I understand why this is a good aquisition, but still 3.2B...
The valuation was 'only' 2B. That escaleted a lot!
Google to Acquire Nest
341–350 of 590 posts
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#342Earlier quoted context omitted.
Please educate yourself on choice paralysis and its implications, learn about the fundamental reasons (cognitive capacity, cognitive bias, etc) and only then worry about our wonderful, adapting, intelligent species.
I know you're trying to be helpful, but "please educate yourself" is almost never a constructive or helpful phrase. We can do better than that here.
Yeah, honestly, I wasn't entirely constructive and that was wrong.
I was irritated by your "...we are now a species that can't even figure out what to eat for ourselves...". It is certainly only my interpretation, but your comment wasn't unlike CNN headline blowing out of proportion another piece of trite consumer business.
Btw, no "we" (as in HN community) can't do better than that, as evidenced by multiples of such posts and comments.
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#343Earlier quoted context omitted.
Here are just a few examples: - Keyhole (now Google Maps) - Android Inc. - Motorola Mobility - GrandCentral (now Google Voice) - NeXT - Siri In general, an acquired company initially became successful by bringing value to consumers. When that company is acquired, it gets more resources to bring more value to customers.
Google Voice is effectively a dead product, isn't it? Doesn't seem that favorable to me.
I use it every single day. I wouldn't call it dead.
We'll see if Google tries to wholly replace it with hangouts. I wouldn't be mad unless it were missing features.
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#344Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does that mean you place no value on aesthetics or industrial design of a beautiful device? Don't get me wrong, I agree that it's overpriced, but I do at least place some value on a well-made device.
I'd pay a few dollars more, maybe . At the end of the day as long as it isn't garishly awful I don't particularly care. For example, this one does everything I need and costs 10% of a nest: http://amzn.com/B002RL9BIM It actually has a backlight which is a step up from what I have today. It's just not important to me. Definitely not $250 important. I could definitely use a smarter thermostat, but my vision of the futu…
Wow. That is ugly.
Imagine you just, like me, bought your dream house. In the den you installed new hardware floors and custom builtin bookshelves, that you built yourself in a few hundred hours, using a gorgeous hardwood and a stain you picked after testing more than a dozen shades.
Which thermostat goes on the wall, about 15 inches from the bookselves. That POS or a Nest?
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#345I'm happy for Nest but sad for myself, given the smoke detector was my Christmas gift last year. Previously I would look to YouTube as an acquisition done right. But after the kerfuffle around G+ integration, I no longer feel that way. If I have to sign in with my G+ account to manage my smoke alarm, it's going directly into the rubbish bin. If Apple had bought Nest, on the other hand, I'd feel very differently.
You don't want your G+ friends automatically notified when you burn dinner? Or will it be targeted ads for delivery pizza?
If you decide to go out to eat, your self-driving car will take you to TacoBell. Only TacoBell.
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#346Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly. I don't care if the government knows when I'm home (they can already figure that out), but imagine if Google's database of Nest info got leaked. Burglars could look at the database and say "Oh hey, look, no one's home right now."
Do you really think burglars could not get their hands on leaked government agency database? This is just another excuse to throw feces at Google, and HN commenters just don't miss any possible opportunity to do that.
strawman and goalposts. PP said google's database, not government databases.
google data breach in last 30 days: http://money.cnn.com/2013/12/04/technology/security/password...
inside job at home security company in last year: http://www.wbng.com/news/state/198129651.html
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#347Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'd still look at YouTube as an acquisition done right. How long has it taken for Google to introduce something that you don't love re: YouTube? At this point, all Google decisions related to YouTube have to be considered independent of the acquisition.
Well content ID is one thing that was unneeded and harmful. Also this video is not available in your country. So not that long. Circa 2007 maybe?
I was mainly referring to the commenter who said the G+ issues being his first problem with the YouTube acquisition. If that was your first major issue, I'd call the acquisition a success. Also, how much of content ID was YouTube covering it's bases legally with the DCMA? I guess, are there easier ways they could have been compliant while being less irritating to users like yourself? I honestly don't know.
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#348Earlier quoted context omitted.
? Only if you're incapable of telling the difference between commas and periods, I suppose.
It isn't factually dishonest, because it is an accurate number, and anyone can make sense of it. I say it is intellectually dishonest because it reads to me as a clear attempt to make the number appear more impressive. Borrowing from Wikipedia, "intellectual honesty": Facts are presented in an unbiased manner, and not twisted to give misleading impressions It would still be accurate to say it was a $3,200,000,000.000…
Maybe he thinks "3.2bn" is less impressive than the actual number, and is just righting a wrong. That would be a reasonable thing to believe.
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#349Earlier quoted context omitted.
I could get the same benefit from a device for $30 of electronics, and however many hours of my free-time I decide to put into such a project. Which would be a lot more than $250 lost, and not a trade I'd be willing to make considering I value my free time with the family a lot more than that. For me this whole thing misses the point though. Saving money is a sort of minimum expectation. The thing that Nest delivers…
Uh, good for you? That is not the value proposition, that is trivial information about your personal life. I don't know why you felt it necessary to try to duplicate a manufactured device by hand, but that is most certainly not the value proposition. The value proposition is that $200 and letting Google extract value from your life by way of energy prices will somehow pay for the fractional energy saved when the devi…
I didn't duplicate anything. That was my rationale behind not doing what you suggested.
Honestly, I'm having a lot of trouble following what you're trying to say.
Now you're talking about unauthorized data use and Google manipulating energy prices? I guess?
Re: Google to Acquire Nest
#350Earlier quoted context omitted.
Helen of Troy which owns Kaz, which owns Honeywell (one of the largest businesses specific to Nest's thermostat space) has a market cap of $1.7bil - http://finance.yahoo.com/echarts?s=HELE - that's why this sounds crazy. On the flip side, P&G is a $217bil business - so, not that crazy how big the market is and can be. EDIT: As larrys points out, Honeywell is a $70bil biz.
Sounded odd to me so I checked it out. HoT only appears to have the rights to certain Honeywell products and not the thermostats: http://www.kaz.com/kaz/honeywell/ Edit: "Honeywell" that you are referring to has a market cap of almost 70 billion: http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=hon&ql=1
Touche! Good point.