10 ms·

Google reminds users to "Call Dad", makes users angry

167 points by psawaya 15y ago

mdpm 15y ago
There are a few sides to this one: On the practical, implementation detail side of this, users should have been allowed to remove the item. I'm sure the reason that didn't happen is simply because of the way it was implemented, and implementing the item as something that was actually per-user would simply have pushed into the 'not happening' zone. As regards, morals, sensibilities and where the hell 'right' is on the larger picture the answer is 'who knows?' - Personally, I think the fact that a slight prompting would have resulted in millions of tiny acts of goodness, and a few larger ones of users being upset, but there's no particular metric one can apply there. My intuition says the balance falls largely on the side of it being a net postitive for their users at large, and their families too. As far as those offended go, I'm sort of reminded of the parallels with doctors and malpractice suits - hundreds of lives saved, helped, made more comfortable, and it' can take one slip-up to undo all of it. No, it's not a 'gtfover it', but it's not so much the message appearing as the inability to control it that led to a small slight being taken as an offense. Anger is almost always fear, and fear almost always a simple desire to not be hurt, and the inability to stop it continuing to prompt them - that likely just resonated with the aspects of whatever hurt in the first place, whether it was mortality, abuse or anything else. No one meant any offense, and there was a person, and then people who thought they'd do something they thought would be good, and might make a few people happier (and possibly serve their employer's larger aims too). They didn't do a bad thing. They did a good thing, badly.
ascendant 15y ago
I'm so tired of sensitive people complaining about everything. We all have our problems, being reminded to "call dad" is not a reason to act like Google showed up to your house and kicked your dog.
tejask 15y ago
It is true that this may hit feelings of some people. If we are blaming them, lets also blame Apple(app store) and a lot others. Unfortunately we have to learn to adapt and let go of these things... Internet is quite insensitive
dget 15y ago
I think a big part of the issue is that a person's Gmail is treated as something much more personal than a TV ad or anything else. I think this is the piece that people blasting complaints as "too sensitive" are missing. To have a unremovable "personal" message there as part of the interface feels weird to start with, but it feels even more like a violation if it's offensive (as with this case).
NoItAll 15y ago
I like that line in the complaint: "biologically only". Wow. Such anger.
sahaj 15y ago
I honestly thought it was a cool new feature of gMail where I can get reminders about calling people that is tied into gCal.
rhizome31 15y ago
If Google say "Call Dad" to users who don't have a dad, it's a bug. Bugs are bad. Google should fix it.
diN0bot 15y ago
sometimes when watching hulu or youtube i see ads that i find offensive. it's not the same situation, but i do wonder where to draw the lines mentioned in the discussions here.
jsz0 15y ago
I found it a bit creepy simply because I view the Google services as pure utility completely segregated from my real life. I use them in the same way I use my microwave or toaster. If I woke up this morning and my microwave said "call Dad" I would have the same reaction. It's not a big deal of course but it's just kind of weird. It shows what a huge challenge Google has to ever develop a coherent social strategy when such a harmless message causes a little controversy.
oomkiller 15y ago
People that get angry about things like this should really just chill. Google's probably created much more happiness than sorrow with this feature, by reminding kids to call their dads.
darklajid 15y ago
A technical question, if I might: Anyone in here that knows how these reminders where targeted? I didn't check GMail yesterday, so I've no clue if they would've been shown to me. And frankly, it would've been the wrong date. Looking at the mess that is [1], was this rolled out to US people only? Using geoip or information from user profiles? Because I cannot imagine that a global reminder would've made much sense, ignoring the current discussion if it was a bad thing in general. 1: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Father%27s_Day#International_history_and_traditions https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Father%27s_Da...
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- nchlswu 15y ago
  That's based on the assumption that everyone offended knows of the forum, though.
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
huntero 15y ago
When you operate on the scale of Google or Facebook, getting "cute" will inevitably end up with some angry users. But without little touches like this, the company would move closer and closer to the IBM-esque corporate monolith. And neither the users nor Google want to see that image. That said, maybe this one was pushing it. I saw that this morning and thought, "Oh, here we go..."
- scott_s 15y ago
  Upvoted not necessarily because I agree with your conclusion, but because I think it synthesizes the main point. Anything with personality automatically means some people will not like them.
- Klinky 15y ago
  Actions speak louder than words. If they don't want to look like an IBM-esque monolith then they shouldn't act like one. Would IBM be less of a monolithic beast if they had commercials with puppies in them, yet never changed their polices or actions? Personalizations are cute so long as you have a personal relationship with who is doing it. If Google was a three man team who interacted with their userbase on a regular basis then these acts of personalization would mean more. But a 26,000 plus employee company having faceless developer #014345 implement feature #21542154, is much harder to pull off as being personal or cute. Especially considering how impersonal Google is towards customer service. It can come off like a socially awkward geek trying to make conversation... Here let's remind you about your great father(or possibly your dead, abusive or absent father) to show how human & personal we are as a company, but if you actually have a problem with one of our products or services good luck actually getting a personal touch then.
- mikhael 15y ago
  When I first saw it, I did find it remarkably annoying, but didn't actually put my finger on it until now: to me it doesn't feel "cute" at all, but rather like a machine or a robot, maybe trying to sound cute, but coming off only as imperative -- like "Reminder: taxes are due today."
president 15y ago
people get angry over the smallest things these days
- redthrowaway 15y ago
  'Tis the Internet we speak of.
- vacri 15y ago
  Hey! My dad was quite tall, thank you very much!
beatpanda 15y ago
You know, as soon as I saw that, even though my dad is perfectly healthy and I hadn't called him yet today, I was a little creeped out. I couldn't put my finger on why. The doodles are one thing, but Gmail is supposed to be a tool, and I think people expect different things from that.
- bobbles 15y ago
  I think having a generic banner such as a "Fathers Day" doodle wouldnt really upset as many people. I think there's something more personal about the specific 'Call Dad' that would certainly make me feel more emotional if I saw it pop up in my contacts list. People get bombarded with "fathers day" "mothers day" "valentines day" every year and it's easy to brush it aside...
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schrototo 15y ago
My father recently died and while things like these may trigger some slight pain, that's just life. You have to get the fuck over it. It's never worth accommodating the easily offended, especially on the Internet.
- fleitz 15y ago
  Couldn't agree with you more, my dad passed about 7 years ago, the OP on the ticket seems to have daddy issues. If I was her father I'd be glad she didn't call. There's a great way for the complainers to get rid of the message, stop using a service provided to you for FREE. Pay for your own server, own web interface, own backups, etc then there will be no "Call Dad" button. Until then deal with the fact that most fathers, sons, and daughters like each other and it's a good day to catch up. The really great part is that later today my kids will be using Gmail to video conference with me. Kudos to Google.
  - wvoq 15y ago
    > the OP on the ticket seems to have daddy issues. Just bookmarking this for the next time someone insists that the folks on hacker news are an egalitarian bunch who would never tolerate casual sexism.
    - irragal 15y ago
      What exactly is the casual sexism here?
      - wvoq 15y ago
        "Daddy issues" is a sexualized pop-Freudian phrase applied only to women. Lots of men, myself included, had rocky relationships with their fathers that caused some emotional harm and affected their later relationships, but you'll never hear immature or irresponsible men described as suffering from "daddy issues". Moreover, the original request was a completely reasonable one: "I don't know how to turn this feature off: I've tried this and this, but it didn't work. What should I do?" When you ask a technical question and receive irrelevant, sexualized and emotionally condescending comments in response, I think that's prima facie evidence of sexism.
nostrademons 15y ago
I was just talking with my mom about this this morning. My father passed away about a year and a half ago. I still very much miss him. I really hate to be That Guy that complains about the little things that are supposed to brighten our day. Particularly because I work for Google and have at various other times been the guy implementing these little things that then get complained about. I wouldn't want to see Google never do these things, because there will always be some minority of the user base that will be offended, and that's just life. Otherwise we get a boring faceless corporation, and that would be a shame. But when I saw this, my reaction was very much the same as the posters on the support forum. It hurt. Because I totally would call him, if I could. But I can't. And that really, really sucks.
- unreal37 15y ago
  This reminds me of when Facebook reminded you to reconnect with friends, some dead. Glad they removed that feature. -1 to Google for this idea, but I wouldn't open a ticket or get enraged about it.
  - silencio 15y ago
    I've used FB's reconnect and "people you may know", among other features and on other sites, to great success. But it was the one time that FB reminded me to reconnect with a friend close to the anniversary of his passing that is what I think of when I think of those types of features. Facebook, Google, etc. don't just know if someone has passed away, if a parent or both parents were abusive or at all a part of your life for whatever reason, or even something like if you broke up with someone else the night before. It's hard to get angry about a feature that otherwise works out well because those services don't have that information. The only thing I can get angry about is the way these services handle requests to close/memorialize accounts. The aforementioned friend FB suggested I reconnect with was one that had an extensive online identity, but his family for whatever reason hasn't done anything (if they even know about all of the accounts). So I've sent notice to FB, LinkedIn and more to try to close or at least freeze the account. Most of them haven't paid attention to non-family requests so far. Doesn't matter that I am connected to him on all the social sites, have all his then-contact/personal information and death notices, and sent from the email address on a domain he linked to on his website (which is in these profiles). There has got to be a better way to handle this problem :(
gavanwoolery 15y ago
In other news, users love to bitch about everything.
- agravier 15y ago
  "Recreational outrage" well describes the reaction of many of the users complaining in that thread
- exit 15y ago
  and much of the culture around here is built on the innovation of bitching about people bitching about something.
protomyth 15y ago
I think it is a good lesson to small companies in that you shouldn't add things to what people consider "mine" or expect the normal family situation applies to everyone. The doodle is ok, but adding reminders crosses the line. Some of the forum postings are just sad and to think some managers decision added one more bit of pain is not something you want.
- nostrademons 15y ago
  FYI, "cutesy" features like this are very rarely "some manager's decision". They usually come from the engineers, who say "Wouldn't it be cool if...", get a bunch of friends to help them, code up a demo, and then go show a manager and say "Can you help us make this happen?" At some point, some VP has to sign off on it, but usually they just give it a cursory look and say "Approved."
  - protomyth 15y ago
    I generally prescribe blame to the person who had the ultimate sign-off authority. Their job is to think of the implications.
- jasonlotito 15y ago
  The flip side is the number of people that called their father because of the reminder, and what positive impact this had. Sorry, I can't help feel any sympathy for people pitching a fit over this. It reminds me of that woman who chastised the free lemonade kids.
  - iamdave 15y ago
    It reminds me of that woman who chastised the free lemonade kids. Sorry, I don't know the story behind this one, but would like to. Link?
    - scott_s 15y ago
      It looks like the original article was taken down, but this is the reddit thread on it: http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/cmizs/sweet_little_girls_give_away_free_lemonade/ http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/cmizs/sweet_little... By the way, Google still impresses me sometimes. I found this by searching for "women chastises free lemonade kids" and the first hit was this thread, and the second was the reddit thread.
monochromatic 15y ago
Google surely must have anticipated that some people would react this way. Good on them for going ahead with this reminder anyway.
- RexRollman 15y ago
  I disagree but not because it caused offense. I just see no reason why Google should be adding reminders when only the end user should be doing that.
jrspruitt 15y ago
"Call your dad on fathers day" as politically incorrect? This seems like overkill. There is a 1000 other vastly more important things to get worked up over. Its not like Google took your dad away or made him someone you despise, and then flaunts how great it is having a dad you'd want to honor on fathers days in front of you. It's a little something to give their service a slight personality. Perhaps its like Field of Dreams, give people somewhere to complain, they will complain, which is fine, but complain about the problem, the people that caused it, not the things that remind you of it, which end up getting those things taken away from the majority of people that would enjoy the rather innocent reminder.I could see being pissed off if you were in jail for a crime you didn't commit, and you were being forced to celebrate the 4th of July or something, but this is not even close to that.
m0nastic 15y ago
I'm not sure how I feel about this (although I don't use Gmail, so thankfully, it doesn't matter how I feel). I like the fact that Google adds little touches that try to remind you that their employees are actual human beings. I can be sympathetic to people who this might make uncomfortable (Father's Day is a pretty bad day for me), but I'm not sure how reasonable it is to try and shield yourself from things like this. I mean, presumably, you don't break down into tears every time a commercial airs advertising a "Father's Day" sale? It just seems like a futile endeavor. It would be like if the color Yellow reminded you of some terrible memory. You'd kind of just have to deal with it.
ciupicri 15y ago
Google reminds about Father's Day, yet it failed to remind me about a birthday over both SMS and email.
- AgentConundrum 15y ago
  I noticed this recently as well, but only last week did I bother looking into it. It seems the only way to fix this is to disable all of your notifications, save that, then go enable them again. Afterward, your notifications should work again.
Aga 15y ago
Many commenters seem not to notice that this upsets not only those whose fathers have recently passed, but even more those whose fathers have left them or abused them.
michaelpinto 15y ago
Google just doesn't get social media — this is the type of stuff that Facebook was doing wrong over two years ago and quickly fixed. Instead of trying to imitate Facebook they should re-focus on fixing services they already have like Blogger. It's mind blowing to think that Blogger is now in the slow lane behind the likes of Tumblr and WordPress. Google is starting to remind me of Yahoo! in a bad way — a place where good products go to die. My advice for them would be to buy Twitter, but they'd only mess that up over time...
AltIvan 15y ago
I am sure that the rainbow that show ups when you search "gay marriage" on google is going to upset some people... guess they need a new option to please those people ("Dont show me the gay rainbow").
- m0nastic 15y ago
  To play Devil's Advocate: What if you logged into Gmail and saw a reminder that said "Be sure to go vote for the bill supporting Gay Marriage Today" that you couldn't delete?
  - burgerbrain 15y ago
    What if I entered a privately owned local mall and saw such a sign? Neither of these would concern me in the slightest.
    - m0nastic 15y ago
      Presumably then, you're a reasonable person. I can assure you though, that if a shopping mall put up a sign like that they'd be flooded with complaints. Ultimately, it's a cost/benefit analysis for the company involved. Gay marriage is a contentious issue presently, Father's Day isn't really. You can find a subset of people who are offended by any implication of supporting any idea or cause. That's why I'm a little torn on this issue. You can object to the fact that Google is putting a non-deletable reminder into people's tasks. You can also object to the fact that Google is taking a Pro-Father's Day stance. I happen to think the first objection is more reasonable (but I can sympathize with the second one, even if I think it's not a really great example of a company offending people with a stance).
      - shaggyfrog 15y ago
        > Gay marriage is a contentious issue presently, Father's Day isn't really. That is not the issue. The problem isn't about being reminded that Father's Day exists. The problem is the undeletable, unsolicited imperative to each and every user that they "call Dad", irrespective of how valid that statement is for any arbitrary user.
pointillistic 15y ago
Wait, are we still in America where every surface in the virtual and real world is covered with ads? In general I have a problem with the ad supported universe, it turns the creative expression into a commodity to sell shoes and lipstick. I wish I can could my dad about this.
ralfd 15y ago
Imagine Batman login to his gmail account and then seeing this reminder…
ahoyhere 15y ago
You know what Google could have done? They could have shown a message that said "It's Father's Day! Do you want to add a to-do to call your dad or someone you love?" And then you could click "No" or "Yes." Then it would have been a case of PERMISSION, rather than INVASION. Emotions matter. With a damaged emotional center in your brain, you cannot make decisions as simple as "which shoes should I put on" -- and thus became utterly paralyzed. To deny that emotions matter is not only inhumane, but extremely illogical in light of all the research that proves otherwise. And a sense of control is one of the most important feelings in the world. Research has shown that removal of the feeling of control actually causes elderly & sick people to DIE much, much faster and more often. Even in things as significant as being the own caretaker of the plants in their room, or choosing the date & time a student volunteer visits them. And if you give the nursing patients control, and then take it away, they die at a higher rate even than those who never had control to begin with. Over & over, studies have shown that emotions have great primacy in human life (and power over the so-called logic!). Google runs roughshod over emotions constantly, and the one of control most egregiously. This is just yet another example. All they had to do was to make it a CHOICE -- and expand "dad" to "someone you love," and they could have avoided hurting people and all this negative PR. Another aspect of emotions is that people treat everything -- software, computers, animals, other inanimate objects -- as if they have personalities & are alive. That's what we're wired to do: to interact with beings. And so people will hold grudges against faceless companies and even tools. And yes, it is wrong, if you think that hurting people unnecessarily by being an antisocial oaf is wrong -- when you could, by investing just a little bit of effort, and by respecting SCIENCE, do a vastly superior job.
tomelders 15y ago
I lost my faith in people reading his.
aj700 15y ago
All these geniuses at Google and nobody realised it was a dumb idea? They haven't all gone to Facebook. Marissa Mayer needs a tighter grip on the still, only just, minimalist homepage. I'd prefer no doodles at all, but I demand no power hogging js doodles!

167 points by psawaya 15y ago

mdpm 15y ago

There are a few sides to this one: On the practical, implementation detail side of this, users should have been allowed to remove the item. I'm sure the reason that didn't happen is simply because of the way it was implemented, and implementing the item as something that was actually per-user would simply have pushed into the 'not happening' zone. As regards, morals, sensibilities and where the hell 'right' is on the larger picture the answer is 'who knows?' - Personally, I think the fact that a slight prompting would have resulted in millions of tiny acts of goodness, and a few larger ones of users being upset, but there's no particular metric one can apply there. My intuition says the balance falls largely on the side of it being a net postitive for their users at large, and their families too. As far as those offended go, I'm sort of reminded of the parallels with doctors and malpractice suits - hundreds of lives saved, helped, made more comfortable, and it' can take one slip-up to undo all of it. No, it's not a 'gtfover it', but it's not so much the message appearing as the inability to control it that led to a small slight being taken as an offense. Anger is almost always fear, and fear almost always a simple desire to not be hurt, and the inability to stop it continuing to prompt them - that likely just resonated with the aspects of whatever hurt in the first place, whether it was mortality, abuse or anything else. No one meant any offense, and there was a person, and then people who thought they'd do something they thought would be good, and might make a few people happier (and possibly serve their employer's larger aims too). They didn't do a bad thing. They did a good thing, badly.

ascendant 15y ago

I'm so tired of sensitive people complaining about everything. We all have our problems, being reminded to "call dad" is not a reason to act like Google showed up to your house and kicked your dog.

tejask 15y ago

It is true that this may hit feelings of some people. If we are blaming them, lets also blame Apple(app store) and a lot others. Unfortunately we have to learn to adapt and let go of these things... Internet is quite insensitive

dget 15y ago

I think a big part of the issue is that a person's Gmail is treated as something much more personal than a TV ad or anything else. I think this is the piece that people blasting complaints as "too sensitive" are missing. To have a unremovable "personal" message there as part of the interface feels weird to start with, but it feels even more like a violation if it's offensive (as with this case).

NoItAll 15y ago

I like that line in the complaint: "biologically only". Wow. Such anger.

sahaj 15y ago

I honestly thought it was a cool new feature of gMail where I can get reminders about calling people that is tied into gCal.

rhizome31 15y ago

If Google say "Call Dad" to users who don't have a dad, it's a bug. Bugs are bad. Google should fix it.

diN0bot 15y ago

sometimes when watching hulu or youtube i see ads that i find offensive. it's not the same situation, but i do wonder where to draw the lines mentioned in the discussions here.

jsz0 15y ago

I found it a bit creepy simply because I view the Google services as pure utility completely segregated from my real life. I use them in the same way I use my microwave or toaster. If I woke up this morning and my microwave said "call Dad" I would have the same reaction. It's not a big deal of course but it's just kind of weird. It shows what a huge challenge Google has to ever develop a coherent social strategy when such a harmless message causes a little controversy.

oomkiller 15y ago

People that get angry about things like this should really just chill. Google's probably created much more happiness than sorrow with this feature, by reminding kids to call their dads.

darklajid 15y ago

A technical question, if I might: Anyone in here that knows how these reminders where targeted? I didn't check GMail yesterday, so I've no clue if they would've been shown to me. And frankly, it would've been the wrong date. Looking at the mess that is [1], was this rolled out to US people only? Using geoip or information from user profiles? Because I cannot imagine that a global reminder would've made much sense, ignoring the current discussion if it was a bad thing in general. 1: https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Father%27s_Day#International_history_and_traditions https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Father%27s_Da...

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nchlswu 15y ago
That's based on the assumption that everyone offended knows of the forum, though.
- deleted 15y ago
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huntero 15y ago

When you operate on the scale of Google or Facebook, getting "cute" will inevitably end up with some angry users. But without little touches like this, the company would move closer and closer to the IBM-esque corporate monolith. And neither the users nor Google want to see that image. That said, maybe this one was pushing it. I saw that this morning and thought, "Oh, here we go..."

scott_s 15y ago
Upvoted not necessarily because I agree with your conclusion, but because I think it synthesizes the main point. Anything with personality automatically means some people will not like them.
Klinky 15y ago
Actions speak louder than words. If they don't want to look like an IBM-esque monolith then they shouldn't act like one. Would IBM be less of a monolithic beast if they had commercials with puppies in them, yet never changed their polices or actions? Personalizations are cute so long as you have a personal relationship with who is doing it. If Google was a three man team who interacted with their userbase on a regular basis then these acts of personalization would mean more. But a 26,000 plus employee company having faceless developer #014345 implement feature #21542154, is much harder to pull off as being personal or cute. Especially considering how impersonal Google is towards customer service. It can come off like a socially awkward geek trying to make conversation... Here let's remind you about your great father(or possibly your dead, abusive or absent father) to show how human & personal we are as a company, but if you actually have a problem with one of our products or services good luck actually getting a personal touch then.
mikhael 15y ago
When I first saw it, I did find it remarkably annoying, but didn't actually put my finger on it until now: to me it doesn't feel "cute" at all, but rather like a machine or a robot, maybe trying to sound cute, but coming off only as imperative -- like "Reminder: taxes are due today."

president 15y ago

people get angry over the smallest things these days

redthrowaway 15y ago
'Tis the Internet we speak of.
vacri 15y ago
Hey! My dad was quite tall, thank you very much!

beatpanda 15y ago

You know, as soon as I saw that, even though my dad is perfectly healthy and I hadn't called him yet today, I was a little creeped out. I couldn't put my finger on why. The doodles are one thing, but Gmail is supposed to be a tool, and I think people expect different things from that.

bobbles 15y ago
I think having a generic banner such as a "Fathers Day" doodle wouldnt really upset as many people. I think there's something more personal about the specific 'Call Dad' that would certainly make me feel more emotional if I saw it pop up in my contacts list. People get bombarded with "fathers day" "mothers day" "valentines day" every year and it's easy to brush it aside...

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schrototo 15y ago

My father recently died and while things like these may trigger some slight pain, that's just life. You have to get the fuck over it. It's never worth accommodating the easily offended, especially on the Internet.

fleitz 15y ago
Couldn't agree with you more, my dad passed about 7 years ago, the OP on the ticket seems to have daddy issues. If I was her father I'd be glad she didn't call. There's a great way for the complainers to get rid of the message, stop using a service provided to you for FREE. Pay for your own server, own web interface, own backups, etc then there will be no "Call Dad" button. Until then deal with the fact that most fathers, sons, and daughters like each other and it's a good day to catch up. The really great part is that later today my kids will be using Gmail to video conference with me. Kudos to Google.
- wvoq 15y ago
  > the OP on the ticket seems to have daddy issues. Just bookmarking this for the next time someone insists that the folks on hacker news are an egalitarian bunch who would never tolerate casual sexism.
  - irragal 15y ago
    What exactly is the casual sexism here?
    - wvoq 15y ago
      "Daddy issues" is a sexualized pop-Freudian phrase applied only to women. Lots of men, myself included, had rocky relationships with their fathers that caused some emotional harm and affected their later relationships, but you'll never hear immature or irresponsible men described as suffering from "daddy issues". Moreover, the original request was a completely reasonable one: "I don't know how to turn this feature off: I've tried this and this, but it didn't work. What should I do?" When you ask a technical question and receive irrelevant, sexualized and emotionally condescending comments in response, I think that's prima facie evidence of sexism.

nostrademons 15y ago

I was just talking with my mom about this this morning. My father passed away about a year and a half ago. I still very much miss him. I really hate to be That Guy that complains about the little things that are supposed to brighten our day. Particularly because I work for Google and have at various other times been the guy implementing these little things that then get complained about. I wouldn't want to see Google never do these things, because there will always be some minority of the user base that will be offended, and that's just life. Otherwise we get a boring faceless corporation, and that would be a shame. But when I saw this, my reaction was very much the same as the posters on the support forum. It hurt. Because I totally would call him, if I could. But I can't. And that really, really sucks.

unreal37 15y ago
This reminds me of when Facebook reminded you to reconnect with friends, some dead. Glad they removed that feature. -1 to Google for this idea, but I wouldn't open a ticket or get enraged about it.
- silencio 15y ago
  I've used FB's reconnect and "people you may know", among other features and on other sites, to great success. But it was the one time that FB reminded me to reconnect with a friend close to the anniversary of his passing that is what I think of when I think of those types of features. Facebook, Google, etc. don't just know if someone has passed away, if a parent or both parents were abusive or at all a part of your life for whatever reason, or even something like if you broke up with someone else the night before. It's hard to get angry about a feature that otherwise works out well because those services don't have that information. The only thing I can get angry about is the way these services handle requests to close/memorialize accounts. The aforementioned friend FB suggested I reconnect with was one that had an extensive online identity, but his family for whatever reason hasn't done anything (if they even know about all of the accounts). So I've sent notice to FB, LinkedIn and more to try to close or at least freeze the account. Most of them haven't paid attention to non-family requests so far. Doesn't matter that I am connected to him on all the social sites, have all his then-contact/personal information and death notices, and sent from the email address on a domain he linked to on his website (which is in these profiles). There has got to be a better way to handle this problem :(

gavanwoolery 15y ago

In other news, users love to bitch about everything.

agravier 15y ago
"Recreational outrage" well describes the reaction of many of the users complaining in that thread
exit 15y ago
and much of the culture around here is built on the innovation of bitching about people bitching about something.

protomyth 15y ago

I think it is a good lesson to small companies in that you shouldn't add things to what people consider "mine" or expect the normal family situation applies to everyone. The doodle is ok, but adding reminders crosses the line. Some of the forum postings are just sad and to think some managers decision added one more bit of pain is not something you want.

nostrademons 15y ago
FYI, "cutesy" features like this are very rarely "some manager's decision". They usually come from the engineers, who say "Wouldn't it be cool if...", get a bunch of friends to help them, code up a demo, and then go show a manager and say "Can you help us make this happen?" At some point, some VP has to sign off on it, but usually they just give it a cursory look and say "Approved."
- protomyth 15y ago
  I generally prescribe blame to the person who had the ultimate sign-off authority. Their job is to think of the implications.
jasonlotito 15y ago
The flip side is the number of people that called their father because of the reminder, and what positive impact this had. Sorry, I can't help feel any sympathy for people pitching a fit over this. It reminds me of that woman who chastised the free lemonade kids.
- iamdave 15y ago
  It reminds me of that woman who chastised the free lemonade kids. Sorry, I don't know the story behind this one, but would like to. Link?
  - scott_s 15y ago
    It looks like the original article was taken down, but this is the reddit thread on it: http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/cmizs/sweet_little_girls_give_away_free_lemonade/ http://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/cmizs/sweet_little... By the way, Google still impresses me sometimes. I found this by searching for "women chastises free lemonade kids" and the first hit was this thread, and the second was the reddit thread.

monochromatic 15y ago

Google surely must have anticipated that some people would react this way. Good on them for going ahead with this reminder anyway.

RexRollman 15y ago
I disagree but not because it caused offense. I just see no reason why Google should be adding reminders when only the end user should be doing that.

jrspruitt 15y ago

"Call your dad on fathers day" as politically incorrect? This seems like overkill. There is a 1000 other vastly more important things to get worked up over. Its not like Google took your dad away or made him someone you despise, and then flaunts how great it is having a dad you'd want to honor on fathers days in front of you. It's a little something to give their service a slight personality. Perhaps its like Field of Dreams, give people somewhere to complain, they will complain, which is fine, but complain about the problem, the people that caused it, not the things that remind you of it, which end up getting those things taken away from the majority of people that would enjoy the rather innocent reminder.I could see being pissed off if you were in jail for a crime you didn't commit, and you were being forced to celebrate the 4th of July or something, but this is not even close to that.

m0nastic 15y ago

I'm not sure how I feel about this (although I don't use Gmail, so thankfully, it doesn't matter how I feel). I like the fact that Google adds little touches that try to remind you that their employees are actual human beings. I can be sympathetic to people who this might make uncomfortable (Father's Day is a pretty bad day for me), but I'm not sure how reasonable it is to try and shield yourself from things like this. I mean, presumably, you don't break down into tears every time a commercial airs advertising a "Father's Day" sale? It just seems like a futile endeavor. It would be like if the color Yellow reminded you of some terrible memory. You'd kind of just have to deal with it.

ciupicri 15y ago

Google reminds about Father's Day, yet it failed to remind me about a birthday over both SMS and email.

AgentConundrum 15y ago
I noticed this recently as well, but only last week did I bother looking into it. It seems the only way to fix this is to disable all of your notifications, save that, then go enable them again. Afterward, your notifications should work again.

Aga 15y ago

Many commenters seem not to notice that this upsets not only those whose fathers have recently passed, but even more those whose fathers have left them or abused them.

michaelpinto 15y ago

Google just doesn't get social media — this is the type of stuff that Facebook was doing wrong over two years ago and quickly fixed. Instead of trying to imitate Facebook they should re-focus on fixing services they already have like Blogger. It's mind blowing to think that Blogger is now in the slow lane behind the likes of Tumblr and WordPress. Google is starting to remind me of Yahoo! in a bad way — a place where good products go to die. My advice for them would be to buy Twitter, but they'd only mess that up over time...

AltIvan 15y ago

I am sure that the rainbow that show ups when you search "gay marriage" on google is going to upset some people... guess they need a new option to please those people ("Dont show me the gay rainbow").

m0nastic 15y ago
To play Devil's Advocate: What if you logged into Gmail and saw a reminder that said "Be sure to go vote for the bill supporting Gay Marriage Today" that you couldn't delete?
- burgerbrain 15y ago
  What if I entered a privately owned local mall and saw such a sign? Neither of these would concern me in the slightest.
  - m0nastic 15y ago
    Presumably then, you're a reasonable person. I can assure you though, that if a shopping mall put up a sign like that they'd be flooded with complaints. Ultimately, it's a cost/benefit analysis for the company involved. Gay marriage is a contentious issue presently, Father's Day isn't really. You can find a subset of people who are offended by any implication of supporting any idea or cause. That's why I'm a little torn on this issue. You can object to the fact that Google is putting a non-deletable reminder into people's tasks. You can also object to the fact that Google is taking a Pro-Father's Day stance. I happen to think the first objection is more reasonable (but I can sympathize with the second one, even if I think it's not a really great example of a company offending people with a stance).
    - shaggyfrog 15y ago
      > Gay marriage is a contentious issue presently, Father's Day isn't really. That is not the issue. The problem isn't about being reminded that Father's Day exists. The problem is the undeletable, unsolicited imperative to each and every user that they "call Dad", irrespective of how valid that statement is for any arbitrary user.

pointillistic 15y ago

Wait, are we still in America where every surface in the virtual and real world is covered with ads? In general I have a problem with the ad supported universe, it turns the creative expression into a commodity to sell shoes and lipstick. I wish I can could my dad about this.

ralfd 15y ago

Imagine Batman login to his gmail account and then seeing this reminder…

ahoyhere 15y ago

You know what Google could have done? They could have shown a message that said "It's Father's Day! Do you want to add a to-do to call your dad or someone you love?" And then you could click "No" or "Yes." Then it would have been a case of PERMISSION, rather than INVASION. Emotions matter. With a damaged emotional center in your brain, you cannot make decisions as simple as "which shoes should I put on" -- and thus became utterly paralyzed. To deny that emotions matter is not only inhumane, but extremely illogical in light of all the research that proves otherwise. And a sense of control is one of the most important feelings in the world. Research has shown that removal of the feeling of control actually causes elderly & sick people to DIE much, much faster and more often. Even in things as significant as being the own caretaker of the plants in their room, or choosing the date & time a student volunteer visits them. And if you give the nursing patients control, and then take it away, they die at a higher rate even than those who never had control to begin with. Over & over, studies have shown that emotions have great primacy in human life (and power over the so-called logic!). Google runs roughshod over emotions constantly, and the one of control most egregiously. This is just yet another example. All they had to do was to make it a CHOICE -- and expand "dad" to "someone you love," and they could have avoided hurting people and all this negative PR. Another aspect of emotions is that people treat everything -- software, computers, animals, other inanimate objects -- as if they have personalities & are alive. That's what we're wired to do: to interact with beings. And so people will hold grudges against faceless companies and even tools. And yes, it is wrong, if you think that hurting people unnecessarily by being an antisocial oaf is wrong -- when you could, by investing just a little bit of effort, and by respecting SCIENCE, do a vastly superior job.

tomelders 15y ago

I lost my faith in people reading his.

aj700 15y ago

All these geniuses at Google and nobody realised it was a dumb idea? They haven't all gone to Facebook. Marissa Mayer needs a tighter grip on the still, only just, minimalist homepage. I'd prefer no doodles at all, but I demand no power hogging js doodles!