Dumped by Google

>Seriously, why does ANYONE use anything other than Google Search and Analytics? Why do you willfully choose to expose yourself and your business to what they can do to you?

A. Does anyone have a valid story were the user actually lost everything, for good?

B. Assuming it's possible the risk of catastrophic failure by losing Google can still be lower in a risk assessment than the cost of redundancy or of making each part independent. Especially in a startup where there is already risk everywhere.

Way to go! At Cozy cloud(https://www.cozycloud.cc/) we are developing an open source personal cloud platform that you can self-host and assign your own domain. Right now we already offer backup of your email address but we would like to offer a good web-mail alternative. Have you got suggestion for a Node.js mail client we could cook in?

Or simply people who didn't have the skills to be a peer?!

And what about closed gardens like social networks and services that wall our data behind proprietary walls? Google data liberation front is a step forward but its still not enough.

People with such great skills and knowledge of the stakes of IT like the HN audience shouldn't put the blame on common people right?!

I genuinely believe that technology and the open source community have reached a maturity that makes the development of simple and solid alternatives are possible, even for the least knowledgeable of us.

Take a look at what this startup is trying to achieve: https://www.cozycloud.cc/ It gives everyone an easy to administrate server, you can assign your own domain name, self host it or have it hosted elsewhere. The server is a plat-form on which you have total control and ownership of your data and can install and develop apps that serves YOUR needs. It still young but with the support of talented people that could become BIG!

I recently had a drive die on me.

Everything was backed up. My passwords were safely stored. But it was going to take some time to get to them.

I did have my Google password, so I logged in. I was on a different computer, a different OS, a different network. I was asked to enter my Google Authenticator number, and then BAMM I got access to everything.

I realised just how scary the Google 'Save passwords' thing is.

I trust Google, and I know they have smart people working on security.

We've seen similar where someone having their Google account hacked lost access to everything.

This should be part of your back up / disaster planning. I guess there's a niche for a single page check-list of what people should be storing 'just in case'.

It would be nice if Google, when they threw you out, let you download a glob of your data. That would make the thing a lot less painful for most people.

> Google told me for the first time that it reserves the right to “terminate your account at any time, for any reason, with or without notice.”

No one reads the ToS / AUP, but this shows why it's a problem. It was not the first time Google told this guy; he was told in the legal documents that he agreed to when he signed up.

Yes, Douglas Adams had it right.

> "But Mr Dent, the plans have been available in the local planning office for the last nine months."

> "Oh yes, well as soon as I heard I went straight round to see them, yesterday afternoon. You hadn't exactly gone out of your way to call attention to them, had you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything."

> "But the plans were on display ..."

> "On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them."

> "That's the display department."

> "With a flashlight."

> "Ah, well the lights had probably gone."

> "So had the stairs."

> "But look, you found the notice didn't you?"

> "Yes," said Arthur, "yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'."