7 ms·

Well, a public utility also doesn't have the right to do this: "You did something wrong, we won't tell you what it was, there's no chance of appeal, and you ar

Well, a public utility also doesn't have the right to do this: "You did something wrong, we won't tell you what it was, there's no chance of appeal, and you are now banned from receiving water service again, ever, for the rest of your life, no matter where you move. And don't try moving in with someone else who's still receiving service, because they'll get banned too."

fatnoah 5y ago
I feel like this is becoming a thing with banks now, too.
- elliekelly 5y ago
  I suspect that has more to do with AML programs becoming significantly more automated/data-driven and the increased information sharing between financial institutions. Twenty years ago one bank would ban you. Now they all do.
thera2 5y ago
Although I understand what you're saying, email and YouTube access is not the same as water. Depriving someone of water would be the same as depriving them of life, which is not true of email, YouTube, and whatever g-services.
- bobbylarrybobby 5y ago
  It’s pretty much impossible to function in modern society without an email address that you can rely on.
  - jolmg 5y ago
    But Google isn't the only provider of email addresses. In contrast, water utilities typically hold monopoly over their region. EDIT: Many people are replying with some variant that the problem is that Google can block the email account that people have tied to their financial and government services. But the same is true of any other email provider. If Google is somehow turned into a public utility, how does that solve the problem for those that are locked out of their email accounts by Fastmail, for instance? Make Fastmail a public utility too, or somehow regulate it? But it's an Australian company, so kind of outside of American jurisdiction. Or regulate the addresses themselves? Put up a law that says that only US public utilities can administer emails on the .com domain? I don't really understand what people are proposing. Or is the proposal just to regulate gmail.com addresses in particular? Treat them as the exception and incentivize more people to use that one provider so they get the protections offered by the proposed regulation.
    - colordrops 5y ago
      It could be very difficult or impossible to access some accounts that use the email address for two factor authentication. And these are typically the most critical accounts.
      - entropicdrifter 5y ago
        I mean, that's really on the user for not setting up more than one 2FA method for their highly critical accounts
        colordrops 5y ago
        That's for properly engineered services. There are many services that won't grant access without your email after auth has expired.
    - basch 5y ago
      However, even with an email address, what are the chances you eventually try and email someone who has gmail. If you get put on the spam list, youre as good as not existing. In concept thats not that different than having an internal account shut down. You still dont exist to google, or any of their patrons.
    - woodruffw 5y ago
      I don't know where I stand on the public utility argument, but to make the strongest possible case for this analogy: most peoples' online lives (including their financials) are tied to a singular email address. That email address forms the ground truth for their identity, including being able to access services that they've lost their credentials for. Google's ability to unilaterally revoke access to the account that ties you to your banking accounts, your state's online service portals, &c. gives them the kind of power that we'd normally only see in regional monopolies like water utilities.
      - jolmg 5y ago
        > gives them the kind of power that we'd normally only see in regional monopolies like water utilities. No access to water from the only provider in your reach, especially if you're kind of broke, really doesn't seem equal to having your email account blocked, when people have very accessible choices of email providers and what they tie to it. The situation sucks, but looking at this from a public utility perspective seems like an XY problem.
  - darig 5y ago
    ok boomer
  - rch 5y ago
    I believe your local public library should be able to provide this, even though it probably doesn't at present.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- russian-hacker 5y ago
  There is only one Google/YouTube. Water is plentiful.
ping_pong 5y ago
This is a direct result of their monopoly, which is why Google should be broken up. Because they have such a huge monopoly, they can afford to ignore customers and have a draconian approach to people, and can get away with it. If there were better competition, they wouldn't have been able to ignore their customers. Breaking them up will alleviate this by ensuring that each company needs to be able to survive on their own, of which one aspect is having better customer support and service.
- izacus 5y ago
  Except that this behaviour shows up in non-monopolistic markets as well. Apple does it. PayPal does it. Heck, our European banks have started doing it despite there being ample competition. What the competition did, is made sure EVERY competing entity does that because it's cheaper and costs were brought down with race to the bottom. I don't get where this bizarre belief that "moar free market" will solve issues. Let's setup proper legal framework where these companies must have a good reason to terminate contract instead - and properly explain it with the ability to appeal.
  - dantheman 5y ago
    Freedom of association is important, and you shouldn't have to do business with people you don't want to.
    - mc32 5y ago
      So it’s okay for banks to choose who they’ll let bank with them? In any case, I disagree. Some things are basic necessities.
      - paddez 5y ago
        Yes. Banks close accounts all the time of clients they no longer want to risk business with.
      - leetcrew 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
fridif 5y ago
Finally, Alex Jones is coming back
dilyevsky 5y ago
Actually they can. Someone i know has a restraining order from ohio dmv (bmv) for getting into argument there and can’t get dl there. Hilarious regulation coming from the state that completely privatized their dmv services
- selimthegrim 5y ago
  And I thought Louisiana charging a fee for using a debit card at state dmv (OMV) offices instead of cash [1] courtesy of Bobby Jindal was something. Sad to see my state of origin has outstripped that. [1] I should also mention the time I looked at my driving record in Louisiana and discovered the remnant of their pre-1981 practice of putting race on driver's licenses. Under my ethnic category (which I had never filled out or been asked) was 'O'. I turned to the clerk and asked "What does this stand for?" She replied "Other." I said "I thought maybe it would be Oriental" (since I am Pakistani-American). She replied "That would be too politically incorrect." I said, "My expectations for this state in that regard are not high."
justbored123 5y ago
You are aware that public utilities CHARGE FOR THEIR SERVICE A LOT? Ask Texans and Californians about their power bills in the last months. The level of entitlement of people like you using a free service and expecting to impose the rules as they see fit and getting all angry at the company giving them an absolutely world class amazing service for free because they don't want to piss off the advertisers that pay for the whole deal is very hard to understand.
- olivierestsage 5y ago
  I don't see what any of that has to do with it being impossible to appeal or contact someone about the ban, though.
- ClumsyPilot 5y ago
  The level of entitlement of thinking you can exploit private data of millions of people for profit and be above the law, undermining our democracy and paying no tax while cozying up to horile regimes, dictators and tyrants. Two can play this maralism game, see?
sixothree 5y ago
"but we still fully intend to profit off your data."
RosanaAnaDana 5y ago
That's a good thing right? right?
bit_logic 5y ago
The government decided that phone numbers are important enough to create regulations that allow phone number portability between carriers. Email addresses need the same regulation. The arguments that lead to phone number portability apply to email addresses as well. And I would argue that email addresses are even more important than phone numbers at this point (it's the single key to all online accounts, most bills, documents, statements are emailed as PDFs, a lot of government services expect a working email address). Email addresses have become critical and portability needs to become a requirement for all email services. There are technical issues, for example if someone cancels Gmail service, how can the @gmail.com address be moved elsewhere? It's not as simple as phone number portability. Maybe a regulation that any email service must provide forwarding service to another email address even if the service is no longer active? Or maybe a trusted mapping that exists outside any single service, kind of like a DNS for email addresses.
- freyr 5y ago
  It would be interesting to have domain-free personal email addresses. The domain is useful to signify membership in an organization. But for individuals, why should our addresses have hotmail or gmail or yahoo or anything else appended to it?

fatnoah 5y ago

I feel like this is becoming a thing with banks now, too.

elliekelly 5y ago
I suspect that has more to do with AML programs becoming significantly more automated/data-driven and the increased information sharing between financial institutions. Twenty years ago one bank would ban you. Now they all do.

thera2 5y ago

Although I understand what you're saying, email and YouTube access is not the same as water. Depriving someone of water would be the same as depriving them of life, which is not true of email, YouTube, and whatever g-services.

bobbylarrybobby 5y ago
It’s pretty much impossible to function in modern society without an email address that you can rely on.
- jolmg 5y ago
  But Google isn't the only provider of email addresses. In contrast, water utilities typically hold monopoly over their region. EDIT: Many people are replying with some variant that the problem is that Google can block the email account that people have tied to their financial and government services. But the same is true of any other email provider. If Google is somehow turned into a public utility, how does that solve the problem for those that are locked out of their email accounts by Fastmail, for instance? Make Fastmail a public utility too, or somehow regulate it? But it's an Australian company, so kind of outside of American jurisdiction. Or regulate the addresses themselves? Put up a law that says that only US public utilities can administer emails on the .com domain? I don't really understand what people are proposing. Or is the proposal just to regulate gmail.com addresses in particular? Treat them as the exception and incentivize more people to use that one provider so they get the protections offered by the proposed regulation.
  - colordrops 5y ago
    It could be very difficult or impossible to access some accounts that use the email address for two factor authentication. And these are typically the most critical accounts.
    - entropicdrifter 5y ago
      I mean, that's really on the user for not setting up more than one 2FA method for their highly critical accounts
      - colordrops 5y ago
        That's for properly engineered services. There are many services that won't grant access without your email after auth has expired.
  - basch 5y ago
    However, even with an email address, what are the chances you eventually try and email someone who has gmail. If you get put on the spam list, youre as good as not existing. In concept thats not that different than having an internal account shut down. You still dont exist to google, or any of their patrons.
  - woodruffw 5y ago
    I don't know where I stand on the public utility argument, but to make the strongest possible case for this analogy: most peoples' online lives (including their financials) are tied to a singular email address. That email address forms the ground truth for their identity, including being able to access services that they've lost their credentials for. Google's ability to unilaterally revoke access to the account that ties you to your banking accounts, your state's online service portals, &c. gives them the kind of power that we'd normally only see in regional monopolies like water utilities.
    - jolmg 5y ago
      > gives them the kind of power that we'd normally only see in regional monopolies like water utilities. No access to water from the only provider in your reach, especially if you're kind of broke, really doesn't seem equal to having your email account blocked, when people have very accessible choices of email providers and what they tie to it. The situation sucks, but looking at this from a public utility perspective seems like an XY problem.
- darig 5y ago
  ok boomer
- rch 5y ago
  I believe your local public library should be able to provide this, even though it probably doesn't at present.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
russian-hacker 5y ago
There is only one Google/YouTube. Water is plentiful.

ping_pong 5y ago

This is a direct result of their monopoly, which is why Google should be broken up. Because they have such a huge monopoly, they can afford to ignore customers and have a draconian approach to people, and can get away with it. If there were better competition, they wouldn't have been able to ignore their customers. Breaking them up will alleviate this by ensuring that each company needs to be able to survive on their own, of which one aspect is having better customer support and service.

izacus 5y ago
Except that this behaviour shows up in non-monopolistic markets as well. Apple does it. PayPal does it. Heck, our European banks have started doing it despite there being ample competition. What the competition did, is made sure EVERY competing entity does that because it's cheaper and costs were brought down with race to the bottom. I don't get where this bizarre belief that "moar free market" will solve issues. Let's setup proper legal framework where these companies must have a good reason to terminate contract instead - and properly explain it with the ability to appeal.
- dantheman 5y ago
  Freedom of association is important, and you shouldn't have to do business with people you don't want to.
  - mc32 5y ago
    So it’s okay for banks to choose who they’ll let bank with them? In any case, I disagree. Some things are basic necessities.
    - paddez 5y ago
      Yes. Banks close accounts all the time of clients they no longer want to risk business with.
    - leetcrew 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

fridif 5y ago

Finally, Alex Jones is coming back

dilyevsky 5y ago

Actually they can. Someone i know has a restraining order from ohio dmv (bmv) for getting into argument there and can’t get dl there. Hilarious regulation coming from the state that completely privatized their dmv services

selimthegrim 5y ago
And I thought Louisiana charging a fee for using a debit card at state dmv (OMV) offices instead of cash [1] courtesy of Bobby Jindal was something. Sad to see my state of origin has outstripped that. [1] I should also mention the time I looked at my driving record in Louisiana and discovered the remnant of their pre-1981 practice of putting race on driver's licenses. Under my ethnic category (which I had never filled out or been asked) was 'O'. I turned to the clerk and asked "What does this stand for?" She replied "Other." I said "I thought maybe it would be Oriental" (since I am Pakistani-American). She replied "That would be too politically incorrect." I said, "My expectations for this state in that regard are not high."

justbored123 5y ago

You are aware that public utilities CHARGE FOR THEIR SERVICE A LOT? Ask Texans and Californians about their power bills in the last months. The level of entitlement of people like you using a free service and expecting to impose the rules as they see fit and getting all angry at the company giving them an absolutely world class amazing service for free because they don't want to piss off the advertisers that pay for the whole deal is very hard to understand.

olivierestsage 5y ago
I don't see what any of that has to do with it being impossible to appeal or contact someone about the ban, though.
ClumsyPilot 5y ago
The level of entitlement of thinking you can exploit private data of millions of people for profit and be above the law, undermining our democracy and paying no tax while cozying up to horile regimes, dictators and tyrants. Two can play this maralism game, see?

sixothree 5y ago

"but we still fully intend to profit off your data."

RosanaAnaDana 5y ago

That's a good thing right? right?

bit_logic 5y ago

The government decided that phone numbers are important enough to create regulations that allow phone number portability between carriers. Email addresses need the same regulation. The arguments that lead to phone number portability apply to email addresses as well. And I would argue that email addresses are even more important than phone numbers at this point (it's the single key to all online accounts, most bills, documents, statements are emailed as PDFs, a lot of government services expect a working email address). Email addresses have become critical and portability needs to become a requirement for all email services. There are technical issues, for example if someone cancels Gmail service, how can the @gmail.com address be moved elsewhere? It's not as simple as phone number portability. Maybe a regulation that any email service must provide forwarding service to another email address even if the service is no longer active? Or maybe a trusted mapping that exists outside any single service, kind of like a DNS for email addresses.

freyr 5y ago
It would be interesting to have domain-free personal email addresses. The domain is useful to signify membership in an organization. But for individuals, why should our addresses have hotmail or gmail or yahoo or anything else appended to it?