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Giving up on Google

robsheldon.com

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Re: Giving up on Google

#81
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The text gets chopped for Chrome/OSX.

Argh. I will fix this. Sorry. edit: fixed.

On quick look it looks like this problem:

http://developer.expressionz.in/blogs/2009/07/27/user-agent-...

  > Basically ,  It looked like  Google Chrome ignored my CSS Resets
  > ( margin:0px).  It actually was  caused by the user agent
  > stylesheet (-webkit-padding-start:40px).  So the solution
  > was to reset this style by setting padding:0 the misbehaving
  > elements .
  > A  good way to prevent this problem from happening to any
  > element is use a global CSS Rest as follows
  > 
  > *{ margin:0; padding:0; }

Re: Giving up on Google

#82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the big deal there is yeah, Gmail works but it doesn't $50 a year work.

Personally, I wish someone I like, like Colin Percival, would start an email service. I like the way he runs Tarsnap.

The problem with starting an e-mail service is the crazy level of administration and sysadmin headaches it induces merely to be able to reliably send e-mail to 90%+ of endpoints.. let alone anything else.

The engineering problem is a pretty interesting one, but the headache of ensuring your users can actually get their mail someplace makes it seem dull or insurmountable to solo developers.

Re: Giving up on Google

#83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FYI, search history is one of the parts of the account you have to put your password in again to view. So it should be safe from prying eyes.

Prying eyes on your side of the connection you mean.

https://www.google.com/

Re: Giving up on Google

#84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prying eyes on your side of the connection you mean.

http s ://www.google.com/

Which terminates on the other side where everything is plaintext again. https is a transport level protocol, so it protects you from people (trivially) snooping on your data in transit but anybody at google with enough clearance has access to that data.

Re: Giving up on Google

#85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http s ://www.google.com/

Which terminates on the other side where everything is plaintext again. https is a transport level protocol, so it protects you from people (trivially) snooping on your data in transit but anybody at google with enough clearance has access to that data.

If that's what you are worried about then it seems like you'd have trouble using the internet in general.

Re: Giving up on Google

#86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which terminates on the other side where everything is plaintext again. https is a transport level protocol, so it protects you from people (trivially) snooping on your data in transit but anybody at google with enough clearance has access to that data.

If that's what you are worried about then it seems like you'd have trouble using the internet in general.

I'm not worried, it's just that the gggp of this comment mentioned that search history is protected by a password and so it 'should be safe from prying eyes.'

All I did was point out that that data is stored on a server somewhere else and that there are lots of eyes that could be prying there.

I'm sure that there are plenty of people that are concerned about their internet use being monitored, for instance, dissidents and other people that have legitimate reasons to be afraid of having their search history lifted in the future.

Interesting reading on the subject of subpoenas of search records:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5165854

The less information that is being held on you by third parties the less chance that one day you'll be part of some drag-net operation.

Re: Giving up on Google

#87

I don't understand the Gmail complaint at all . Sure it has its weaknesses such as the policy to not spend the resources stemming emails causing search to suck, but Gmail pretty much defined the usable webmail interface for power users. The interface on my webmail software feels like a mail client should -- easy navigation, threaded conversations, multiple window panes, and it's fast. Google on the other hand took ye…

A lot has changed since 2004. Yahoo for example has 3 pane viewing, tabbed email and chat, you can scroll through and see every email in your Inbox ever received without having to click any links.

It feels pretty much like a desktop application, actually...

Re: Giving up on Google

#88
My biggest peeve about Google is how subpar their search is outside of Web & GMail. YouTube is the one that burns me the most. I often have to go to web search and append youtube at the end of my query to find the relevant result. The same exact search on YouTube gets me nothing relevant. The same is true of Android Market. A simple misplaced space, typo or misspelling breaks your search. It's like time warping back to web search circa 1996. I've never understood why Google doesn't apply all their knowledge about search to these other services.

Re: Giving up on Google

#89
I can't recall ever being seriously annoyed at google search until instant search. There have been times when I've been disappointed with the results. I've shared many of the experiences he mentions in the article.

Instant search has not saved me any time and a couple times it has gotten in my way.

Re: Giving up on Google

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Lately, I've found myself feeling like search is back in 1999 again. You're spoiled then.

"It could be worse" is always a valid rebuttal to any complaint. But it doesn't actually move the conversation forward at all.

But I didn't mean "It could be worse", I meant google search is actually amazing and I find what I'm looking for 99% of the time.
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