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"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely". This Buzz stunt should haunt Google forever as we clearly can't trust them on "do no evil". This is a

by amix 17y ago

"Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely". This Buzz stunt should haunt Google forever as we clearly can't trust them on "do no evil". This is a at least the sentiment I still have from this Buzz privacy scandal.

anatoly 17y ago
The unofficial Google motto is "Don't be evil", not "Do no evil". It's a subtle, yet important, difference.
- dkersten 17y ago
  The other subtle, yet important, difference is that its an unofficial motto. Everyone assumes its Googles official stance on everything, yet they never said that[1], so really, they can be as evil as they want without going against anything they've ever stated. Quite clever of them, really, to make everyone assume that this is their official motto, when they can later turn around and say,w ith a straight face, no, we never claimed that. [1] Please correct me if I'm wrong. I searched but found no evidence saying otherwise. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_be_evil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_be_evil doesn't really say that its their motto either, but does certainly suggest that Google has been riding the Don't be Evil publicity.
  - anatoly 17y ago
    Think about it. What would be the hypothetical benefit? Being able to say "Hi, yes, we're being evil, but it's OK because we never officially promised otherwise"? Do you think such a statement heralds a clear PR win for any company? Disclaimer: I work at Google. My opinions are my own.
    - dkersten 17y ago
      Of course I don't think they'll do that, but if they've already messed up PR for some reason, due to being evil, at least they can brush it off (at least a little) on having never claimed that they weren't going to be evil. If it comes to that, they're probably already screwed, but at least they have a counter argument against the you promised you wouldn't be evil crowd.
- amix 17y ago
  Buchheit, the creator of Gmail, said he "wanted something that, once you put it in there, would be hard to take out," adding that the slogan was "also a bit of a jab at a lot of the other companies, especially our competitors, who at the time, in our opinion, were kind of exploiting the users to some extent." from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dont_be_evil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dont_be_evil Exploiting users privacy in order to build a social network is evil - - and saying "I'm sorry" and fixing the issue when you have exploited millions of users does not make Google's Buzz act less evil. An analogy could be to spam millions of people to build a social network - - and then you say "I'm sorry, we won't spam any longer, see we fixed it". Is this acceptable? I say no. They should be accountable for their actions and be punished like spammers get punished.
  - rpdillon 17y ago
    Listen, when they rolled out Buzz, it showed a giant splash screen and asked if you want to try it or not. I have a screenshot of this screen. There were two links at the bottom that either allowed you to try it out, or to not use it and go to GMail. If individuals are hung up about privacy, they don't have to join. If they do join, I have a whole set of screenshots I took before the revamp on Thursday showing all the ways they could configure Buzz before it was activated. If users actually bothered to read, Google's plan would have worked well. Unfortunately, people who say they're hung up on privacy can't be bothered to read how to protect it when they join a new social network, yet, have plenty of time to blog about it to complain afterwards. Irony, that.
calcnerd256 17y ago
Hanlon's razor

by amix 17y ago

anatoly 17y ago

The unofficial Google motto is "Don't be evil", not "Do no evil". It's a subtle, yet important, difference.

dkersten 17y ago
The other subtle, yet important, difference is that its an unofficial motto. Everyone assumes its Googles official stance on everything, yet they never said that[1], so really, they can be as evil as they want without going against anything they've ever stated. Quite clever of them, really, to make everyone assume that this is their official motto, when they can later turn around and say,w ith a straight face, no, we never claimed that. [1] Please correct me if I'm wrong. I searched but found no evidence saying otherwise. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_be_evil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don%27t_be_evil doesn't really say that its their motto either, but does certainly suggest that Google has been riding the Don't be Evil publicity.
- anatoly 17y ago
  Think about it. What would be the hypothetical benefit? Being able to say "Hi, yes, we're being evil, but it's OK because we never officially promised otherwise"? Do you think such a statement heralds a clear PR win for any company? Disclaimer: I work at Google. My opinions are my own.
  - dkersten 17y ago
    Of course I don't think they'll do that, but if they've already messed up PR for some reason, due to being evil, at least they can brush it off (at least a little) on having never claimed that they weren't going to be evil. If it comes to that, they're probably already screwed, but at least they have a counter argument against the you promised you wouldn't be evil crowd.
amix 17y ago
Buchheit, the creator of Gmail, said he "wanted something that, once you put it in there, would be hard to take out," adding that the slogan was "also a bit of a jab at a lot of the other companies, especially our competitors, who at the time, in our opinion, were kind of exploiting the users to some extent." from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dont_be_evil http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dont_be_evil Exploiting users privacy in order to build a social network is evil - - and saying "I'm sorry" and fixing the issue when you have exploited millions of users does not make Google's Buzz act less evil. An analogy could be to spam millions of people to build a social network - - and then you say "I'm sorry, we won't spam any longer, see we fixed it". Is this acceptable? I say no. They should be accountable for their actions and be punished like spammers get punished.
- rpdillon 17y ago
  Listen, when they rolled out Buzz, it showed a giant splash screen and asked if you want to try it or not. I have a screenshot of this screen. There were two links at the bottom that either allowed you to try it out, or to not use it and go to GMail. If individuals are hung up about privacy, they don't have to join. If they do join, I have a whole set of screenshots I took before the revamp on Thursday showing all the ways they could configure Buzz before it was activated. If users actually bothered to read, Google's plan would have worked well. Unfortunately, people who say they're hung up on privacy can't be bothered to read how to protect it when they join a new social network, yet, have plenty of time to blog about it to complain afterwards. Irony, that.

calcnerd256 17y ago

Hanlon's razor