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Good. To quote an old friend who worked for Google: "I'm worried that if the rest of America knew what we were actually doing here they would literally come he

Good. To quote an old friend who worked for Google: "I'm worried that if the rest of America knew what we were actually doing here they would literally come here and kill us..."

infinity0 7y ago
Can you elaborate? I left Google years ago but it wasn't that bad.
daenz 7y ago
Suddenly, any regret from not pursuing a Google interview is gone...
- fizwhiz 7y ago
  Will you consider interviewing should the case ultimately turn out in Google's favor?
  - PenguinCoder 7y ago
    At least in my opinion, no. Many reasons but the underlying ones that make me not want to interview with or work for, Google are the same as for Microsoft. I can't trust them. I can already hear the argument, 'who can you trust'. That's subjective depending on your criteria. For me, I won't work for a company I do not trust to keep their promises, be it to the community or its employees.
mav3rick 7y ago
There are many many people who do good work at Google. Quote a random to suit your pitch forks. No name, no context , no source.
oldjokes 7y ago
I wonder how severe the backlash is going to be, not just for Google but all the tech giants. Our anti-trust laws were mostly written around monopolies abusing pricing power to rip off consumers, but with the intersection of data and hosting and analytics and everything else the potential to abuse people is far greater than just raising prices. And they have expanded their ability to profile and experiment on individuals worldwide, regardless of whether you create a Google account. It's just getting scary at this point.
devoply 7y ago
If he or she worked for Google why did they not bother exposing them when he got out. They could do it anonymously through a media outlet in the UK like the Guardian. I mean I would guess it's pretty much yeah we have everything you have ever typed into Android, almost every site you have visited, a detailed dossier of your porn habits, all your Google Home conversations... All your e-mails. List of your friends. Your driving habits. And we've been pretty much trying to kill all our competition pretending like there are bugs in our software when often it's been intentional... oh and we've been sharing everything with the government so it's been looking the other way.
- d1zzy 7y ago
  That is not a likely scenario. There are so many ways through which purposeful anti-competitive behavior masked as accident would get exposed for what it is that it wouldn't work in practice (just look at how many internal posts got leaked around Demore).
asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago
As a Googler, that's a sentiment I have never heard expressed, nor have I felt anything even remotely like it myself. My guess would be that most people would feel a lot better about the company if they could see how the sausage gets made. At least, judging by the reactions of my family members when they ask me concerned questions and I explain how things work, that's what would happen. That being said, it will be interesting to see what comes out of this investigation. I'm curious to know what practices they are going to zero in on. No company should be immune to the law.
- sockpuppet999 7y ago
  It's not how the sausage is made that matters. The sausage is making ppl sick. I have no doubt you in your siloed Dev team know very little about what exactly is happening with your final products. We outside of your bubble are growing tired of your superiors growth at ANY cost company policies. Take heed bro. Time is getting kind of short. The surveillance economy is gonna bust. I'm gonna help break it- Any way I can. I'm not the only one thinking Along these lines
  - dang 7y ago
    Please don't post like this here.
    - acct1771 7y ago
      Can you be more clear about the specifics? I don't like the general tone, but agree with the sentiment, and it seems tough to share without addressing the user personally, but was that it?
    - sockpuppet999 7y ago
      I'm sorry if I offended you Daniel. I offer my sincere apologies as I've seen the good work you do here and know your job is not easy. That being said I'd also like to add that these parasite corporations who keep pushing the envelope in regards to maximizing profits due to tracking thier users 24 hours a day It just needs to stop I'm sorry if I touched nerve but this needs to be said. I'm not going to say millions of ppl are worried about this. I will say that I'm old enough to have followed Google from thier early days( And yes I made a bundle on thier stocks in the 2ktens) It's a whole new world now. Google is behaving like a parasite by hoovering up every single data point that they can,and yes it's legal and within thier ToS to do this - it's bad. It's probably evil. We could go on and on About it( how they destroy every single thing they touchit-And yes you can call me a hippocrate for using a Gmail Address and I accept your criticism( it's not my only one. Daniel if you have to shut me down again because I've pinched another nerve,so be it-
gerash 7y ago
I have never heard anyone working at Google say that. I'm not sure what your old friend was up to though.
vore 7y ago
While I'm all for increased scrutiny of tech companies that have such a large presence in the public sphere, the current administration has been off-and-on pretty hostile towards Google for reasons rather unrelated to antitrust. Given the DoJ's actions in the AT&T/Time Warner merger, it wouldn't be a stretch to suspect a politically motivated ploy here. Do the ends justify the means? Maybe. Is this causing an unfortunate precedent to be set? Maybe, too.
bilbo0s 7y ago
This could actually turn out to be terrible for we the consumers. It's unlikely that Google would be found to be a monopoly. So we can forget about that. But the anti-competitive nature of their business practices could be targeted successfully I think. (Keep in mind, "I think" means jack in court. The government could very well be laughed out of court. But I think Google does still have some questionable practices.) Google made some superficial changes around 2013-14 time frame, but I don't know if that would be enough for them to get out of hot water. But the thing we should be concerned with is how the government goes about solving this anti-competitive issue. A breakup is not in the cards since Google is not a monopoly. So the fact that the justice dept has jurisdiction here does not bode well for us. It likely means any remedies will be within the parameters of the current regulatory regime. But what we as consumers really need is a new regulatory regime. What do I mean by that? Well, like the Microsoft case, they may "solve" this whole issue of anti-competitive practices by simply obliging google to allow everyone access to their 'OS', so to speak. But in this case the 'OS' would effectively be their data. Which is our data. Which would be very bad news for us. All of a sudden, hundreds of companies, all with guaranteed access to our data. Basically, imagine the privacy equivalent of a 9mm round being turned into a shotgun blast for everyone not fortunate enough to be born an EU citizen. (GDPR) What we really need is a GDPR, not really sanctions against Google. But DOJ can only give us sanctions. I'm starting to believe that somewhere deep in the bowels of the government, there is an extreme aversion to any potential action that might lead to making commerce based privacy infractions illegal.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
tanilama 7y ago
Sounds too self-obsessed, and that claim suits any big corporation without context.
jeffk_teh_haxor 7y ago
That happened.
summerlight 7y ago
Interesting. I work for Google as well and I have a somehow opposite opinion here. Working here means you gotta fight through extremely complicated, thorough (and sometime bureaucratic) privacy, security and legal reviews by daily basis. Those teams have a real power to block any launches they don't like; Google give them the power not because of good-will but it's more about decreasing a risk of significant revenue impacting consequences. You got a fancy design which may give you a big revenue boost at the cost of compromising user privacy or legal risks? Good luck with upcoming privacy and/or legal review sessions; they don't care about your product since they have no motivation to do that. I'm not trying to convince you and HN users to trust Google (which seems to be impossible anyway), but at least for more than 5 years there has been a strong incentive structure for not doing something that might make "the rest of America would literally come to Google and kill them". I think this investigation would enhance this structure even further, which might be a good thing since there's still room to improve especially for keeping high level executives in check.
- atomical 7y ago
  Is this sort of compliance testing needed in countries with authoritarian leaders?
  - summerlight 7y ago
    It's mostly about western world regulations, especially those from EU.
- Fins 7y ago
  Where were those teams when whatever the predecessor to G+ was called was launched and started sharing with your abusive ex's, people you had orders of protection taken etc. etc.? I am sure they do review things quite carefully to avoid something too obviously illegal. But anything more than that? Color me skeptical.
- blub 7y ago
  "You got a fancy design which may give you a big revenue boost at the cost of compromising user privacy or legal risks? Good luck with upcoming privacy and/or legal review sessions; they don't care about your product since they have no motivation to do that." From the outside, it's doubtful that this team exists at all. Or if they do, they must watch YouTube all day instead of doing their jobs, because Google is getting better and better at compromising privacy, thanks to fancy designs/dark patterns: https://www.forbrukerradet.no/undersokelse/2018/every-step-you-take/ https://www.forbrukerradet.no/undersokelse/2018/every-step-y... It looks to me like you have no clue what your own company's doing but hurry nevertheless to defend them.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

Good. To quote an old friend who worked for Google: "I'm worried that if the rest of America knew what we were actually doing here they would literally come here and kill us..."

infinity0 7y ago

Can you elaborate? I left Google years ago but it wasn't that bad.

daenz 7y ago

Suddenly, any regret from not pursuing a Google interview is gone...

fizwhiz 7y ago
Will you consider interviewing should the case ultimately turn out in Google's favor?
- PenguinCoder 7y ago
  At least in my opinion, no. Many reasons but the underlying ones that make me not want to interview with or work for, Google are the same as for Microsoft. I can't trust them. I can already hear the argument, 'who can you trust'. That's subjective depending on your criteria. For me, I won't work for a company I do not trust to keep their promises, be it to the community or its employees.

mav3rick 7y ago

There are many many people who do good work at Google. Quote a random to suit your pitch forks. No name, no context , no source.

oldjokes 7y ago

I wonder how severe the backlash is going to be, not just for Google but all the tech giants. Our anti-trust laws were mostly written around monopolies abusing pricing power to rip off consumers, but with the intersection of data and hosting and analytics and everything else the potential to abuse people is far greater than just raising prices. And they have expanded their ability to profile and experiment on individuals worldwide, regardless of whether you create a Google account. It's just getting scary at this point.

devoply 7y ago

If he or she worked for Google why did they not bother exposing them when he got out. They could do it anonymously through a media outlet in the UK like the Guardian. I mean I would guess it's pretty much yeah we have everything you have ever typed into Android, almost every site you have visited, a detailed dossier of your porn habits, all your Google Home conversations... All your e-mails. List of your friends. Your driving habits. And we've been pretty much trying to kill all our competition pretending like there are bugs in our software when often it's been intentional... oh and we've been sharing everything with the government so it's been looking the other way.

d1zzy 7y ago
That is not a likely scenario. There are so many ways through which purposeful anti-competitive behavior masked as accident would get exposed for what it is that it wouldn't work in practice (just look at how many internal posts got leaked around Demore).

asdfasgasdgasdg 7y ago

As a Googler, that's a sentiment I have never heard expressed, nor have I felt anything even remotely like it myself. My guess would be that most people would feel a lot better about the company if they could see how the sausage gets made. At least, judging by the reactions of my family members when they ask me concerned questions and I explain how things work, that's what would happen. That being said, it will be interesting to see what comes out of this investigation. I'm curious to know what practices they are going to zero in on. No company should be immune to the law.

sockpuppet999 7y ago
It's not how the sausage is made that matters. The sausage is making ppl sick. I have no doubt you in your siloed Dev team know very little about what exactly is happening with your final products. We outside of your bubble are growing tired of your superiors growth at ANY cost company policies. Take heed bro. Time is getting kind of short. The surveillance economy is gonna bust. I'm gonna help break it- Any way I can. I'm not the only one thinking Along these lines
- dang 7y ago
  Please don't post like this here.
  - acct1771 7y ago
    Can you be more clear about the specifics? I don't like the general tone, but agree with the sentiment, and it seems tough to share without addressing the user personally, but was that it?
  - sockpuppet999 7y ago
    I'm sorry if I offended you Daniel. I offer my sincere apologies as I've seen the good work you do here and know your job is not easy. That being said I'd also like to add that these parasite corporations who keep pushing the envelope in regards to maximizing profits due to tracking thier users 24 hours a day It just needs to stop I'm sorry if I touched nerve but this needs to be said. I'm not going to say millions of ppl are worried about this. I will say that I'm old enough to have followed Google from thier early days( And yes I made a bundle on thier stocks in the 2ktens) It's a whole new world now. Google is behaving like a parasite by hoovering up every single data point that they can,and yes it's legal and within thier ToS to do this - it's bad. It's probably evil. We could go on and on About it( how they destroy every single thing they touchit-And yes you can call me a hippocrate for using a Gmail Address and I accept your criticism( it's not my only one. Daniel if you have to shut me down again because I've pinched another nerve,so be it-

gerash 7y ago

I have never heard anyone working at Google say that. I'm not sure what your old friend was up to though.

vore 7y ago

While I'm all for increased scrutiny of tech companies that have such a large presence in the public sphere, the current administration has been off-and-on pretty hostile towards Google for reasons rather unrelated to antitrust. Given the DoJ's actions in the AT&T/Time Warner merger, it wouldn't be a stretch to suspect a politically motivated ploy here. Do the ends justify the means? Maybe. Is this causing an unfortunate precedent to be set? Maybe, too.

bilbo0s 7y ago

This could actually turn out to be terrible for we the consumers. It's unlikely that Google would be found to be a monopoly. So we can forget about that. But the anti-competitive nature of their business practices could be targeted successfully I think. (Keep in mind, "I think" means jack in court. The government could very well be laughed out of court. But I think Google does still have some questionable practices.) Google made some superficial changes around 2013-14 time frame, but I don't know if that would be enough for them to get out of hot water. But the thing we should be concerned with is how the government goes about solving this anti-competitive issue. A breakup is not in the cards since Google is not a monopoly. So the fact that the justice dept has jurisdiction here does not bode well for us. It likely means any remedies will be within the parameters of the current regulatory regime. But what we as consumers really need is a new regulatory regime. What do I mean by that? Well, like the Microsoft case, they may "solve" this whole issue of anti-competitive practices by simply obliging google to allow everyone access to their 'OS', so to speak. But in this case the 'OS' would effectively be their data. Which is our data. Which would be very bad news for us. All of a sudden, hundreds of companies, all with guaranteed access to our data. Basically, imagine the privacy equivalent of a 9mm round being turned into a shotgun blast for everyone not fortunate enough to be born an EU citizen. (GDPR) What we really need is a GDPR, not really sanctions against Google. But DOJ can only give us sanctions. I'm starting to believe that somewhere deep in the bowels of the government, there is an extreme aversion to any potential action that might lead to making commerce based privacy infractions illegal.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

tanilama 7y ago

Sounds too self-obsessed, and that claim suits any big corporation without context.

jeffk_teh_haxor 7y ago

That happened.

summerlight 7y ago

Interesting. I work for Google as well and I have a somehow opposite opinion here. Working here means you gotta fight through extremely complicated, thorough (and sometime bureaucratic) privacy, security and legal reviews by daily basis. Those teams have a real power to block any launches they don't like; Google give them the power not because of good-will but it's more about decreasing a risk of significant revenue impacting consequences. You got a fancy design which may give you a big revenue boost at the cost of compromising user privacy or legal risks? Good luck with upcoming privacy and/or legal review sessions; they don't care about your product since they have no motivation to do that. I'm not trying to convince you and HN users to trust Google (which seems to be impossible anyway), but at least for more than 5 years there has been a strong incentive structure for not doing something that might make "the rest of America would literally come to Google and kill them". I think this investigation would enhance this structure even further, which might be a good thing since there's still room to improve especially for keeping high level executives in check.

atomical 7y ago
Is this sort of compliance testing needed in countries with authoritarian leaders?
- summerlight 7y ago
  It's mostly about western world regulations, especially those from EU.
Fins 7y ago
Where were those teams when whatever the predecessor to G+ was called was launched and started sharing with your abusive ex's, people you had orders of protection taken etc. etc.? I am sure they do review things quite carefully to avoid something too obviously illegal. But anything more than that? Color me skeptical.
blub 7y ago
"You got a fancy design which may give you a big revenue boost at the cost of compromising user privacy or legal risks? Good luck with upcoming privacy and/or legal review sessions; they don't care about your product since they have no motivation to do that." From the outside, it's doubtful that this team exists at all. Or if they do, they must watch YouTube all day instead of doing their jobs, because Google is getting better and better at compromising privacy, thanks to fancy designs/dark patterns: https://www.forbrukerradet.no/undersokelse/2018/every-step-you-take/ https://www.forbrukerradet.no/undersokelse/2018/every-step-y... It looks to me like you have no clue what your own company's doing but hurry nevertheless to defend them.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]