I believe Google also bans non-Google file sharing tools like Dropbox or OneDrive from employee’s computers too.
Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
341–350 of 450 posts
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#342Earlier quoted context omitted.
I great worry that China's intelligence service has the zoom traffic of American's routed to the Chinese zoom servers, so they can intercept.
Every native app made by a Chinese company could also provide a backdoor to the PLA. Same could be said about apps from other countries and the NSA, FSB, GCHQ, Mossad, ASD, whatever the Germans are calling the gentler, kinder, totally-not-spying-on-everyone-anymore-we-swear successor to the Stasi, etc. There is no specific evidence for this, but it is a possibility. Balancing remote possibilities and accepting some t…
the gentler, kinder, totally-not-spying-on-everyone-anymore-we-swear successor to the Stasi, etc
I like it! I'd totally give that TV series a try!
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#343Earlier quoted context omitted.
> It has way more features than google docs and is standard everywhere I work for another FAANG and we don’t use MS Word. It certainly isn’t “standard” for us. It’s not standard for two of the three FAANG companies, so “everywhere” is inaccurate. Being popular isn’t the same thing as standard. Pages is a far more usable for the vast majority of use cases. Most people aren’t creating extremely complicated word process…
This isn't about the merits of excel over sheets, it's about employees coming on the board and lying to promote their company. Google makes 1.61 million in revenue per employee. Honestly it's only going to get worse, because if you see the videos of the company meetings, Sundar was always the super loyalist that would say anything to protect Google or run interference for senior leadership. And now that he's CEO they…
I may work for Google but I am often critical of them. I have no reason to lie in this instance, and anyone you talk to who works for Google will corroborate what I'm saying. Not everything is a conspiracy.
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#344Earlier quoted context omitted.
I only ever use Zoom on Linux (Ubuntu), and it works just fine every time. My experience with Google Meet matches yours with Zoom.
I concur. I haven't tried Zoom on any other platform yet, but it has been 100% reliable on my Ubuntu machine. Nothing else even comes close. I've had hundreds of Zoom calls over the past 8 months, from 1:1s to all-hands with ~500 participants. Audio, cameras, screen sharing all worked every single time.
Same experience with Fedora on Wayland. Zoom is solid: audio, video, screen sharing. True for very large calls too.
Nothing else comes close on Linux for me.
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#345Earlier quoted context omitted.
The browser version of Zoom seems to require a free account be created, and it was audio only in Chromium, I could not get it to use my camera. Zoom refused to work in Firefox. Jitsi and Google Meet seem to work in both browsers, without requiring me to log in.
You can join Zoom meetings on your browser without creating an account. It's a bit off the beaten path: 1. Go to zoom.com 2. Click "Join a meeting" 3. Enter meeting id and click Join 4. Ignore the automatic app download 5. Go back 6. Click "Join a meeting" again 7. Enter meeting id and click Join again 8. Ignore the app download again 9. Click at "If nothing prompts, click here" 10. Click "Join from your browser" 11.…
This is only true if "your browser" is Chrome. If you try in the latest Firefox or Safari it tells you to try a "modern browser".
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#346(disclaimer: I work at El Goog) A number of companies have rightfully banned Zoom's native apps, given how insecure they are. I had previously uninstalled it when the news about the secret web server they install came out. Google is still allowing use of the web app, but the web app bizarrely doesn't support Grid/Gallery View, which is the main reason my friends/family wanted to use it. Hangouts Meet was optimized fo…
We switched from google hangouts to zoom a while ago because the quality "felt" better. We are a small distributed team where our internet connections run the range of fast to slow. We didn't track numbers or anything, but fewer dropouts, frozen videos, better sound quality, etc. Maybe we all just had better internet days each time we used zoom though. Never know. The UI is initially confusing, but so is the UI for e…
Zoom is better at quality.
To give an example, they prioritize audio over anything else. Which makes sense because if you can't understand what the person is saying, you can't have a meeting. So they automatically downgrade or upgrade your video to try to keep latency decent on audio. Meet just has a manual setting where you can up or downgrade video or audio.
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#347Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your reasoning is based on the belief that Google is sacrificing productivity by not giving all employees office. GP is directly contradicting that line of thought, which makes the rest of it fall apart.
there is two narratives, which do you think is more likely: 1. Google is dogfooding it's own products to improve them and make them competitive and stop potential data/privacy/security leaks by using external software. 2. Google is trying to save 20 bucks There is nothing wrong with Google docs or sheets and I have used them both. But sooner or later you make enough documents or work with enough spreadsheets you're g…
Why should it be an either/or thing? Both are valid reasons for Google to prefer its employees use Docs. However the fact that you can choose to use MS Office without any special permissions somewhat undermines your reasoning in point 1.
Google may be a rich company but it's also a very frugal company in many ways, particularly wrt technology (they pioneered the "huge amounts of redundant cheap hardware" approach to DC construction, for example). When Googlers were being coaxed into switching to Docs from MS Office, the financial benefits were front and centre to that pitch.
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#348Earlier quoted context omitted.
The threat model for a school is kids/others disrupting sessions and creepers using access to gawp at (or communicate with kids). Since the Chinese government is unlikely to feel the need to compel Zoom to do that, the fact that they have all the keys centrally stored is not a problem. Google's threat model actually does include state level attack (And specifically by China) to steal IP or access confidential user da…
I great worry that China's intelligence service has the zoom traffic of American's routed to the Chinese zoom servers, so they can intercept.
I'm not sure why you worry about that. It's guaranteed they have it and use it. You should worry about "is it a problem for me that the Chinese government and Chinese companies have access to my video meeting streams"
If yes: do not use Zoom right now. If no: do what you want.
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#349Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your reasoning is based on the belief that Google is sacrificing productivity by not giving all employees office. GP is directly contradicting that line of thought, which makes the rest of it fall apart.
there is two narratives, which do you think is more likely: 1. Google is dogfooding it's own products to improve them and make them competitive and stop potential data/privacy/security leaks by using external software. 2. Google is trying to save 20 bucks There is nothing wrong with Google docs or sheets and I have used them both. But sooner or later you make enough documents or work with enough spreadsheets you're g…
Those two things aren't mutually exclusive.
1. Yes, Google probably prefers for people to use its own products both for usability and security reasons.
2. Google also wants to save money. However, if someone wants a license for a Microsoft product, they can get one.
Re: Google bans Zoom from employees' computers
#350Earlier quoted context omitted.
Every native app made by a Chinese company could also provide a backdoor to the PLA. Same could be said about apps from other countries and the NSA, FSB, GCHQ, Mossad, ASD, whatever the Germans are calling the gentler, kinder, totally-not-spying-on-everyone-anymore-we-swear successor to the Stasi, etc. There is no specific evidence for this, but it is a possibility. Balancing remote possibilities and accepting some t…
the gentler, kinder, totally-not-spying-on-everyone-anymore-we-swear successor to the Stasi, etc I like it! I'd totally give that TV series a try!
That'd be the BND as an FYI