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> "If you're over your storage limit for two years, Google may delete your content across Gmail, Drive and Photos," the company said. That's different from jus

> "If you're over your storage limit for two years, Google may delete your content across Gmail, Drive and Photos," the company said. That's different from just deleting all your data because you're inactive. Which is it? Edit: it seems both. Here's the blog post (maybe this is a better link): https://blog.google/products/photos/storage-policy-update/ https://blog.google/products/photos/storage-policy-update/

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
sam1r 6y ago
Curious if one would even receive the notification emails prior to content deletion. Once you hit the 15gb limit, you stop receiving emails within 24 hours. 2 years is plenty time versus "Hey. You are out of storage. In 24 hours, we're cutting off communication." [1] [1] https://imgur.com/a/fBrlu4t https://imgur.com/a/fBrlu4t
- jeffbee 6y ago
  The one time I ran out of quota in Gmail, because Google backup for MacOS has a serious bug, I did not receive the notice because the same batch job that disables delivery for your account is the one that sends you the email. I didn’t get the message until a week later when I figured it out and deleted some photos. Pretty dumb. Also, Gmail delivers an in-band message about your quota, but not in Inbox, Inbox for iOS, nor the Gmail app for iOS nor Gmail for mobile web. ONLY Gmail classic for desktop web. So I didn’t get those banners, either. In other words I still find this quota system difficult to use despite the fact that I was the tech lead of Gmail delivery SRE for years.
geek_at 6y ago
oh damn. I've created an account for my newborn son on my (free) google workspace domain and send him emails every few weeks with updates and photos. He'll receive the account when he's like 12. Will these be deleted too?
- sulam 6y ago
  It seems you need to actually use the tool, ie, this is a service they're offering, not something they (currently) do without active involvement.
  - toast0 6y ago
    On the other hand, they literally advertised this use case on tv. Kind of rude to make it not work.
    - alisonkisk 6y ago
      It does work.
- mehrdadn 6y ago
  I don't know but I would suggest (at least) logging into the account and doing something (uploading a file, sending an email, etc.) every year.
  - josephg 6y ago
    I would also suggest yearly doing a full backup of the account: https://takeout.google.com/settings/takeout https://takeout.google.com/settings/takeout Gmail backup archives are easy enough to load and read in other email programs, if google's storage ever becomes unreliable for you.
    - snazz 6y ago
      Google even lets you schedule them every two months, which works nicely for me.
      - pnutjam 6y ago
        I do daily backups using the API.
donatj 6y ago
The original link should be replaced with this one. The original is clickbait
hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
Wow, 4.3 petabytes a day. Operating at Google's scale these days is just nuts.
- est31 6y ago
  One of the advantages of being on an exponential growth curve is that this figure has been way lower in the past. Just go back 5 years and it's only a fraction of that. 5 more years and it's even lower. The gmail/drive/etc. data that come from Google's first decade of existence probably fit into those 4.3 petabytes.
  - vageli 6y ago
    How is this an advantage?
    - est31 6y ago
      Advantage in the sense that they have to store less. 4.3 petabytes times the age of Google in days is way way more than they actually have to store, as the time period when they were adding 4.3 petabytes daily is short in comparison.
      - jstanley 6y ago
        So the advantage of being on an exponential growth curve is that today's problems are tiny in comparison to tomorrow's problems? That seems like a disadvantage!
  - sagarm 6y ago
    The other implication of exponential data growth is that shortening retention periods is only a short term solution to storage costs.
    - dvfjsdhgfv 6y ago
      I'd say it's the main implication. Google will have to use more drastic means soon. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.
1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago
I have read about users who are receiving someone else's mail. They have some account that has been set to forward mail. It then appears that either (a) Google assigns the address to someone else (perhaps due to inactivity) or (b) someone else keeps inadvertently typing this email address. The mail gets forwarded to some other user. If this is true, this calls the whole notion of "Gmail security" (and more generally large third party email provider security) into question. Now think about all the changes Google makes in the name of "security". One misspelling or typo and it is all for naught. The mail is sent to another user. Does it really make sense to use a free third party email provider like Google for important purposes. It seems like we are making identity theft even easier (not to mention online ad services). One thing we know is Google will not discourage use of Gmail for important matters linked to a real identity. They want more personal information, not less. Meanwhile Google discourages automated creation of accounts not linked to real identities, which would be safer if compromised.
- v0tary 6y ago
  Yes. I can prove that this is real. I had a Gmail account that I registered when I was younger and did exactly that - setup a forward to my alt (which over the years became my primary). A few years ago I started receiving emails for another person with my same name. Legit work emails, party invites and the like. Turns out that person was using my original email. I never contacted anyone about this for fear Google would just delete both accounts to save their own asses. Still receive those emails to this day. However recent times have convinced me that it's time to move away from the big ol G. This is space issue is one of them. mailcow anyone?
  - robjan 6y ago
    I also receive emails and invites for someone else but I actively use my Gmail account. I think it's just people misspelling email addresses.
    - bhrgunatha 6y ago
      I've got several of these for one active email in particular. I've always thought it was bad data entry. There is a cluster in the US south - Georgia, Texas and Alabama. At first I tried to rectify the mistakes but gave up due to lack of response.
pishpash 6y ago
It's high time for somebody to make an appliance running open protocols that behaves like cloud applications but that is owned and hosted at one's home. Maybe it's what NAS is turning into, but open, and more broadly conceived: for email, chat, etc.
- mehrdadn 6y ago
  I imagine unreliability of home networks just makes this a bad idea for things like email even if you somehow managed to get around all the other obstacles like security/privacy/trust issues (spam, etc.)
  - pishpash 6y ago
    But all of this is separable: storage at home, transport/computing provided by Google. So security and trust verification can come from Google (or any other provider) but emails stay home. Or photo processing provided by Google, but photos stay home. That would however relegate them to a pipe and service provider and possibly force them into openly competing, so they would never do that. Owning your data for the lock-in is the point.
- pnutjam 6y ago
  https://clarkconnect.com/ https://clarkconnect.com/
- inquirerofsorts 6y ago
  Nextcloud Hub does all of this: https://nextcloud.com/hub/ https://nextcloud.com/hub/
- msh 6y ago
  Thats what the helm appliance tries to do: https://www.thehelm.com/ https://www.thehelm.com/ If you search HN there is a quite interesting thread on it.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

sam1r 6y ago

Curious if one would even receive the notification emails prior to content deletion. Once you hit the 15gb limit, you stop receiving emails within 24 hours. 2 years is plenty time versus "Hey. You are out of storage. In 24 hours, we're cutting off communication." [1] [1] https://imgur.com/a/fBrlu4t https://imgur.com/a/fBrlu4t

jeffbee 6y ago
The one time I ran out of quota in Gmail, because Google backup for MacOS has a serious bug, I did not receive the notice because the same batch job that disables delivery for your account is the one that sends you the email. I didn’t get the message until a week later when I figured it out and deleted some photos. Pretty dumb. Also, Gmail delivers an in-band message about your quota, but not in Inbox, Inbox for iOS, nor the Gmail app for iOS nor Gmail for mobile web. ONLY Gmail classic for desktop web. So I didn’t get those banners, either. In other words I still find this quota system difficult to use despite the fact that I was the tech lead of Gmail delivery SRE for years.

geek_at 6y ago

oh damn. I've created an account for my newborn son on my (free) google workspace domain and send him emails every few weeks with updates and photos. He'll receive the account when he's like 12. Will these be deleted too?

sulam 6y ago
It seems you need to actually use the tool, ie, this is a service they're offering, not something they (currently) do without active involvement.
- toast0 6y ago
  On the other hand, they literally advertised this use case on tv. Kind of rude to make it not work.
  - alisonkisk 6y ago
    It does work.
mehrdadn 6y ago
I don't know but I would suggest (at least) logging into the account and doing something (uploading a file, sending an email, etc.) every year.
- josephg 6y ago
  I would also suggest yearly doing a full backup of the account: https://takeout.google.com/settings/takeout https://takeout.google.com/settings/takeout Gmail backup archives are easy enough to load and read in other email programs, if google's storage ever becomes unreliable for you.
  - snazz 6y ago
    Google even lets you schedule them every two months, which works nicely for me.
    - pnutjam 6y ago
      I do daily backups using the API.

donatj 6y ago

The original link should be replaced with this one. The original is clickbait

hn_throwaway_99 6y ago

Wow, 4.3 petabytes a day. Operating at Google's scale these days is just nuts.

est31 6y ago
One of the advantages of being on an exponential growth curve is that this figure has been way lower in the past. Just go back 5 years and it's only a fraction of that. 5 more years and it's even lower. The gmail/drive/etc. data that come from Google's first decade of existence probably fit into those 4.3 petabytes.
- vageli 6y ago
  How is this an advantage?
  - est31 6y ago
    Advantage in the sense that they have to store less. 4.3 petabytes times the age of Google in days is way way more than they actually have to store, as the time period when they were adding 4.3 petabytes daily is short in comparison.
    - jstanley 6y ago
      So the advantage of being on an exponential growth curve is that today's problems are tiny in comparison to tomorrow's problems? That seems like a disadvantage!
- sagarm 6y ago
  The other implication of exponential data growth is that shortening retention periods is only a short term solution to storage costs.
  - dvfjsdhgfv 6y ago
    I'd say it's the main implication. Google will have to use more drastic means soon. It will be interesting to see how this plays out.

1vuio0pswjnm7 6y ago

I have read about users who are receiving someone else's mail. They have some account that has been set to forward mail. It then appears that either (a) Google assigns the address to someone else (perhaps due to inactivity) or (b) someone else keeps inadvertently typing this email address. The mail gets forwarded to some other user. If this is true, this calls the whole notion of "Gmail security" (and more generally large third party email provider security) into question. Now think about all the changes Google makes in the name of "security". One misspelling or typo and it is all for naught. The mail is sent to another user. Does it really make sense to use a free third party email provider like Google for important purposes. It seems like we are making identity theft even easier (not to mention online ad services). One thing we know is Google will not discourage use of Gmail for important matters linked to a real identity. They want more personal information, not less. Meanwhile Google discourages automated creation of accounts not linked to real identities, which would be safer if compromised.

v0tary 6y ago
Yes. I can prove that this is real. I had a Gmail account that I registered when I was younger and did exactly that - setup a forward to my alt (which over the years became my primary). A few years ago I started receiving emails for another person with my same name. Legit work emails, party invites and the like. Turns out that person was using my original email. I never contacted anyone about this for fear Google would just delete both accounts to save their own asses. Still receive those emails to this day. However recent times have convinced me that it's time to move away from the big ol G. This is space issue is one of them. mailcow anyone?
- robjan 6y ago
  I also receive emails and invites for someone else but I actively use my Gmail account. I think it's just people misspelling email addresses.
  - bhrgunatha 6y ago
    I've got several of these for one active email in particular. I've always thought it was bad data entry. There is a cluster in the US south - Georgia, Texas and Alabama. At first I tried to rectify the mistakes but gave up due to lack of response.

pishpash 6y ago

It's high time for somebody to make an appliance running open protocols that behaves like cloud applications but that is owned and hosted at one's home. Maybe it's what NAS is turning into, but open, and more broadly conceived: for email, chat, etc.

mehrdadn 6y ago
I imagine unreliability of home networks just makes this a bad idea for things like email even if you somehow managed to get around all the other obstacles like security/privacy/trust issues (spam, etc.)
- pishpash 6y ago
  But all of this is separable: storage at home, transport/computing provided by Google. So security and trust verification can come from Google (or any other provider) but emails stay home. Or photo processing provided by Google, but photos stay home. That would however relegate them to a pipe and service provider and possibly force them into openly competing, so they would never do that. Owning your data for the lock-in is the point.
pnutjam 6y ago
https://clarkconnect.com/ https://clarkconnect.com/
inquirerofsorts 6y ago
Nextcloud Hub does all of this: https://nextcloud.com/hub/ https://nextcloud.com/hub/
msh 6y ago
Thats what the helm appliance tries to do: https://www.thehelm.com/ https://www.thehelm.com/ If you search HN there is a quite interesting thread on it.