People are getting more aware of what happens to their data - and concerned about it - and while a political solution will probably be cackhanded, the tech community can surely do better than giants slogging it out over soundbites.
But my problem with it is that it's keeping Google from offering the ability to encrypt e-mail and have "zero knowledge" policies for e-mail. This is why I think Google will be one of the last (if ever) to adopt such policies or offer such service. But I don't think Microsoft will do it any earlier either. So I really don't see Microsoft's services as "better" in any way, from this point of view.
If I'll ever move my e-mail, it will probably be to a company that does care about stuff like this and lives outside of US, not to Microsoft, which is just another side of the same coin. I want a whole new coin.
> "zero knowledge" policies for e-mail
Even if all incoming emails were encrypted prior to hitting Google's servers, the headers would still be visible (plus things like automated emails will probably never be encrypted).