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Comment by drstewart | Hacker News Reader

I hate these arguments. It doesn't matter what their overall revenue is, it only matters what the cost is relative to the product at hand and to the value of the thing they're paying for. Nobody is sitting there approving expenses relative to their overall revenue.

Would you pay $50 for a stick of gum? Why not? If you make hundreds of thousands of dollars, surely it shouldn't phase you?

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Personally, I don't care what's "efficient" and what will make Google the most money. What I care about is how they treat a) their users, and b) the planet.

Money is a means to an end. The fact that so much of our society treats it as their score in the game of life—something to be maximized at all costs as an end in itself—is a disease of the mind.

If Google (and, yes, literally every other major corporation) made more decisions based on what was better for their users (not just "their customers", because in certain aspects of their business that's advertisers, not regular users) and for the health of the planet, while simply making sure that they had a reasonably comfortable financial cushion, we would all be better off, and Google's executives and shareholders would barely notice the difference in their high scores.

I'd happily pay 10c a year for extended support on my phone that I don't want to replace.

That's a different and fair argument (and so would I as a Pixel 3 owner).

That's a different argument, but this one too works even if “the estimate were two orders of magnitude too small”. Even $10 a year is a bargain when the alternative is throwing the phone away.

For perspective, they could have asked each additional Pixel purchase $.50 from the starting price to support it for an additional 5 years. (also pixel 3 owner)

You're right, the relative expense to the revenue isn't a good argument when you're framing it in the light of efficient business practices.

On the other hand if you consider the real intention of illuminating Google's cashflow it's pretty damning. Do you pay some relative pittance to keep devices supported, adding value to customers, reducing waste, increasing convenience? 'Cause this is a moral argument, not a financial one, and if you're fleecing the public at large (in myriad ways) it's more a question of the lord giving alms to his subject than it is paying $50 for a piece of gum.

Should Lord Google be a beneficent ruler, or a shitpile?

If Google starts subsidizing their physical devices from their infinite money bin of advertising revenue, they'll run afoul of antitrust and anti dumping laws.

And this way, they risk running afoul false advertising and class action lawsuits. Its not mentioned anywhere that the phone becomes dangerous to use after 3 years.

Whaaa? Nope, not how that works.

You can't run afoul of antitrust laws without being a monopoly. It's why Apple can make it so safari is the only browser available on the Iphone whereas microsoft lost a bunch of money (particularly in the EU) for installing IE by default on everyone's computer.

Android phones are nowhere near antitrust territory, specifically from google. Before they'd run any risks they'd need to actually outsell someone like samsung or apple.

Just because you are rich and potentially a monopoly in one market, doesn't mean you are in all markets.

If Google is deemed a monopoly in search (or advertising, or Android app store, etc.), using that position or money to try and gain advantage in another market (in this case, phones) is problematic.

> 'Cause this is a moral argument, not a financial one, and if you're fleecing the public at large (in myriad ways) it's more a question of the lord giving alms to his subject than it is paying $50 for a piece of gum.

The argument still breaks down at bigger numbers. If you have 500 different ideas for ways the lord should spend a negligible 1% of his money, then even if you have a good argument that the lord should do something, that's not enough by itself to show that any particular idea meets the bar.

If Google charges Apple-level prices, surely it's reasonable for customers to expect Apple-level support.

If Apple-level support was a decisive factor for Android customers either they wouldn't be buying Android phones, or Google would have offered it long ago.

It seems reasonable for Google to offer that level of support, certainly. But anyone expecting it isn't paying attention to Google's record.

For somebody that uses Linux privately and professionally, Apple support was one of the major reasons I switched from Android to iOS based devices. Just until recently I had iPhone 6s (I keep my devices until they break or go out of support).

Apple used to look expensive to me, but if I divide initial cost per number of year of device exploitation, it actually gets cheaper then Android devices.

1 million dollars for million of users sticking around for 2 extra years on Google services is EXTREMELY cheap all things considered.

Problem is those millions will still be using Google Services, just on a new phone paid by themselves.

Not necessarily. Every time you force a user to abandon their current product you risk them looking over the wall at your competitors. In the U.S. at least, iPhones are really attractive, and I say this as an Android user. When my Pixel 3a is EOL'ed in May 2022, I think I may take the plunge and finally switch. If I do that, Google immediately loses my valuable telemetry, they lose my usage of Chrome mobile, and they risk my switching to iCloud - something I can't use on my Android phone.

Google's operating income is like $50B. A more proportionate question would be whether I was willing to pay $10 for a reusable shopping bag since it's marginally better for the environment compared to a free plastic bag—and the answer is yes, absolutely, it wouldn't even be a question.

Google has a profit of ~20 billion dollars per quarter. That is, it has a profit of ~80 billion dollars per year.

There's only so much you can do with money. Their yearly profit (once again, not revenue, profit) is larger than the entire state budget revenue of more than 150 countries (not combined) [1].

So yes. The argument is very valid.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_governmen...

>Would you pay $50 for a stick of gum?

There are people who do.

https://wakkinews.com/2018/12/18/worlds-most-expensive-chewi...

    The gums were repackaged and auctioned off to fans who would do anything to have something already used by Britney Spears, including an already been chewed, sticky bubble gum. The gums were sold for between $50 to $100.

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