Most people don’t understand how QR code works. So right now it may just send a SMS or prepare for it. But some day, it will do the remote attestation under the hood and the end user does not see the difference. I would bet a lot for this preparation.
Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
241–250 of 549 posts
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#242People complain a lot about Gmail, but honestly I kind of understand Google's plight here. They've essentially gotten roped into maintaining a huge chunk of internet infrastructure, for free . If they ever shut it down the whole world would end up rioting because it's so widely used. But it's expensive, complicated and time-consuming to maintain - and both a source of and recipient of endless waves of spam and scams.…
>They've essentially gotten roped into maintaining a huge chunk of internet infrastructure, for free.
Not for free. Being monopoly is a huge reward. It isn't possible today to have a small email provider. While probably not having that intention from the start, Gmail played a huge role here as its existence allowed everybody to just ignore/block small providers.
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#243Recently helped a small business set up a Google Workspace account and we hit a wall during registration. Told the owners that if Google is already being difficult during signup, imagine being locked out later with client work on the line. Pulled up a few horror stories about Google lockouts to drive the point home. They ended up with another workspace solution.
This is useful. What were the horror stories?
Which workspace solution did the client settle on?
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#244Earlier quoted context omitted.
Lack of accountability for the companies that allow their services & platforms to be used for spam/scamming. Take DocuSign for instance. Still, this many years later, is a major source of phishing emails from their free trials. DocuSign could easily shut this down today by either requiring a CC for the trial, or forcing a call with a sales rep to start a trial. But they don't, they continue to allow their service to…
I feel like there's no way for them to win, though. The kind of accountability you're talking about what require them to do essentially tons of KYC/AML vetting, and HN would be equally outraged about that.
It's a little hard to get outraged about that hypothetical, given that legitimate usage of DocuSign typically involves sending them documents containing all sorts of sensitive information.
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#245Earlier quoted context omitted.
Google Workspaces are just like Windows 11 on the network, and constantly running Windows update. You never know what changes, installed/uninstalled, or breaks.
I feel like I must be using a different gogole workspace. I've used it every day for the last 10 years and just don't seem to have these issues? Stuff just seems to work for the most part? It's all way more stable and low-admin than any other desktop software I've used at least!
Are you a home user or corporate? Do you maintain a deployment for multiple users?
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#246People complain a lot about Gmail, but honestly I kind of understand Google's plight here. They've essentially gotten roped into maintaining a huge chunk of internet infrastructure, for free . If they ever shut it down the whole world would end up rioting because it's so widely used. But it's expensive, complicated and time-consuming to maintain - and both a source of and recipient of endless waves of spam and scams.…
> They've essentially gotten roped into maintaining a huge chunk of internet infrastructure, for free. I’ll stop you here. Google offered it for free and, at the time, offered such an high amount of mail storage for free it sounded insane. At the time, my ISP gave me a 25MB or 50MB inbox and that was considered pretty decent, when Google was trying to get people in with 1-2GB. They absolutely have a right to take ant…
I remember in the early days you could watch your storage quota go up in real time.
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#247Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am not sure the backslash would be big if Gmail said that a year from now you would have to pay $9.99 per month to use your Gmail ($12.99 ad-free). I mean people would complain, but would that actually give a backslash? Especially if they made it easy for people to move their account elsewhere? People are used to paying a lot more for things outside of tech. I suspect what is really holding them back is the loss of…
> I am not sure the backslash would be big if Gmail said that a year from now you would have to pay $9.99 per month I think approximately 95% of all Gmail users would leave. Regular people are accustomed to paying nothing for things like email. And if I have to pay for email, I am not paying Google for it, especially not twice the cost of Fastmail.
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Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#248Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do you have any idea of how much they can datamine from an email service? Just making a special parser for amazon emails can give google a realtime insight on the ecommerce space.
For a while Amazon stopped giving detail about the purchased items in their emails, to prevent Google from doing exactly that. A year or two ago they returned to full detail. I've always wondered if it was customer pressure or a backroom deal with Amazon was reached. I kind of doubt that Google would cave to the former, right?
i wonder how AMZN hasn't started its own mail yet.
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#249People complain a lot about Gmail, but honestly I kind of understand Google's plight here. They've essentially gotten roped into maintaining a huge chunk of internet infrastructure, for free . If they ever shut it down the whole world would end up rioting because it's so widely used. But it's expensive, complicated and time-consuming to maintain - and both a source of and recipient of endless waves of spam and scams.…
>> They've essentially gotten roped into maintaining a huge chunk of internet infrastructure, for free
They CHOSE to offer it for free so they could monopolise the market. They got roped into absolutely nothing.
Re: Gmail registration now requires scanning a QR code and sending a text message
#250Earlier quoted context omitted.
Apparently it’s just an SMS URI. It’s not something specific to a phone. It’s just a convenient method to enter your phone number.
To enter their phone number because you sent an SMS to them. So if there are any costs for sending this SMS it’s on you.
> So if there are any costs for sending this SMS it’s on you.
It's a $0/month e-mail service.
If the price of entry is a single text message, I think that's fair.