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> and what are the implications? Remember when Google was working on the DoD’s autonomous murder drone project? Isn’t WA the predominant means of text communi

by RNCTX 5y ago

> and what are the implications? Remember when Google was working on the DoD’s autonomous murder drone project? Isn’t WA the predominant means of text communication for people who travel abroad regularly?

Jensson 5y ago
> Remember when Google was working on the DoD’s autonomous murder drone project? They did just a demo, Amazon and Microsoft are the biggest contractors in that space. News media loves to shit on Google in these scenarios but most of it is just Google trying to take a pie of markets others are already in. So all these articles just amounts to Google becoming as evil as the other tech giants. For example, we know Microsoft takes on these DoD AI projects. Maybe the VSCode telemetry is used to help them make murder drones? We also know Microsoft collaborates with CCP to operate its bing search in China. Maybe they hand over the VSCode telemetry to CCP? People don't ask those questions about Microsoft, so why ask them about Google?
- RNCTX 5y ago
  Did you miss the early 2000s when we were all on Slashdot which headed every Microsoft story with Bill Gates in a Borg costume? Of course people accuse Microsoft, we've been accusing Microsoft since before Google existed. If you did miss that time because it's outside of your time in the tech world, the difference here is that Microsoft never claimed to be anything but a B2B software dealer with a passing fascination with extending its monopoly to the consumer markets. It tried cable TV boxes, phones, and all sorts of other hare brained ideas but the Xbox was the only one that really stuck. Google PR image'd itself as the anti-Microsoft. No feature creep, just a plain white page that showed you what you wanted to find. Features in the core search product were subtle and generally high on usefulness and low on intrusiveness. Even the Google ad business was marketed as the acceptable compromise between the brain-melting strobe light ads of the late 90s and the word-based ads that people would not object to. tl;dr: Google had to work at burning all of its bridges.

by RNCTX 5y ago

Jensson 5y ago

> Remember when Google was working on the DoD’s autonomous murder drone project? They did just a demo, Amazon and Microsoft are the biggest contractors in that space. News media loves to shit on Google in these scenarios but most of it is just Google trying to take a pie of markets others are already in. So all these articles just amounts to Google becoming as evil as the other tech giants. For example, we know Microsoft takes on these DoD AI projects. Maybe the VSCode telemetry is used to help them make murder drones? We also know Microsoft collaborates with CCP to operate its bing search in China. Maybe they hand over the VSCode telemetry to CCP? People don't ask those questions about Microsoft, so why ask them about Google?

RNCTX 5y ago
Did you miss the early 2000s when we were all on Slashdot which headed every Microsoft story with Bill Gates in a Borg costume? Of course people accuse Microsoft, we've been accusing Microsoft since before Google existed. If you did miss that time because it's outside of your time in the tech world, the difference here is that Microsoft never claimed to be anything but a B2B software dealer with a passing fascination with extending its monopoly to the consumer markets. It tried cable TV boxes, phones, and all sorts of other hare brained ideas but the Xbox was the only one that really stuck. Google PR image'd itself as the anti-Microsoft. No feature creep, just a plain white page that showed you what you wanted to find. Features in the core search product were subtle and generally high on usefulness and low on intrusiveness. Even the Google ad business was marketed as the acceptable compromise between the brain-melting strobe light ads of the late 90s and the word-based ads that people would not object to. tl;dr: Google had to work at burning all of its bridges.