good at all . The PageRank algorithm basically cracked the search problem. Making money actually came years later. Google used the method of "get a zillion users and we'll figure out money later."
If I remember correctly, AltaVista had a pretty sophisticated advanced search mode where you could string together search terms with Boolean operators (and/or/not). And I'm sure that AltaVista had some kind of metric of "site quality" before PageRank came along. For example, you could judge how "important" a site is by how often people click on a search result to go there, or how big they are (number of URLs from tha…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Just who the fuck do they think they are?? One of the leading services targeted by account generation farms to launch spam.
Go on, tell me how you send spam e-mail through Google+.
They're unlikely to reinvent account verification from scratch for each of their products though.
I was all enthusiastic about G+ for about 5 minutes - until they wouldn't allow my wife to sign up without giving them her phone number, and proving that it was hers by accepting a call from them . Just who the fuck do they think they are?? There is no way I could suggest my friends and family sign up to such an intrusive service, so I quickly deleted my own account. It's an absolutely stunning achievement to create…
Not sure if that statement is specifically related to your wife having to "provide a phone number", but... Facebook does the same thing.
Does Google believe that if they just push a little harder and finish the job, that somehow the people so alienated will be won over? Or is the pursuit of profit far more important than the perception of the brand overall? Right now, and for the last year, the brand is being severely tarnished in all of the networks I have, tech and real-life. I don't see them winning on any front. A Pyrrhic victory.
I have no idea why people talk about huge corporations like they have hive mind and are in total unity? Google is now a mega-corp, comprised of thousands competing for finite success outcomes (raises & promos). It is also data driven hence they look at metrics that are considered success like registers over abandonments. Brand tarnish is a long term outcome, therefore it can not be seen in typical a/b testing cycles.…
That, or all of this is just a huge coincidence. I find that to be the least plausible explanation.
Clearly this is a unified strategic approach. It's one Google doing this, not dozens of units that happen to accidentally all try to do the same things the same way at the same time. It's the total unity part that actually makes it more creepy.
The whole phone number thing is an attempt to solve a very hard problem. Most people have terrrrrrrrrrrible password practices. Absolutely abysmal. And they are keeping extremely sensitive data inside their email as well as using their email address as the key to accessing many other websites and pieces of sensitive data. Think about how screwed you'd be if you lost access to you email address. Now think of how many…
You're right that in general this helps, and most of Google's account security energy is going towards helping average users deal with basic security. Microsoft offers a similar option (you must choose to use a phone, or a secret question, I think). But interestingly, phone auth changes as your account becomes more valuable. If your Google account unlocks everything you have, then a targeted stealing of your phone nu…
If you develop a way to recover people's email accounts that is simple for consumers, requires no human intervention, and is more secure than phone numbers, patent it and make millions. Seriously, this is a hard problem to solve and companies will gladly pay you for a better solution.