User Name
Password
AppleNova Forums » Third-Party Products »

Has google forgotten its "do no evil" creed?


Register Members List Calendar Search FAQ Posting Guidelines
Has google forgotten its "do no evil" creed?
Thread Tools
cosus
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: El Rio de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles
Send a message via ICQ to cosus Send a message via AIM to cosus Send a message via MSN to cosus Send a message via Yahoo to cosus Send a message via Skype™ to cosus 
2009-11-10, 01:23

Google has yet created a product that has produced a revenue stream beyond search. Their current strategy reminds me of Cisco, purchasing companies inorder to increase revenue, however nothing they have yet purchased, drone writely to grandcentral to that software encryption software has increased anything other than their Internet presence. Organically they haven't produced much other than orkut or Gmail and neither are champions of industry. Yahoo remains to have the most visited site and most active e-mail base. Other than gears and android, they haven't produced a viable product. the books project they implemented, while sound at first glance is very anti competitive. Even yahoo at this point is creating an open source distributed system. Now with their purchase of the mobile ad service we finally see why Android was produced. Really though, a company as large as google producing products with no forseable revenue sounds anti-competive.

I'm just wondering if at this point google is more of obstacle to innovation with everything being "free". Garmin and TomTom stocks plummeted on google's new navigation. Google did make a generation where "free" actually means free, but with such cutthoat prices, how can anyone compete?

Microsoft forced the browser to be free and look where that led. A temporary end to all competition. I just at times can see google going the same direction. Though, zoho office has a much superior UI to google docs, but they don't intend to be entirely "free".

Retired 8 years ahead of schedule.
  quote
cosus
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2007
Location: El Rio de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles
Send a message via ICQ to cosus Send a message via AIM to cosus Send a message via MSN to cosus Send a message via Yahoo to cosus Send a message via Skype™ to cosus 
2009-11-10, 01:26

BTW for a company that has given so much away for free, they just hit another 52 week high today on the stock market.
  quote
Chinney
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Ottawa, ON
 
2009-11-10, 06:08

Is your complaint one of predatory pricing: i.e., pricing below cost to eliminate competition, allowing the company to eventually charge more for services that only it offers (i.e. monopoly)? I had not thought of that negative aspect of the 'free' model - and I think that it is less likely to actually take place in the constantly-shifting free-for-all (in all senses) that is the Internet - but Google might just be trying to head in that direction.

When there's an eel in the lake that's as long as a snake that's a moray.
  quote
Wrao
Yarp
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Road Warrior
 
2009-11-10, 10:52

For the last year or so I have felt as though we are all waiting for the other boot to drop with Google. But, if you asked me why I felt that, I would not really have much of an answer. It's just sort of a bad feeling I get when I consider just how much raw presence Google has in our lives. In addition to that, when I consider how Google managed to make so much money, primarily through figuring out a way to tap into virtually every penny of Advertising, and then you put that alongside the fact that the amount of advertising on the web seems to be increasing, both in sheer volume, and in annoyance. It all kind of worries me. But, lacking any real concrete evidence to believe that Google has(or will) start to lose their 'way' and progressively become 'teh suck'... well, could just be baseless paranoia.
  quote
Robo
Formerly Roboman, still
awesome
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Portland, OR
 
2009-11-10, 23:00

Has google forgotten it's

Gah!

That said, Google only has as much of a presence as you let it, and there's alternatives to virtually all of Google's products, if you're worried about Google. I'm really not, though. There's stuff I don't like about them (they're engineer-dominated rather than design-driven, and it sort of shows) but I don't worry about Google's presence in my life or anything. Maybe if they start, like, being evil, I'll worry about it. But so far they've been okay (though I still prefer Mobile Me).

and i guess i've known it all along / the truth is, you have to be soft to be strong
  quote
709
¡Damned!
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Purgatory
 
2009-11-10, 23:16

Quote:
Originally Posted by Roboman View Post
There's stuff I don't like about them (they're engineer-dominated rather than design-driven, and it sort of shows).
I kind of like them for this. They're like the odd, nerdy cousin that made it big in Silicon Valley. One great idea and whammo. They're getting their aggressive on nowadays, sure, but it's all shit everyone else is like "Whaa? WTF are they doing that for?" Meanwhile the nerdy dude in glasses is smirking and getting 10,000hr whores to suck ...um, kind of lost track there for a second.

Actually, I think the Droid is a perfect example of how Google is now. Awesome on the inside, fucking butt-ugly on the outside. Do they need a corporate makeover? No. Their quirky style has held them so far, and I expect that to last another 12-18 months*. Does Verizon need an Android phone that lives up to the hype? Yes. If Dragon doesn't do it then they're fucked, imo.


*late '10 to mid '11 is when I expect a full Google makeover.

So it goes.
  quote
JohnnyTheA
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
 
2009-11-10, 23:36

I think Google knows they can coast for a few years (while their stock goes up) without having any short-term, overnight, new profit sources. I kind of like that this one company is in the inviable position to play around with all kinds of odd ideas, business models, and experiments. If this were any other company there would be huge pressure to produce right away. The investors buying Google (I'm not one but I maybe I should be) are looking long range. If only there were more companies like this.

As for "evil", I know they have been doing biz with the PRC and other evil places but I think overall they have been a positive force for geeks like me and others. Imagine an internet with them!

JTA
  quote
ast3r3x
25 chars of wasted space.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Send a message via AIM to ast3r3x  
2009-11-11, 07:26

You seem to be mad google is trying to get as big of a presence as possible to make money off of their core business model of showing small blocks of unpronounced text.

In the mean time you are mad at them for giving you free products to up their revenue. I think you're out of line getting angry at them for finding a symbiotic relationship with everyone.

That said, look back over your post at all the things they've given us, and then add on a lot more to that, just off the top of my head I'd say google docs, GWT, and the knowledge for hadoop are all pretty great things.
  quote
ast3r3x
25 chars of wasted space.
 
Join Date: May 2004
Send a message via AIM to ast3r3x  
2009-11-11, 07:27

Quote:
Originally Posted by 709 View Post
They're getting their aggressive on nowadays, sure, but it's all shit everyone else is like "Whaa? WTF are they doing that for?" Meanwhile the nerdy dude in glasses is smirking and getting 10,000hr whores to suck ...um, kind of lost track there for a second,
As disturbing as it is funny
  quote
Elysium
Environmental Bloodhound
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Land of ice and snow
Send a message via AIM to Elysium  
2009-11-11, 16:35

Quote:
Originally Posted by Roboman View Post
Has google forgotten it's

Gah!
GAH!

Never use an apostrophe with possessive pronouns: his, hers, its, theirs, ours, yours, whose. They already show possession so they do not require an apostrophe.



  quote
chucker
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: near Bremen, Germany
Send a message via ICQ to chucker Send a message via AIM to chucker Send a message via MSN to chucker Send a message via Yahoo to chucker Send a message via Skype™ to chucker 
2009-11-11, 16:45

Quote:
Originally Posted by Elysium View Post
GAH!

Never use an apostrophe with possessive pronouns: his, hers, its, theirs, ours, yours, whose. They already show possession so they do not require an apostrophe.



Um. I think that was Robo's point.
  quote
Robo
Formerly Roboman, still
awesome
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Portland, OR
 
2009-11-11, 16:54

Chucker speaks the truth; the thread title has since been edited.

Either that or I was seeing things...

That said, from just the four words I wrote there really wasn't an error yet -- I could have finished "Has Google forgotten it's supposed to do no evil?" and then "it's" would be a contraction. That'd be a bit wordy, but grammatically acceptable. So the error was understood only in relation to the thread title, which is now...different. But I digress.

I lurves teh Google. Gimme moar. Gimme moar Google.

and i guess i've known it all along / the truth is, you have to be soft to be strong
  quote
joveblue
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Melbourne
 
2009-11-11, 17:45

Google Docs was an external innovation (Writely), but since being acquired it's been given a lot of attention (and new apps added - spreadsheet and presentations). Indeed, often the aim of a lot of tech start-ups is to be acquired as they don't really have a good business model. So it's good that there's someone around to take on these projects and continue their development and, at some point, find a business model to support them. Google usually also integrate it with some of their own technologies. Even with a business model, a lot of these things would really struggle without access to Google's immense customer-base.

A couple of internal innovations that come to mind have been Gmail, Google Maps, Google Wave, Chrome... *scratches chin*
  quote
chucker
 
Join Date: May 2004
Location: near Bremen, Germany
Send a message via ICQ to chucker Send a message via AIM to chucker Send a message via MSN to chucker Send a message via Yahoo to chucker Send a message via Skype™ to chucker 
2009-11-11, 17:54

Quote:
Originally Posted by joveblue View Post
Google Docs was an external innovation (Writely), but since being acquired it's been given a lot of attention (and new apps added - spreadsheet and presentations).
Google Spreadsheets originates from XL2Web, another third-party acquisition. Not sure if the presentation app is entirely their own.

Either way, making it all fit together as a homogenous-feeling product is plenty of work, too.
  quote
ronmexico
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Dec 2005
 
2009-11-11, 22:29

Google is to NBC, CBS, Fox (free but advertisement driven) as Everyone else is to HBO, Showtime, Starz. It seems to me that NBC, CBS, Fox makes more money...
  quote
joveblue
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Melbourne
 
2010-01-13, 01:54

I'll post this here as it's kinda related...

4 years on from the (kinda controversial) launch of Google.cn (Google China) Google have announced on their blog a "new approach to China"... Here's the crux of the post if you can't be bothered reading it all

Quote:
Originally Posted by David Drummond, SVP, Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer
In mid-December, we detected a highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China that resulted in the theft of intellectual property from Google.

...

Second, we have evidence to suggest that a primary goal of the attackers was accessing the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists.

...

We launched Google.cn in January 2006 in the belief that the benefits of increased access to information for people in China and a more open Internet outweighed our discomfort in agreeing to censor some results.

...

These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered--combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web--have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China. We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.
Very interesting.
  quote
Robo
Formerly Roboman, still
awesome
 
Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Portland, OR
 
2010-01-13, 02:18

Wait, there's a guy named David Drummond that works at Google? There's a book designer named David Drummond. He's sort of a superstar for last year's Small Crimes in an Age of Abundance. He designed the cover for my old Composition professor's latest book, which sort of impressed me. Not the book, that he got Drummond to do the cover for it. Well, I shouldn't say that the book didn't impress me, because I didn't read it...but it's about being a veteran and stuff...not exactly my cup of tea...but I digress.

Uh, yeah, that Google stuff is interesting. (No, really, it is. Really.)

and i guess i've known it all along / the truth is, you have to be soft to be strong
  quote
bassplayinMacFiend
Banging the Bottom End
 
Join Date: Jun 2004
 
2010-01-13, 11:16

Hope Google doesn't get involved in a shareholder lawsuit and that other companies will come around as well.
  quote
ezkcdude
Veteran Member
 
Join Date: Jan 2005
 
2010-01-14, 08:42

Quote:
Originally Posted by cosus View Post
Really though, a company as large as google producing products with no forseable revenue sounds anti-competive.
It seems to me the business model of Google is very similar to the major tv networks. Programming is free and paid for by advertising. Doesn't seem all that evil or innovative to me. But it *works* for the internet, as it did for television in the early years.
  quote
Posting Rules Navigation
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Post Reply

Forum Jump
Thread Tools
Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Google secretly reveals new browser project: Google Chrome Brad General Discussion 62 2008-10-28 15:16
My server seems to have forgotten it's users and groups. turtle Genius Bar 16 2008-05-31 12:09
How evil are you?? Foj AppleOutsider 89 2007-03-13 01:28
Tivo To Go for the Mac Forgotten pixelpusher Speculation and Rumors 6 2006-11-07 12:00
Hard Drive question...have I forgotten anything? lumpy Purchasing Advice 3 2005-09-28 02:26


« Previous Thread | Next Thread »

All times are GMT -5. The time now is 11:12.


Powered by vBulletin®
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright ©2004 - 2024, AppleNova