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Why Google makes the perfect ISP

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Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#51

Post by pwny »

briandear wrote: post #43
pwny wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, but no other ISP is any better (at least that I know of) and THEY certainly don't offer gigabyte unlimited internet for 70$ a month. Google being the lesser of all evils here, we can only hope that they will drive the market into a much better state and that if their priorities ever stop aligning with ours, something better will have emerged (just as Fiber is emerging to change the status quo now).

The problem is when google starts to target advertising based on your entire online life. For example, currently, google can't really see what you're unloading to dropbox or iCloud or emails you receive (outside of Gmail.) But if they're the ISP, they can start to target advertising based on the documents you upload or files you upload. The information they could collect would be mind-blowing. And you just know that…

I accept your premise but respectfully reject your conclusion. However, my stance might have a lot to do with the way I personally use the internet.

There's a few points here that I make sure I follow:

1. Whatever activity I have online is something that I don't care about others finding out about (similar to not uploading pictures to Facebook that I wouldn't want seen). This is the front page check: anything you wouldn't want on the newspaper cover, you don't do.

2. For things that I DON'T want known, I consider using anonymity tools such as TOR (I've never needed this thus far).

3. For sensitive data, I just don't store it on the internet. If I ABSOLUTELY need to do so, I use client side encryption, such as TrueCrypt. I would recommend doing that if you store sensitive or personal data in dropbox as your example suggests.

We also currently have nothing to suggest that Google will be monitoring the pipes (at least any more than any ISP), so one can assume that Google won't know about anything more than they do now.

Once you realize that most of the data you submit online is used, read and sold by the services you provide it to and accept that fact, you can start seeing your online identity as something precious you don't goof around with. For those reasons, I can't see Google getting any more intrusive in my life than it is now by controlling the pipe: they (or other corporations) already control most of the services I wilfully submit my data to.

At this point, I stop seeing those services (Google, Facebook, etc) as free and instead treat them with caution, while understanding that I pay them in data instead of money. And honestly, I'm kind of fine with this because I use them carefully.

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#52

Post by huggyface »

rickmb wrote: post #35

Google's core business is advertising. Google likes to do stuff with the data that passes through its systems. Google has explicitly and pro-actively taken sides in fight against copyright violations instead of remaining a neutral party. And they've been less than steadfast on Net Neutrality, which is a big red flag for a company that wants to be an ISP. This is not about Google being "evil", but I do not want a comp…

Google's core business is advertising

Google's core business is doing cool stuff with technology. While they often need to resort to advertising to monetize many of their cool products (see: search. What else could they do? The bar had already been set and a for-pay search vendor would be DOA), it does you no good to try to frame everything in the advertising picture.

Amazon's core business is selling books. It would be sophistry to argue that AWS is really a mechanism to try to get you to buy books.

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#53

Post by Achshar »

fear91 wrote: post #49
Achshar wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you used adwords? I have. And it is pretty transparent about almost everything that should be available to the advertiser. They certanly have the website base and actively moniter ads for inapprpiate content, increasing overall prosperity of the network. Although it could get them more money, they play for long term and keep the standard high. They need to make money like every other company.

Not really but a friend of mine was scammed out of $40k legit AdSense earnings. As for the quality of AdWords - I have not forgotten about the 500 million dollar fine Google received for pharmacy ads.

> Not really but a friend of mine was scammed out of $40k legit AdSense earnings.

Can you give more details? Are you/he suggesting Google scammed him? Any reason/evidence to believe so?

> As for the quality of AdWords - I have not forgotten about the 500 million dollar fine Google received for pharmacy ads.

Adwords is better when compared to competitors. This does not mean it is perfect. Automation can do only so much.

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#54

Post by jahmed »

ajross wrote: post #34
kodablah wrote: post #21

If I were a potential customer, my biggest fear would be customer service. There is a track record of no-human-contact service disabling; especially with "free" products. If Google shuts down an ad-sense account for perceived violation without good justification or interaction, how can I expect them not to do the same with my internet for an unjust DMCA complaint?

Indeed. There is much fear and uncertainty about Google's proposed service. You are right to doubt them.

Fear and uncertainty? The company that provides fairly clear blog posts, comments, changelogs and EOL guidance for its many of its products?

Goog has made a commitment for at least 7 years on this project which is great for a capital intensive project. This is a long term bet that has tons of potential for both the company and the ecosystem. Google has always been particularly good at building reference models that they are in many cases happy with everyone else copying. Look at Gmail, Chrome, Android, Maps and the features they helped create or popularize. Fiber is another example of what Google thinks is a good idea and one that they think you'll agree with.

In the end Google doesnt care who you get a gigabit connection from they just want everyone to have one. The KC network is just an example they want people to copy.

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#55

Post by ajross »

jahmed wrote: post #54
ajross wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. There is much fear and uncertainty about Google's proposed service. You are right to doubt them.

Fear and uncertainty? The company that provides fairly clear blog posts, comments, changelogs and EOL guidance for its many of its products? Goog has made a commitment for at least 7 years on this project which is great for a capital intensive project. This is a long term bet that has tons of potential for both the company and the ecosystem. Google has always been particularly good at building reference models that t…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fear,_uncertainty_and_doubt

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#56

Post by eavc »

ArbitraryLimits wrote: post #26

Let's take a poll: How many people here understand that Google is doing this because Internet connections are a complement of your personal data, which they would like to monetize, and not out of the goodness of their hearts?

Both Android and this move are as much motivated by defensive interests as anything else.

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#57

Post by magicalist »

briandear wrote: post #43
pwny wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course, but no other ISP is any better (at least that I know of) and THEY certainly don't offer gigabyte unlimited internet for 70$ a month. Google being the lesser of all evils here, we can only hope that they will drive the market into a much better state and that if their priorities ever stop aligning with ours, something better will have emerged (just as Fiber is emerging to change the status quo now).

The problem is when google starts to target advertising based on your entire online life. For example, currently, google can't really see what you're unloading to dropbox or iCloud or emails you receive (outside of Gmail.) But if they're the ISP, they can start to target advertising based on the documents you upload or files you upload. The information they could collect would be mind-blowing. And you just know that…

>For example, currently, google can't really see what you're unloading to dropbox or iCloud or emails you receive (outside of Gmail.) But if they're the ISP, they can start to target advertising based on the documents you upload or files you upload.

Note that the privacy policy says they don't (http://fiber.google.com/legal/privacy.html), that you have laws that protect you (like the Cable Communications Policy Act -- though not enough), and that both dropbox and icloud traffic (and hopefully messages from your email server) are sent over encrypted connections anyway.

I agree with you that internet connectivity should be considered a public utility by now, but your post has almost nothing to do with google and everything to do with connecting to the internet through any third party.

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#58

Post by InclinedPlane »

ajross wrote: post #36
InclinedPlane wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. It's the same as their chrome gambit. Releasing chrome kicked the IE development team into gear and lit a fire under firefox's ass. Today if I launch any of the 3 most popular browsers on this machine each of them will score 100/100 on the acid 3 test and render it smoothly and seamlessly. That certainly wasn't the case when chrome 1.0 was released a bit more than 3 years ago. Now the installed base of folks…

It's a total digression, but this brings a tear to my eye too. Kids today will never know the suffering that was endured by their predecessors.

Coincidentally, I just happened to stumble on this yesterday: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHb6M03Ft84

Computer Chronicles, Battle of the Browsers, 1997.

Re: Why Google makes the perfect ISP

#59

Post by pyoung »

yock wrote: post #22
hythloday wrote: post #20

Sorry for the weak pun, but I really couldn't help myself: I wish the title had been "Why Google is an acceptable ISP". Apropos of the article, I'm increasingly unconvinced that free markets work well enough when they're dealing with infrastructure--roads, train lines, phone lines--that have an expensive one-off set-up cost and then a larger cost of switching while the original provider attempts to recoup the set-up…

I'd probably argue that most private industry infrastructure efforts are decidedly not free markets. Given the politics involved in building out large utilities, governments tend to get heavily involved. Around the country this has resulted in some strange relationships between company and government, most involving some manner of limited monopoly in exchange for certain guarantees regarding types of service. Those a…

There are some good and bad reasons for this. For example, the deregulation of electric utilities in California in 1996 was an epic failure. Part of that was due to the design of the deregulation scheme, but a lot of is was attributed to the perverse incentives of the free market.
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