Tim O'Reilly: Really, Google is evil now? Let's Get Real. How About Apple?

Honestly, it's in the media's best interest for fanboys on each side to be at war with each other, not anyone else's. If you like an Android phone, use Android, if you prefer an iPhone, use an iPhone. It doesn't need to be a point of contention.

Both companies have made mistakes, but we needn't go "Oh, you think Google is evil? Well, let me tell you about Apple". The truth is, it's hard to not be "evil" and have the insane amount of revenue's that these companies both share. Of course, this all depends on how you interpret "evil".

Steve Jobs famously said: "We have to let go of this notion that for Apple to win, Microsoft has to lose. We have to embrace a notion that for Apple to win, Apple has to do a really good job".

Yet when he (reluctantly) took the time to write about the recent Foxconn issues[2], he tried to deflect blame from Apple because they're simply an easy target considering they're "now arguably the most successful company on the planet." No furious anger, no outrage, just a simple "uh well shit happens, its unfortunate."

What kind of hypocrisy must exist inside someone's head to be capable of writing both of those articles? What's worse is that nearly every article MG's written this past week or so has been about just how amazingly-super-awesome it is that Apple made so much money. Apparently it's all great to be the most "successful company on the planet", but heaven forbid anyone dare look at how those profits are earned in a critical light.

But but but Mom, Samsung is doing it too!! No one is going to change their manufacturing practices as long as a company like Apple is reaping in some of the largest profits in recorded history using Foxconn style labor as a foundation.

[1]: http://parislemon.com/post/15604811641/why-i-hate-android

[2]: http://parislemon.com/post/16561630035/this-is-why-we-cant-h...

http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/smokey.html http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/ricardo.htm

Key quote: "At best, forcing developing countries to adhere to our labor standards would create a privileged labor aristocracy, leaving the poor majority no better off. And it might not even do that. [...] A policy of good jobs in principle, but no jobs in practice, might assuage our consciences, but it is no favor to its alleged beneficiaries."

Is he wrong? (Please don't downvote me just because you disagree with Krugman.)

I think that concentrating on Google, Apple, or any of these other big Western companies is getting off on the wrong foot. It makes us feel all self-righteous to do it, but doesn't actually get to the root of the problem. Ultimately, those countries which host cheap labor and allow its exploitation are responsible for offering it. Perhaps not the true in small, powerless countries which can get pushed around by large corporations, but China certainly doesn't fall into that category.

If we want things to change, I think we either need to turn our eye to the Chinese government for not enacting stricter controls, or simply declare that these problems are an inevitable result of poverty and industrialization, and that the only ways out are to either return everybody to agrarian lifestyles (which is in many ways worse than working in an evil factory) or allowing these poor conditions to produce economic growth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn#Major_customers

FoxConn has almost 1 million employees, and they aren't all working on Apple products. If we're going to call out companies, shouldn't we be calling out them all?

These arguments based on dichotomous binary are pointless. Nothing is as simple as "good" an "evil".

Nor is Apple to blame on their own for the China conditions. No more than Google is by benefiting from it.

It makes good headlines. That's it.

I think that sums it up quite nicely. There are (potentially) broken expectations with Google, which isn't really the case with Apple.

"And right now, customers care more about a new iPhone than working conditions in China."

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/26/business/ieconomy-apples-i...

The myopic lens of online discourse is currently focused on Apple, presumably because it got the This American Life treatment, and because it is the most successful company of our time – but there isn't a single business out there that doesn't have something to answer for.

I swear, nearly had tears in my eyes. I'm not proud anymore to be part of this machine (we build iphone/mac apps).

We are fighting SOPA, anyone who care enough to fight this fight.

Any idea of what we can do?

And don't just blow off people's concerns about data mishandling. "We haven't done anything bad yet, so people shouldn't be worried." Go ahead and whistle past the graveyard, Tim.

The question that we really need to ask about Apple is : Is Apple worse than Samsung in treating its laborers? I dont know. But my best guess is that its the opposite.

Google on the other hand is being given a hardtime lately because of the title Don't be evil that they enjoyed for a long time. That is not helping them to compete with Apple or Facebook. Now Page is taking a hard look at the company and transforming it to really compete with the frontrunners. To do that effectively they cannot send flowers to the war. And now when they pick up their weapons, they are being criticized for it.

As much as I love Tim, I don't think he thinks critically of Google as much as he does about Apple. He might have liked all they did in the past, but the new Google is not going to play the savior of the world. They are going to bring in their guns to the war, there is going to be blood spilled all over the field, and if they have to win, Google will be responsible for the blood as much as Facebook or Apple.

p.s: Tim is one of my few idols.

I might as well just say that Google is evil because they pay very little tax, and Apple is awesome because they give Americans good development jobs. Both facts are true about both company, but why let a little thing like reality stop you from ignoring that to serve your point?

The consumer electronics manufacturing and assembly business is ugly. No one company is better or worse unless they actually demonstrate that. Apple at the very least offers their reports. Where are the reports from all the assemblers that also use Foxconn, including ones involved in some high profile suicide related cases like Microsoft?

Oh right, Apple is the big boys so let's throw rocks at them. I get why the guy in the TAL segment focused on Apple. We can all agree they are an attention grabber and delving into "Well, Microsoft does it too" is totally missing the point in that instance.

However, if Googlers are going to start casting stones like they are sinless because they just deal in data and collecting data is A-OK, I'm afraid I'm going to have to point out what a load of crap that is.

In the end, I went Tim's route and went with a company that treats its workers better - but it was a very hard decision and I was struck by the similarities between my purchase and the localvoire trend.

About the factories of Apple's suppliers: I think the way towards better health and safety conditions for workers in developing countries is via local laws and rights. You can't rely on some corporation to police this.

The problem is if a government is known to be a bunch of thugs with guns whose children are the super rich owners of the country, can you rely on that government to play its part? What if that's not the case? Do you leave the country and maybe cause more poverty? I'm not sure.

For all I know, data is mostly used to sell other services for cash, except a little more effectively.

And blaming Apple for working condititions during manufacturing is missing the forest for the trees. The whole model of short-lived consumer electronics is absolutely terrible, starting with where materials come from, ending one some landfill where children burn valuable metals out of the remains. I think we could change much more if we would absolutely oppose the notion that it is normal to throw away cellphones after two, and computers after three years.

Oh my god, they're COLLECTING the information that I give to them, in order to organize it and make it universally accessible and useful?!

And they're giving me options to disable collecting my information, if I don't want them to?!

And if I do choose to let Google collect my information, they're giving me tools to audit the information they have on me?!

OUTRAGE!

Google should figure out a way to organize the world‘s information and make it universally accessible and useful, without first COLLECTING that information!!!

How long have they had this mission statement, anyway? Is it like a week old, or something?

"Foxconn clients include American, European and Japanese companies. Notable products which the company manufactures include the Amazon Kindle, iPad,[5] iPhone,[6] PlayStation 3, Wii and Xbox 360." - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn

No good deed goes unpunished I say <sigh>. Google, a company which has been more transparent than most other companies I care to remember (and I've worked for a lot of shitty big companies). A company which gives away more open source than most other companies. A company which hires people based on "Googley" culture, which includes, a culture of employees who actually desire to be open and to act against abusing consumers and often confront management if they try to do so. A company which has stood up for the internet and protested SOPA. (A company I'm proud to work for.)

After all that, people still keep putting up batshit crazy conspiracy theories about what Google plans to do ("dominate the world" and other crazy shit in comments). Did you ever think that maybe, just maybe, Google management, although in the business of generating a return for shareholders, is not in the business of maximizing shareholder returns at the cost of everything else, including abusing their customers, users, and employees? If Google's sole interest was to bend over for profits and shareholders (to go evil because that's what Wall Street demands), they could have cut costs a long time ago to boost EPS, or sold your data to direct marketers.

Or maybe, that tens of thousands of employees, trained into a progressive culture of openness and transparency, won't just sit idly by while some kind of uber conspiracy theory using your data takes place? Even if Larry and Sergey were false prophets, preaching sermons every week at TGIF about Googley-ness, but secretly practicing evil, they still have created an expectation in their employees of being well behaved, and that doesn't fade fast.

Google's been running lots of free services that cost a hell of a lot of money to develop, maintain, and host, from search, to email, to maps, street video, youtube, etc. Not to mention hundreds of open source projects, including big ones like Android and Chrome which are staffed by very large teams. None of this costs anything for the end user, except the ability to model your preferences and target advertising. For Developers, besides open source, Google runs lots of developer conventions, and hands out free hardware costing millions like candy. When you go to Apple developer events, how much does it cost, and how much free stuff do you get?

You may think that is a bad bargain, so then, don't use free web services. But there is nothing inherently evil about modeling users via their behavior. A perfect search engine would know enough about you from your behavior, to predict what your question really meant out of a set of possible ambiguous ones, and that requires a historical relationship with the person asking the question.

Google's privacy policy changes really is about simplifying the legalese as well as having single-sign on for its services, and combining data to allow all of them to better serve the user. We don't want to be like Yahoo, with 500 different properties, none of them integrated very well. We want our stuff to work together more seamlessly. After all, if you are trying to organize the world's information, that means aggregation.

You may cynically think this is bullshit, but us poor naive, deluded, employees actually believe that is what we're working on. So somewhere along the line, we will have to learn the evil truth that we're actually been building a weapon for world domination.

I guess it would be like working on nuclear energy and being told enriching uranium was only for peaceful purposes, and not for bombs. I suppose it's possible.

But do try to remember, this company has a reasonably flat management structure, that it has tens of thousands of people who care a lot about doing the right think because it is part of company culture.

That counts for something, at least, a check and balance.

Sorry, I'm gonna need to see some proof before I believe that version. Everything I've read points to Wintek management (who have a long history of reported labor abuses) cutting corners left and right to make more profit.

I wonder how Tim feels about iBooks? Perhaps what's really upsetting is the thought that book publishers will become obsolete?

it does make me think that this story really needs more mainstream press.

Google is high-fructose corn syrup, Apple is McDonald's.

As a foreign-owned corporation Microsoft, Amazon, Dell, HP, Sony, Samsung, HTC, Motorola, Apple do not have the authority, leverage or government support to change something that is so fundamental to China's culture and politics. This is the responsibility of Foxconn and the Chinese Government.

Are we forgetting something? This is China we're talking about. Foreigners do not have any say in this.

Google appears to really believe that people are going to sit around like sheep and let them rape every aspect of their online lives, and I can guarantee you this is not how it will play out. This is not the future I want. And Google will one day find out the hard way how wrong they are about their vision.