With Google, There Will Be Bad Blood
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I think MG Siegler is the John C. Dvorak of these modern times. I wish the TC authors would disclose any stock positions they have in any company mentioned in their posts.
In Germany, some days ago, came out that Microsoft paid for an Anti-Google article in a Newspaper. I can search for a link (in German) if somebody wants proof.
Blog entry about this: http://blog.die-linke.de/digitalelinke/anti-google-pr-in-der...
Follow up in a startup blog: http://netzwertig.com/2011/08/05/mangelnde-transparenz-uber-...
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BizSpark sponsors Hackers & Founders, and they've been great to work with, but their sponsorships just cover costs of events for Hackers & Founders.
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I am a believer in "If you don't pay for the product, you are the product", however. I'm not a fan of Facebook for many of the same reasons.
Startups and developers are creeped out by of Google.
Follow me:
What is Google's product? Really, If you were to sell Google, what would you say it's product is?
Think about it long and hard, and what you end up with (I believe) is the world's largest trove of personal data and information ever accumulated: email, voice prints, search data, location data, music preferences, sexual predilections, travel information, etc... And, they have an insatiable hunger to gather more data.
How do they make money off if it? Right now... selling ads based on the world's biggest recommender system.
Couple that with Google's strict NDA policy which prevents Googlers from being out and about in the community talking about what they are doing, and people really get creeped out.
Google's IP restrictions essentially prevent Googlers from working on a startup in their spare time, because it would compete with their employer, whose mission is to "organize the world's information". Which makes a deafening silence around the Googleplex when it comes to spinning off startups.
Finally, the current interpretation of Delaware corporate law states that a corporation must maximize shareholder value. In the next 20 years, Google is going to have to start extracting more value out of this massive database of personal information they are assembling. And, Google's secrecy and self-isolation erodes trust. No one has any clue or guarantee about what Google is going to do next. It's impossible to contact someone on the inside if the Google behemoth blindly steps on you. They have no customer service to speak of.
This is why people in the Valley are creeped out by Google.
> And, Google's secrecy and self-isolation erodes trust.
Many, if not most, tech companies are much more secretive than Google (Apple?). From the few times I've read Google's blogs, I thought they were quite transparent and open.
> the current interpretation of Delaware corporate law states that a corporation must maximize shareholder value.
That would make a great tagline for a dystopian Hollywood film. There is a good reason why Google takes good care of your data and won't sell it to evil governments or corporations: they would go out of business if they did so.
Your comment is more a criticism of NDAs, corporate secrecy and capitalism than Google itself.
Ummm.... I'm talking from the perspective of hosting the largest networking group of tech founders in Silicon Valley for the last 4 years. We've held meetups of 150+ people 4 miles away from the Googleplex every month for several years now.
How many Google engineers have I talked to at our meetups in the last 12 months? 2 or 3. I've also talked to a ton of other young startups around the Valley.
What I'm saying is based on that experience. I don't know where you're located, or what your experience is with Google aside from "the few times I've read Google's blogs". Your mileage of course may vary.
That would make a great tagline for a dystopian Hollywood film.
Perhaps. But, I'm also basing this on a number of conversations with quite expensive lawyers in and around Silicon Valley. The fact of the matter in US corporate law, is that C Corporations have to maximize shareholder value, and act in the best interests of their shareholders. When a corporation doesn't do that, the directors of that corporation open themselves to being sued for breach of fiduciary duty.
There is a good reason why Google takes good care of your data and won't sell it to evil governments or corporations: they would go out of business if they did so.
Or, they could quietly, privately maximize that data by looking up personal data on founders of startups that are being potentially acquired by Google. They'd be quite silly not to, actually.
They could certainly look up for a history of searches coming from a competitor's IP addresses to see what they are planning.
They could certainly look up a potential employee's search history, calendar history (to check for other scheduled interviews), email contents, GPS location data from their Android phones when they are screening job candidates.
I'm saying this from the perspective of having built an alpha of a search engine for financial news. And, I know that I was certainly interested in every single search that was referred from an IP address located in Manhattan. And if a lot of queries came in for a topic that I didn't have much data for in my index, I quickly went out and found sources of information to pad my index with.
It's not a criticism of corporate secrecy and capitalism. It's the essence of capitalism.
If Google doesn't use that data for it's own corporate advantage it's stupid. I've never heard of anyone call Google stupid. And, that's exactly what I would do if I had access to that kind of data. Couple that with some tight NDA's and no one would ever know.
Maybe they don't do some of the things you're saying because its illegal and in 13 years of business where their business relies on a public reputation.. it would do more damage to their business then the minor wins of spying on some startup that they can probably out compete anyways.
Not trying to be difficult, or troll.
What laws would this be breaking? The data they are gathering is proprietary and people have opted in to that data by using their services. Why shouldn't they use it to their financial benefit?
And in any case, there's huge PR exposure. And Google is ridiculously sensitive to bad PR.
I often get the sense the lawyers are running things, considering how often I've given up personally on ideas that involve data mining.
By the tone of this article, it would seem the author (MG Siegler) prefers instead that a monopoly exists in every sector of the market and that the companies are all buddy-buddy with one another.
Fuck everything about that.
It is mind boggling how the vestiges of religious zealotry make a big part of technology evangelism! You would think that the technically inclined will take at least a tad bit logical approach to it but no - it's equally worse or more than religious zealotry!
On the contrary Google is distributing an Open Source OS with well documented APIs (that RIM is using to run Android apps as-is), they aren't requiring any anti-competitive agreements/royalties from anyone to forbid them using alternative OS etc. They are betting on good-will and competence as far as I can see - that manufacturers can use it on its merits rather than being forced to do it. Of course in the process they are making money but it's win-win for everyone.
IE killed Netscape - that was anti competitive for some but having lived through Netscape 4.x I can assure you that Netscape's incompetence was also a big part of their failure.
You and others (given the down votes) may not agree with the narrative and don't want to hear it, but it is a probable argument that can be used to go after Google and stay any effort to allow them free use of other companies patents. The original DoJ's case against Microsoft attacking IE was rather out there given Microsoft's other behavior (i.e. no matter what OS you buy Microsoft still gets its fee).
// I think this is my last comment on any Google story. Companies can do cool stuff and still do uncool things, just like people. Every company tries to protect its revenue stream in whatever way it thinks up.
I agree that that monopolistic era was especially pernicious. It wasn't just that Microsoft controlled a huge share of the desktop market; it was that this made them a de facto gatekeeper with regard to technology before the Web. Also, there were a lot of startups that couldn't get fair acquisition prices because there was only one buyer. The only good thing that comes out of monopolies is R&D (e.g. Bell Labs)... but I'd rather see R&D propelled by employee demands for autonomy (when there's lots of competition for talent) than by executive largess within a monopoly. One of the most exciting things to come out of Microsoft's research department is F#, and that emerged after the monopoly era was over.
Apple and Google both make excellent products, with completely different approaches but an end result that's great for users. Competition is good for products and also good for employees within companies (competition for talent).
Could we end up back with hotmail again in 2 years time when this dust settles? Will our (popular, modern) phones cease to be quite so useful if the almighty Google falls? (mail/calendar/contact synching/chat)
I suppose I should be more concerned by my own reliance on an American for-profit company than on if they'll come out of all this unscathed...
Moving to other providers, after having invested so much time and effort (for better or worse) into the almighty GOOG would be a massive pain for me, a techy, let alone for those not so inclined. I can't imagine having to walk through the Yahoo! Mail interface with my mother, for example :)
Sure they revolutionized search, but I feel they glory for other peoples hard work.
And yes I've been around a long time and I remember the world before Google perfectly fine.
[Citation Needed]
There is no such thing is the world as a constant when it comes to human emotions, much less a conglomerate. Even the most darkest have at least a little light.
By reading through your history I can see where your bias lies.
EDIT: rephrasing of final line.
Back before Android was such a force he used to trash talk Microsoft constantly. Now that Android has overtaken iOS he's switched targets to Google.
He still works for them because he gets a ton of attention and page views for TC. But really he's just a troll, and while trolls get lots of attention that isn't necessarily a good thing...
http://www.cnbc.com/id/43017686/Facebook_Admits_Secret_PR_Mo...
For example Google Analytics. From Wikipedia;
> Another market share analysis claims that Google Analytics is used at around 49.95% of the top 1,000,000 websites (as currently ranked by Alexa)
Having used Google Analytics on a relatively high traffic site ( http://www.local.ch ), it has some serious shortcomings, such as limits on API usage and accuracy of the data or even basic technical support. We'd be more than willing to pay an "enterprise license" fee in the order of a few hundreds of thousands to address this but Google isn't interested, which is maddening. As such they squat on the analytics market, their free offering acting as a barrier to entry for innovative competition, while failing to innovate themselves. The strategy with Analytics seems to be that it should support the ad business and nothing more.
The Android Market is another example. The market dynamics are different, but again Androids primary purpose seems to be to supporting the ad business again. That seems to be reflected by Googles fumbling of the Android Market to the point where Amazon feels it's worth attempting.
Similar stories apply to many other of Googles products; Groups, Blogger, Picassa, Google Desktop and to an extent even Google Docs - the appearance of "we're already rich - why bother?".
As such, outside of it's core business Google is basically a "Market squatter", blocking entry to others while driving customers mad with incomplete offerings. Can't help feeling if they could solve this by getting serious about monetizing those side products.