13 ms·

Google could face class action lawsuit over free G Suite legacy account shutdown

162 points by woranl 5y ago

Ekaros 5y ago
I find amazing that any person smart enough to set one up thinks that anything can be free forever. Like they aren't dealing with revenue generating entity that might change their policies at any point... And justifiably so.
- mittermayr 5y ago
  Well, at the time I felt it was clear that Google used this to push their brand, use the data for aggregated ad intelligence and would also utilize it to upsell into other products. To say it's free, and then suddenly pull the carpet is something they may be able to do legally, but it is (hopefully) going to bring them the disaster they deserve. The cost of keeping those accounts at limited state and with locked features would be negligible compared to the loss in future revenue.
ralph84 5y ago
I have no problem paying something, but $6/user/month for family emails @${SURNAME}.org that I've given out to dozens of extended family members isn't gonna work. Hopefully with all of the backlash they come out with a more reasonably priced plan for people doing personal email hosting.
- dhd415 5y ago
  This +100. I'd pay a reasonable amount for my Google Voice numbers, too, if it would ensure that I don't lose them on short notice.
  - YaraAllen 5y ago
    Same. I am OK with paying $6/user/month for the new plans but they don't include Google Voice, which is $10/user/month. I would be ecstatic if they had a cheaper plan that included Google Voice or if they allowed me to migrate my Google Voice number/account to a regular Google account.
    - dlgeek 5y ago
      Can you port it out and back in?
      - YaraAllen 5y ago
        It's possible for now but you lose all your history, settings, etc. And my Google Voice number has been primary number for a decade or so and thus has a lot of important stuff that I would like to keep.
        mike503 5y ago
        I was able to migrate a Google Voice number and history from one @gmail.com to another @gmail.com - IIRC there was someone on Google support forums who I messaged with and after validating accounts they put it in some queue or something. IIRC a day or two later it was all there. Magic.
- hoistbypetard 5y ago
  I'm in the same boat. I think I'm likely going to stand up a Nextcloud instance on a VPS for calendar/contacts/docs and move mail (somewhere). Paying by user/mailbox is really not a good deal for the way we've been using it, so it will either be someone that charges based on domain/traffic/maibox size or something self hosted for received mail with a pay-per-message smtp smarthost. It's really not something I'm happy about needing to figure out all of a sudden.
- wyufro 5y ago
  Hasn't there always been a 10 user limit? That's what I remember at least.
  - interestica 5y ago
    Up to 100 users was a thing
    - kashmirix 5y ago
      Many more. I opened (and still have) a 500-user legacy account, and also have two 200-user accounts in case anyone is interested.
sschueller 5y ago
I don't understand why Google didn't just continue to grandfather the existing free accounts. They already limited them from changing primary domain and number of users that can exist. Additionally a lot of people (like me) will run out of storage and pay for the extra storage. Run ads in my account for all I care. Why is gmail still free at this point? Instead they decided that stating "Free forever" doesn't mean forever and screw the people who decided to trust you from day 1. Yeah, I know it's free and I shouldn't complain but moving email is a huge ordeal and giving me just a few months after 10+ years is a dick move. BTW, I have yet to receive an email from Google telling me that my account will no longer be free. I first heard of this on HN yesterday.
- djhn 5y ago
  Exactly the same situation. I haven't received any communication from Google about this. I only have 1 user (a restriction which was already in force at the time I registered for the free tier), so I'm wondering whether this even applies to me?
- pykiss 5y ago
  Yes. It's not about money, it's about trust.
- jfengel 5y ago
  I'm not sure, but given the intermittent grief I've had with this, it seems like they have to pay a team to maintain it. Maybe it's more than just some cheapo storage and CPU time, but a cost to them in maintenance (including unexpected upkeep of seemingly unrelated features). I can't imagine why that is. You'd think it would be easy. But I've had enough cases where my account wasn't compatible with something (especially my Pixel phone) that makes me suspect that this lets them jettison some of their code base.
  - bener 5y ago
    Wouldn't it be running on the same setup as their paid offerings? It's the same thing, just with limitations.
ggm 5y ago
The lawyers appear to be filtering to people who have been informed by Google. I'm a legacy free gsuite instance with a domain but haven't been directly informed, I just know about it third hand. I still expect the problem. As a non US instance I'm wary of class action in the US anyway.
- dannyw 5y ago
  why? ive cashed out many US class actions as an aussie.
  - ggm 5y ago
    Always assumed there's a cost side risk for low return. This may be different, the inconvenience here is high. Also in OZ
    - oh_sigh 5y ago
      The only cost (AIUI - IANAL) is that if you join the class action, you waive your right to sue them for the same thing at a later date as an individual or as part of another class action lawsuit.
danhab99 5y ago
If Google wins, it will be a demonstration into how important it is to read terms of service. I mean what if there was a clause in the original terms of service from all those years ago that said "free forever was not actually forever", and Google chose to stop being free today. What if it was always there and none of us noticed?
- postalrat 5y ago
  Did they advertise it as "free forever" or "free forever*"? Hiding the truth deep in the terms of service yet advertising something different shouldn't be legal.
  - danhab99 5y ago
  - labster 5y ago
    What if a EULA revision includes terms that indemnify them from all claims resulting from false advertising?
- Spooky23 5y ago
  Usually there’s a term that allows for the agreement to be changed.
xoa 5y ago
I saw some talk of "class action" in previous threads. I'm REALLY skeptical. What I posted on Ars: "Pitch" is not a contract. If you saved the terms of service when you signed up, please post it and show that Google promised that it would be available forever, for free. But it wasn't. Here's the actual Google Workspace (Free) Agreement [0]. You will note that, as is standard for online service contracts, they reserved the right to both modify the Service and Terms at any time ("1.2 Modifications") and it's expressly terminable at will (emphasis added): Quote: 10. Termination. 10.1 By Customer. Customer may discontinue use of the Service at any time. 10.2 By Google. Customer agrees that Google may at any time and for any reason terminate this Agreement and/or terminate the provision of all or any portion of the Service. Notwithstanding the foregoing, Google will provide at least thirty (30) days notice to Customer prior to terminating or suspending the Service; provided that the Service may be terminated immediately if (i) Customer has breached this Agreement or (ii) Google reasonably determines that it is commercially impractical to continue providing the Service in light of applicable laws. 10.3 Effects of Termination. If this Agreement terminates, then: (i) the rights granted by one party to the other will cease immediately (except as set forth in this Section); (ii) Google will provide Customer access to, and the ability to export, the Customer Data for a commercially reasonable period of time; and (iii) after a commercially reasonable period of time, Google will delete Customer Data by removing pointers to it on Google's active servers and overwriting it over time. They've provided way more than 30 days, they're fine. Nobody sane promises forever but even if they do, contracts are governed by law and in general law (at least in the US) is very uncomfortable with perpetual contracts [1]. It's not always impossible to legally spell out perpetual but it usually has to be very specific and has serious requirements. There is lots of case law around this. An indefinite end term doesn't mean perpetual, on the contrary it is read as at-will since there is no end date. Google's ToS will be governed under California law and the 9th Circuit, and AFAIK it has to be specific there too, Shannon v. Civil Service Employees Ins. Union, 169 Cal. App. 2d 79, 337 P.2d 136, 138 (1959). [2]: Quote: Contracts for life or in perpetuity will only be upheld when the intention is clearly expressed in unequivocal terms, and courts are prone to hold against the theory that a contract infers a perpetuity of right or imposes a perpetuity of obligation, and they will only construe a contract to impose such an obligation when the written document itself compels the construction and none other. Contracts for life--and that is what is contended for here--are so unusual as to have been, with rare exceptions, condemned by the courts as unreasonable and unauthorized. "Because of the unusual nature of life or perpetual agreements, the length and permanence of the obligation undertaken, the various unforeseeable events and conditions which may be encountered on such a journey in the future, and the unpredictable effects upon the parties, special precautions have been decreed essential, both as to consideration and the terms of employment, in construing and enforcing the compact. The responsibility assumed and the obligations imposed will be neither created nor spelled out by mere inference when they are not clearly and unequivocally expressed in the contract itself." People on the internet have very weird ideas about law. Further, the remedy in civil law is about "making each party whole" and the courts in general loath specific performance. Normally remedy is about damages which can be covered with money. Maybe maybe maybe (not really) someone could squeeze out some switching cost, but no court is going to order Google to keep providing service that could be found elsewhere. ---- 0: https://web.archive.org/web/20201031044304/https://workspace.google.com/terms/standard_terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20201031044304/https://workspace... 1: https://privateequity.weil.com/glenn-west-musings/forever-long-time-no-time/ https://privateequity.weil.com/glenn-west-musings/forever-lo... 2: https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/2d/169/79.html https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/2d/1...
dkjaudyeqooe 5y ago
A fair settlement of this would be to allow users to continue using their existing domain names with the accounts striped down to the same functionality as a free Gmail account and associated service access. Unused user slots would be taken away as would administrator access. How would that hurt Google besides taking away a modest revenue raising opportunity? Edit: just to be clear, your account essentially becomes a gmail account that happens to have a custom domain name.
- Aloha 5y ago
  You'd still need some sort of administrator access, so you can remove accounts on your domain.
  - dkjaudyeqooe 5y ago
    That would be the same process as deleting a Gmail account.
    - Aloha 5y ago
      I mean, I would need an administrative panel to add or delete accounts in my domain, basically.
- mchristen 5y ago
  I believe there is a technical challenge they are not willing to overcome. My Google Apps account has long had broken integrations with almost all of the "new" google services. There is also a limitation in that you can't join a family group using a Google apps account, so I'm forced to have a regular gmail account anyways in order to participate in that.
  - kashmirix 5y ago
    I believe the limitation stems from the fact that Google Family uses the same underlying mechanism in Android as Mobile Device Management that's part of Workspace. I once managed to create an account that was simultaneously in Google Family AND in Google Workspace, but the end effect were constant notifications in Android that the account has joined Family, then deleted from Family, this several times a minute.
donmcronald 5y ago
> When we asked if moving purchases between accounts might be possible, a Google representative confirmed it wasn't And the quote from Google: > No, customers cannot move those subscriptions and purchases to a free Google Account. If a customer does not wish to upgrade, they will not be asked to forfeit their login credentials, and they will not lose access to other Google services, such as YouTube, Photos and Google Play, nor paid content, including YouTube and Play Store purchases. So that sounds like I can migrate email, make sure I'm not using Google Docs, let the account drop to limited mode, and keep using my apps I've purchased. I don't really care about other Google services at this point because I haven't trusted them for years. As long as I can keep logging in on my phone so I have access to my app purchases, that's all I really care about.
- Shank 5y ago
  You’ll have access to your app purchases, but you won’t be able to get email at that address. For example, that means you won’t be able to get email receipts about subscription renewals, about purchases being refunded, or any other pertinent information that google might choose to send over email. It’s better than cutting everyone off entirely, but far from ideal. You’re basically left with a half cancelled account at that point. Edit: See @jsnell’s followup. In this response, I totally forgot that you could just change the MX records and continue to use the Google Account. I don’t know why I thought this.
  - jsnell 5y ago
    Of course you'd be able to receive email at that address, but you cannot have that email address be hosted for free at Google. You'd need to self-host, or pay somebody else to host email for that domain.
    - sschueller 5y ago
      So back to the days where you could make a Google account with any email address before gapps exited. It was such a mess once domains where moved to gapps to know if it was a legacy account or gapps account. In fact I will still get prompted for some addresses.
gamblor956 5y ago
Those of us with the old Google Apps for Domains accounts (aka G Suite legacy accounts) don't particularly care about the email functionality. Email is portable, and there are plenty of equal or superior alternatives (based on your particular wants/needs). The issue is that Google is dropping all other functionality associated with the accounts, particularly purchases made using these accounts, without the option to retain purchases if the domain administrator terminates the service instead of paying. (EDIT: there are other comments saying that Google's support page says that purchases can be accessed even after terminating the domain service. Redditors say otherwise. It appears that Google's support page has jumped the gun on intended functionality that doesn't actually exist yet.) IOW: it's pay to keep your decade of purchases, or fuck you goodbye. Crap like this is why I no longer invest in new Google products, and why I actively recommend alternatives to Google products (literally, "anything but Google") to friends and family who ask.
- pxx 5y ago
  Your account doesn't disappear. I don't know what Redditors you're listening to but they don't seem to have the full picture. What "intended" functionality are you waiting for here? The documentation exists today on what happens when you cancel Google Workspace: https://support.google.com/a/answer/1257646?hl=en https://support.google.com/a/answer/1257646?hl=en
  - JaimeThompson 5y ago
    Google has handled messaging on this horribly. I, like many others, still haven't been officially told by Google.
  - Spooky23 5y ago
    The account owners may not, but a domain organizer can whack other accounts when they turn down the tenant. The whole thing is a stupid, poorly conceived initiative which obviously wasn’t planned very well, since the comms from Google are so muddled.
- Namidairo 5y ago
  > The issue is that Google is dropping all other functionality associated with the accounts, particularly purchases made using these accounts, FWIW, the small handful of people I've mentioned this to are indeed more concerned about their purchases and SSO than their email. It seems takeout is acceptable enough to assuade any email concerns, in their cases.
thomasjudge 5y ago
Oh, great, a class action lawsuit. Upon success the plaintiff's law firm will collect a third+ of the multi-million dollar settlement, and each affected user will get...a coupon for 10% off a year's subscription to G-suite
dannyw 5y ago
I want to understand why I've still not been notified.
- sschueller 5y ago
  Same here, I have not received anything yet. I have a large amount of domains I setup back in the day.
  - iszomer 5y ago
    I was notified back in 2020 and decided to just can the (free) service. The most tedious thing I ever did was to go through my password manager and find every online service account that tied to my GSuite email address for the past decade and either change the email address or deprecate them entirely. What was most interesting of my particular setup was having my GSuite email address forwarded to my regular GMail account and having the ability to compose emails on behalf of the GSuite email address. When I did log into the actual GSuite account, it had close to 5k~ unsolicited emails caught in the spam filter that never got forwarded.
    - kej 5y ago
      Too late for you, but for anyone else or future reference, if you have account 1 forwarding to account 2 you can add a filter on account 1 with the condition "doesn't have the words" and the value "somelonggarbagestringthatwillneverbeinyourmail" and select "never send to spam". That way spam filtering only happens in account 2 where you can check it regularly.
- iamben 5y ago
  Yeah same. Is it a country thing?
  - mattl 5y ago
    I set up my accounts in the UK, so possibly.
croon 5y ago
I've already been paying them $12/month for storage for years, mostly out of laziness, but at least Google One added sharing storage a year or so back so I could add my family. If they added custom domains to Google One I might be tempted to keep it. At this point I might just go over to Microsoft 365 family which has storage, custom domains and extra fluff, as far as I can tell, for cheaper than just the storage at Google. Is outlook that bad?
- matt_heimer 5y ago
  Hadn't heard about the custom domains on 365, upon researching there is a limitation - "At the moment, we only support connecting domains managed by GoDaddy with Outlook.com" - https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-a-personalized-email-address-in-microsoft-365-75416a58-b225-4c02-8c07-8979403b427b https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-a-personalize...
  - iofiiiiiiiii 5y ago
    That limitation seems to just be a marketing thing - a few more searches reveal they do not actually check what registrar you use.
- blagie 5y ago
  Outlook is that bad. That said, at this point, starting from scratch, I'd pick it over Google in a heartbeat.
jahewson 5y ago
I’m pretty mad about this whole thing. All I want is to be able to downgrade my account to a free account - but there’s no way to do that. I have to delete it and everything connected to my Google Account - oauth logins, Nest, Maps, Drive, is collateral damage. I only signed up in the first place to get a custom domain for my personal gmail.
amanzi 5y ago
I have several free G-suite accounts that I use for various domains and services, including one I've used as my primary email for 10+ years. But over the last couple of years, it's become more annoying using the G-suite free accounts, as they aren't as full-featured as newer (paid) G-suite accounts or even free Google accounts. This announcement has finally given me the motivation to finally get rid of these accounts and move to a more modern solution. Unfortunately for Google, I've moved them to a paid M365 account since it has more features, is better specced (e.g. more storage), and is also cheaper. Also - as others have mentioned here, I too haven't received an official notification from Google about the impending decommissioning. If they backtrack on this now, I'll still be off the Google platform and a couple steps closer to getting out of the Google ecosystem completely.
- Mindless2112 5y ago
  Same boat. I'm not mad. This is just the kick in the pants I needed. I already have a Mail-in-a-Box set up; now I have an unignorable reason to migrate everything.
- iofiiiiiiiii 5y ago
  M365 is what I am looking at, as well. Can you go into detail about the differences and what you found better with M365?
ChrisArchitect 5y ago
it's not even whether it's a rug pull after all these years or that the timeline of a few months isn't enough -- it's that there doesn't seem to be clear ways to migrate either down to gmail/fee google account or laterally to maintain all the disjointed G services etc. I don't want to download my entire Takeout history and re-establish anything. In my case my 'provider' running G Suite wants to shut it down and I'm happy to pay to continue the service running my own G Suite account/domain, but can't see a way to guarantee safe transfer of my data! Nightmare really.
blagie 5y ago
So now that we need to migrate our families off, what are the best alternatives to Google for personal email / document / etc. accounts?
- mittermayr 5y ago
  I've moved to MXRoute, just started setting it up yesterday. E-mail is the easier part to solve (it'll cost a bit, but MXRoute has unlimited domains/accounts/aliases, compared to others who charge 'by seat'). The larger problem is Docs, Sheets, and Forms. They don't allow you to change the owner to a non-domain Gmail account. So the plan of creating a regular free Gmail account and then moving everything over won't work. They've put the road blocks at the right places to force people who notice this all too late into upgrades.
sjtindell 5y ago
The company is literally too big to fail or care. Break them up. Make search its own company, and most of the rest will almost surely completely die. And monitor acquisitions ruthlessly going forward.
anon_np 5y ago
Source: https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-hos https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-hos... "A standard edition of Google Apps for Your Domain is available today as a beta product without cost to domain administrators or end users. Key features include 2 gigabytes of email storage for each user, easy to use customization tools, and help for administrators via email or an online help center. Furthermore, ORGANIZATIONS THAT SIGN UP DURING THE BETA PERIOD WILL NOT EVER HAVE TO PAY FOR USERS ACCEPTED DURING THAT PERIOD (provided Google continues to offer the service)." and Source: https://web.archive.org/web/20070222003704/http://www.google https://web.archive.org/web/20070222003704/http://www.google... "GOOGLE APPS FOR YOUR DOMAIN BETA AGREEMENT [..] 18. Fees. Provided that Google continues to offer the Service to Customer, Google will continue to provide a version of the Service (with substantially the same services as those provided as of the Effective Date) free of charge to Customer; provided that such commitment (i) applies only to End User Accounts created during the period when the Service is considered a beta service (the "Beta Period") by Google (such Beta Period determination at Google's sole discretion), (ii) does not apply to the Domain Service described in Section 4 above, and (iii) may not apply to new opt-in services added by Google to the Service in the future. For sake of clarity, Google reserves the right to offer a premium version of the Service for a fee." -- -np
- Aloha 5y ago
  I wonder if this is why some us have not been notified about this change. I signed up in 2008, which would have been very early in the services life - well before they offered paid accounts.
- Aloha 5y ago
  Okay, so here is a non trunkated version of the first link - http://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-hosted-communications_28.html http://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-host... "A standard edition of Google Apps for Your Domain is available today as a beta product without cost to domain administrators or end users. Key features include 2 gigabytes of email storage for each user, easy to use customization tools, and help for administrators via email or an online help center. Furthermore, organizations that sign up during the beta period will not ever have to pay for users accepted during that period (provided Google continues to offer the service)." The original version of the TOS from August 2006 read as follows: https://web.archive.org/web/20061029132431/https://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20061029132431/https://www.googl... "16. Modification. Except as provided in Section 17, Google reserves the right to change or modify any of the terms and conditions contained in this Agreement or any policy governing Google Apps, at any time, by posting the new agreement at http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html or such URL as Google may provide. Customer is responsible for regularly reviewing any updates to this Agreement. Any changes or modifications to this Agreement will become binding (i) when made in a writing executed by both parties, (ii) by Customer's online acceptance of updated terms, or (iii) after Customer's continued use of Google Apps after such terms have been updated by Google." "17. No Fees. Provided that Google continues to offer Google Apps for Your Domain to Customer, Google will continue to provide a version of Google Apps for Your Domain (with substantially the same services as those provided as of the Effective Date) free of charge to Customer; provided that such commitment (i) applies only to End User Accounts created during the period when the Google Hosted Services are considered a beta service (the "Beta Period") by Google (such Beta Period determination at Google's sole discretion) and (ii) may not apply to new opt-in services added by Google to the Google Apps for Your Domain in the future. For sake of clarity, Google reserves the right to offer a premium version of Google Apps for Your Domain for a fee." In mid 2007 the language was changed to read the following: https://web.archive.org/web/20070407174217/http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20070407174217/http://www.google... "17. Modification. Except as provided in Section 18, Google reserves the right to change or modify any of the terms and conditions contained in this Agreement or any policy governing the Service, at any time, by posting the new agreement at http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html or such URL as Google may provide. Customer is responsible for regularly reviewing any updates to this Agreement. Any changes or modifications to this Agreement will become binding (i) when made in a writing executed by both parties, (ii) by Customer's online acceptance of updated terms, or (iii) after Customer's continued use of the Service after such terms have been updated by Google." "18. Fees. Provided that Google continues to offer the Service to Customer, Google will continue to provide a version of the Service (with substantially the same services as those provided as of the Effective Date) free of charge to Customer; provided that such commitment: (i) does not apply to the Domain Service described in Section 4 above; and (ii) may not apply to new opt-in services added by Google to the Service in the future. For sake of clarity, Google reserves the right to offer a premium version of the Service for a fee." This version was persisting thru at least March of 2011: https://web.archive.org/web/20110330181415/http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/terms/standard_terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20110330181415/http://www.google... However by December of 2011, that language was gone: https://web.archive.org/web/20111231230542/http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/terms/standard_terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20111231230542/http://www.google...
midrus 5y ago
A workaround that might work if you only care about not losing your custom email address: Transfer your custom domain to Google Domains (you have to pay for your domain registration as usual), as they allow to set up free email forwarding to your free gmail account. This only works if you just want to not lose your email address (as me). Of course this is not a solution if you also rely on calendar, docs, etc...
- midrus 5y ago
  (*) and don't trust this forwarding is going to be free forever. They might come next year saying forwarding is $100 per message.

162 points by woranl 5y ago

I find amazing that any person smart enough to set one up thinks that anything can be free forever. Like they aren't dealing with revenue generating entity that might change their policies at any point... And justifiably so.

mittermayr 5y ago
Well, at the time I felt it was clear that Google used this to push their brand, use the data for aggregated ad intelligence and would also utilize it to upsell into other products. To say it's free, and then suddenly pull the carpet is something they may be able to do legally, but it is (hopefully) going to bring them the disaster they deserve. The cost of keeping those accounts at limited state and with locked features would be negligible compared to the loss in future revenue.

ralph84 5y ago

I have no problem paying something, but $6/user/month for family emails @${SURNAME}.org that I've given out to dozens of extended family members isn't gonna work. Hopefully with all of the backlash they come out with a more reasonably priced plan for people doing personal email hosting.

dhd415 5y ago
This +100. I'd pay a reasonable amount for my Google Voice numbers, too, if it would ensure that I don't lose them on short notice.
- YaraAllen 5y ago
  Same. I am OK with paying $6/user/month for the new plans but they don't include Google Voice, which is $10/user/month. I would be ecstatic if they had a cheaper plan that included Google Voice or if they allowed me to migrate my Google Voice number/account to a regular Google account.
  - dlgeek 5y ago
    Can you port it out and back in?
    - YaraAllen 5y ago
      It's possible for now but you lose all your history, settings, etc. And my Google Voice number has been primary number for a decade or so and thus has a lot of important stuff that I would like to keep.
      - mike503 5y ago
        I was able to migrate a Google Voice number and history from one @gmail.com to another @gmail.com - IIRC there was someone on Google support forums who I messaged with and after validating accounts they put it in some queue or something. IIRC a day or two later it was all there. Magic.
hoistbypetard 5y ago
I'm in the same boat. I think I'm likely going to stand up a Nextcloud instance on a VPS for calendar/contacts/docs and move mail (somewhere). Paying by user/mailbox is really not a good deal for the way we've been using it, so it will either be someone that charges based on domain/traffic/maibox size or something self hosted for received mail with a pay-per-message smtp smarthost. It's really not something I'm happy about needing to figure out all of a sudden.
wyufro 5y ago
Hasn't there always been a 10 user limit? That's what I remember at least.
- interestica 5y ago
  Up to 100 users was a thing
  - kashmirix 5y ago
    Many more. I opened (and still have) a 500-user legacy account, and also have two 200-user accounts in case anyone is interested.

sschueller 5y ago

I don't understand why Google didn't just continue to grandfather the existing free accounts. They already limited them from changing primary domain and number of users that can exist. Additionally a lot of people (like me) will run out of storage and pay for the extra storage. Run ads in my account for all I care. Why is gmail still free at this point? Instead they decided that stating "Free forever" doesn't mean forever and screw the people who decided to trust you from day 1. Yeah, I know it's free and I shouldn't complain but moving email is a huge ordeal and giving me just a few months after 10+ years is a dick move. BTW, I have yet to receive an email from Google telling me that my account will no longer be free. I first heard of this on HN yesterday.

djhn 5y ago
Exactly the same situation. I haven't received any communication from Google about this. I only have 1 user (a restriction which was already in force at the time I registered for the free tier), so I'm wondering whether this even applies to me?
pykiss 5y ago
Yes. It's not about money, it's about trust.
jfengel 5y ago
I'm not sure, but given the intermittent grief I've had with this, it seems like they have to pay a team to maintain it. Maybe it's more than just some cheapo storage and CPU time, but a cost to them in maintenance (including unexpected upkeep of seemingly unrelated features). I can't imagine why that is. You'd think it would be easy. But I've had enough cases where my account wasn't compatible with something (especially my Pixel phone) that makes me suspect that this lets them jettison some of their code base.
- bener 5y ago
  Wouldn't it be running on the same setup as their paid offerings? It's the same thing, just with limitations.

ggm 5y ago

The lawyers appear to be filtering to people who have been informed by Google. I'm a legacy free gsuite instance with a domain but haven't been directly informed, I just know about it third hand. I still expect the problem. As a non US instance I'm wary of class action in the US anyway.

dannyw 5y ago
why? ive cashed out many US class actions as an aussie.
- ggm 5y ago
  Always assumed there's a cost side risk for low return. This may be different, the inconvenience here is high. Also in OZ
  - oh_sigh 5y ago
    The only cost (AIUI - IANAL) is that if you join the class action, you waive your right to sue them for the same thing at a later date as an individual or as part of another class action lawsuit.

danhab99 5y ago

If Google wins, it will be a demonstration into how important it is to read terms of service. I mean what if there was a clause in the original terms of service from all those years ago that said "free forever was not actually forever", and Google chose to stop being free today. What if it was always there and none of us noticed?

postalrat 5y ago
Did they advertise it as "free forever" or "free forever*"? Hiding the truth deep in the terms of service yet advertising something different shouldn't be legal.
- danhab99 5y ago
- labster 5y ago
  What if a EULA revision includes terms that indemnify them from all claims resulting from false advertising?
Spooky23 5y ago
Usually there’s a term that allows for the agreement to be changed.

xoa 5y ago

I saw some talk of "class action" in previous threads. I'm REALLY skeptical. What I posted on Ars: "Pitch" is not a contract. If you saved the terms of service when you signed up, please post it and show that Google promised that it would be available forever, for free. But it wasn't. Here's the actual Google Workspace (Free) Agreement [0]. You will note that, as is standard for online service contracts, they reserved the right to both modify the Service and Terms at any time ("1.2 Modifications") and it's expressly terminable at will (emphasis added): Quote: 10. Termination. 10.1 By Customer. Customer may discontinue use of the Service at any time. 10.2 By Google. Customer agrees that Google may at any time and for any reason terminate this Agreement and/or terminate the provision of all or any portion of the Service. Notwithstanding the foregoing, Google will provide at least thirty (30) days notice to Customer prior to terminating or suspending the Service; provided that the Service may be terminated immediately if (i) Customer has breached this Agreement or (ii) Google reasonably determines that it is commercially impractical to continue providing the Service in light of applicable laws. 10.3 Effects of Termination. If this Agreement terminates, then: (i) the rights granted by one party to the other will cease immediately (except as set forth in this Section); (ii) Google will provide Customer access to, and the ability to export, the Customer Data for a commercially reasonable period of time; and (iii) after a commercially reasonable period of time, Google will delete Customer Data by removing pointers to it on Google's active servers and overwriting it over time. They've provided way more than 30 days, they're fine. Nobody sane promises forever but even if they do, contracts are governed by law and in general law (at least in the US) is very uncomfortable with perpetual contracts [1]. It's not always impossible to legally spell out perpetual but it usually has to be very specific and has serious requirements. There is lots of case law around this. An indefinite end term doesn't mean perpetual, on the contrary it is read as at-will since there is no end date. Google's ToS will be governed under California law and the 9th Circuit, and AFAIK it has to be specific there too, Shannon v. Civil Service Employees Ins. Union, 169 Cal. App. 2d 79, 337 P.2d 136, 138 (1959). [2]: Quote: Contracts for life or in perpetuity will only be upheld when the intention is clearly expressed in unequivocal terms, and courts are prone to hold against the theory that a contract infers a perpetuity of right or imposes a perpetuity of obligation, and they will only construe a contract to impose such an obligation when the written document itself compels the construction and none other. Contracts for life--and that is what is contended for here--are so unusual as to have been, with rare exceptions, condemned by the courts as unreasonable and unauthorized. "Because of the unusual nature of life or perpetual agreements, the length and permanence of the obligation undertaken, the various unforeseeable events and conditions which may be encountered on such a journey in the future, and the unpredictable effects upon the parties, special precautions have been decreed essential, both as to consideration and the terms of employment, in construing and enforcing the compact. The responsibility assumed and the obligations imposed will be neither created nor spelled out by mere inference when they are not clearly and unequivocally expressed in the contract itself." People on the internet have very weird ideas about law. Further, the remedy in civil law is about "making each party whole" and the courts in general loath specific performance. Normally remedy is about damages which can be covered with money. Maybe maybe maybe (not really) someone could squeeze out some switching cost, but no court is going to order Google to keep providing service that could be found elsewhere. ---- 0: https://web.archive.org/web/20201031044304/https://workspace.google.com/terms/standard_terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20201031044304/https://workspace... 1: https://privateequity.weil.com/glenn-west-musings/forever-long-time-no-time/ https://privateequity.weil.com/glenn-west-musings/forever-lo... 2: https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/2d/169/79.html https://law.justia.com/cases/california/court-of-appeal/2d/1...

dkjaudyeqooe 5y ago

A fair settlement of this would be to allow users to continue using their existing domain names with the accounts striped down to the same functionality as a free Gmail account and associated service access. Unused user slots would be taken away as would administrator access. How would that hurt Google besides taking away a modest revenue raising opportunity? Edit: just to be clear, your account essentially becomes a gmail account that happens to have a custom domain name.

Aloha 5y ago
You'd still need some sort of administrator access, so you can remove accounts on your domain.
- dkjaudyeqooe 5y ago
  That would be the same process as deleting a Gmail account.
  - Aloha 5y ago
    I mean, I would need an administrative panel to add or delete accounts in my domain, basically.
mchristen 5y ago
I believe there is a technical challenge they are not willing to overcome. My Google Apps account has long had broken integrations with almost all of the "new" google services. There is also a limitation in that you can't join a family group using a Google apps account, so I'm forced to have a regular gmail account anyways in order to participate in that.
- kashmirix 5y ago
  I believe the limitation stems from the fact that Google Family uses the same underlying mechanism in Android as Mobile Device Management that's part of Workspace. I once managed to create an account that was simultaneously in Google Family AND in Google Workspace, but the end effect were constant notifications in Android that the account has joined Family, then deleted from Family, this several times a minute.

donmcronald 5y ago

> When we asked if moving purchases between accounts might be possible, a Google representative confirmed it wasn't And the quote from Google: > No, customers cannot move those subscriptions and purchases to a free Google Account. If a customer does not wish to upgrade, they will not be asked to forfeit their login credentials, and they will not lose access to other Google services, such as YouTube, Photos and Google Play, nor paid content, including YouTube and Play Store purchases. So that sounds like I can migrate email, make sure I'm not using Google Docs, let the account drop to limited mode, and keep using my apps I've purchased. I don't really care about other Google services at this point because I haven't trusted them for years. As long as I can keep logging in on my phone so I have access to my app purchases, that's all I really care about.

Shank 5y ago
You’ll have access to your app purchases, but you won’t be able to get email at that address. For example, that means you won’t be able to get email receipts about subscription renewals, about purchases being refunded, or any other pertinent information that google might choose to send over email. It’s better than cutting everyone off entirely, but far from ideal. You’re basically left with a half cancelled account at that point. Edit: See @jsnell’s followup. In this response, I totally forgot that you could just change the MX records and continue to use the Google Account. I don’t know why I thought this.
- jsnell 5y ago
  Of course you'd be able to receive email at that address, but you cannot have that email address be hosted for free at Google. You'd need to self-host, or pay somebody else to host email for that domain.
  - sschueller 5y ago
    So back to the days where you could make a Google account with any email address before gapps exited. It was such a mess once domains where moved to gapps to know if it was a legacy account or gapps account. In fact I will still get prompted for some addresses.

gamblor956 5y ago

Those of us with the old Google Apps for Domains accounts (aka G Suite legacy accounts) don't particularly care about the email functionality. Email is portable, and there are plenty of equal or superior alternatives (based on your particular wants/needs). The issue is that Google is dropping all other functionality associated with the accounts, particularly purchases made using these accounts, without the option to retain purchases if the domain administrator terminates the service instead of paying. (EDIT: there are other comments saying that Google's support page says that purchases can be accessed even after terminating the domain service. Redditors say otherwise. It appears that Google's support page has jumped the gun on intended functionality that doesn't actually exist yet.) IOW: it's pay to keep your decade of purchases, or fuck you goodbye. Crap like this is why I no longer invest in new Google products, and why I actively recommend alternatives to Google products (literally, "anything but Google") to friends and family who ask.

pxx 5y ago
Your account doesn't disappear. I don't know what Redditors you're listening to but they don't seem to have the full picture. What "intended" functionality are you waiting for here? The documentation exists today on what happens when you cancel Google Workspace: https://support.google.com/a/answer/1257646?hl=en https://support.google.com/a/answer/1257646?hl=en
- JaimeThompson 5y ago
  Google has handled messaging on this horribly. I, like many others, still haven't been officially told by Google.
- Spooky23 5y ago
  The account owners may not, but a domain organizer can whack other accounts when they turn down the tenant. The whole thing is a stupid, poorly conceived initiative which obviously wasn’t planned very well, since the comms from Google are so muddled.
Namidairo 5y ago
> The issue is that Google is dropping all other functionality associated with the accounts, particularly purchases made using these accounts, FWIW, the small handful of people I've mentioned this to are indeed more concerned about their purchases and SSO than their email. It seems takeout is acceptable enough to assuade any email concerns, in their cases.

thomasjudge 5y ago

Oh, great, a class action lawsuit. Upon success the plaintiff's law firm will collect a third+ of the multi-million dollar settlement, and each affected user will get...a coupon for 10% off a year's subscription to G-suite

dannyw 5y ago

I want to understand why I've still not been notified.

sschueller 5y ago
Same here, I have not received anything yet. I have a large amount of domains I setup back in the day.
- iszomer 5y ago
  I was notified back in 2020 and decided to just can the (free) service. The most tedious thing I ever did was to go through my password manager and find every online service account that tied to my GSuite email address for the past decade and either change the email address or deprecate them entirely. What was most interesting of my particular setup was having my GSuite email address forwarded to my regular GMail account and having the ability to compose emails on behalf of the GSuite email address. When I did log into the actual GSuite account, it had close to 5k~ unsolicited emails caught in the spam filter that never got forwarded.
  - kej 5y ago
    Too late for you, but for anyone else or future reference, if you have account 1 forwarding to account 2 you can add a filter on account 1 with the condition "doesn't have the words" and the value "somelonggarbagestringthatwillneverbeinyourmail" and select "never send to spam". That way spam filtering only happens in account 2 where you can check it regularly.
iamben 5y ago
Yeah same. Is it a country thing?
- mattl 5y ago
  I set up my accounts in the UK, so possibly.

croon 5y ago

I've already been paying them $12/month for storage for years, mostly out of laziness, but at least Google One added sharing storage a year or so back so I could add my family. If they added custom domains to Google One I might be tempted to keep it. At this point I might just go over to Microsoft 365 family which has storage, custom domains and extra fluff, as far as I can tell, for cheaper than just the storage at Google. Is outlook that bad?

matt_heimer 5y ago
Hadn't heard about the custom domains on 365, upon researching there is a limitation - "At the moment, we only support connecting domains managed by GoDaddy with Outlook.com" - https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-a-personalized-email-address-in-microsoft-365-75416a58-b225-4c02-8c07-8979403b427b https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/get-a-personalize...
- iofiiiiiiiii 5y ago
  That limitation seems to just be a marketing thing - a few more searches reveal they do not actually check what registrar you use.
blagie 5y ago
Outlook is that bad. That said, at this point, starting from scratch, I'd pick it over Google in a heartbeat.

jahewson 5y ago

I’m pretty mad about this whole thing. All I want is to be able to downgrade my account to a free account - but there’s no way to do that. I have to delete it and everything connected to my Google Account - oauth logins, Nest, Maps, Drive, is collateral damage. I only signed up in the first place to get a custom domain for my personal gmail.

amanzi 5y ago

I have several free G-suite accounts that I use for various domains and services, including one I've used as my primary email for 10+ years. But over the last couple of years, it's become more annoying using the G-suite free accounts, as they aren't as full-featured as newer (paid) G-suite accounts or even free Google accounts. This announcement has finally given me the motivation to finally get rid of these accounts and move to a more modern solution. Unfortunately for Google, I've moved them to a paid M365 account since it has more features, is better specced (e.g. more storage), and is also cheaper. Also - as others have mentioned here, I too haven't received an official notification from Google about the impending decommissioning. If they backtrack on this now, I'll still be off the Google platform and a couple steps closer to getting out of the Google ecosystem completely.

Mindless2112 5y ago
Same boat. I'm not mad. This is just the kick in the pants I needed. I already have a Mail-in-a-Box set up; now I have an unignorable reason to migrate everything.
iofiiiiiiiii 5y ago
M365 is what I am looking at, as well. Can you go into detail about the differences and what you found better with M365?

ChrisArchitect 5y ago

it's not even whether it's a rug pull after all these years or that the timeline of a few months isn't enough -- it's that there doesn't seem to be clear ways to migrate either down to gmail/fee google account or laterally to maintain all the disjointed G services etc. I don't want to download my entire Takeout history and re-establish anything. In my case my 'provider' running G Suite wants to shut it down and I'm happy to pay to continue the service running my own G Suite account/domain, but can't see a way to guarantee safe transfer of my data! Nightmare really.

blagie 5y ago

So now that we need to migrate our families off, what are the best alternatives to Google for personal email / document / etc. accounts?

mittermayr 5y ago
I've moved to MXRoute, just started setting it up yesterday. E-mail is the easier part to solve (it'll cost a bit, but MXRoute has unlimited domains/accounts/aliases, compared to others who charge 'by seat'). The larger problem is Docs, Sheets, and Forms. They don't allow you to change the owner to a non-domain Gmail account. So the plan of creating a regular free Gmail account and then moving everything over won't work. They've put the road blocks at the right places to force people who notice this all too late into upgrades.

sjtindell 5y ago

The company is literally too big to fail or care. Break them up. Make search its own company, and most of the rest will almost surely completely die. And monitor acquisitions ruthlessly going forward.

anon_np 5y ago

Source: https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-hos https://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-hos... "A standard edition of Google Apps for Your Domain is available today as a beta product without cost to domain administrators or end users. Key features include 2 gigabytes of email storage for each user, easy to use customization tools, and help for administrators via email or an online help center. Furthermore, ORGANIZATIONS THAT SIGN UP DURING THE BETA PERIOD WILL NOT EVER HAVE TO PAY FOR USERS ACCEPTED DURING THAT PERIOD (provided Google continues to offer the service)." and Source: https://web.archive.org/web/20070222003704/http://www.google https://web.archive.org/web/20070222003704/http://www.google... "GOOGLE APPS FOR YOUR DOMAIN BETA AGREEMENT [..] 18. Fees. Provided that Google continues to offer the Service to Customer, Google will continue to provide a version of the Service (with substantially the same services as those provided as of the Effective Date) free of charge to Customer; provided that such commitment (i) applies only to End User Accounts created during the period when the Service is considered a beta service (the "Beta Period") by Google (such Beta Period determination at Google's sole discretion), (ii) does not apply to the Domain Service described in Section 4 above, and (iii) may not apply to new opt-in services added by Google to the Service in the future. For sake of clarity, Google reserves the right to offer a premium version of the Service for a fee." -- -np

Aloha 5y ago
I wonder if this is why some us have not been notified about this change. I signed up in 2008, which would have been very early in the services life - well before they offered paid accounts.
Aloha 5y ago
Okay, so here is a non trunkated version of the first link - http://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-hosted-communications_28.html http://googlepress.blogspot.com/2006/08/google-launches-host... "A standard edition of Google Apps for Your Domain is available today as a beta product without cost to domain administrators or end users. Key features include 2 gigabytes of email storage for each user, easy to use customization tools, and help for administrators via email or an online help center. Furthermore, organizations that sign up during the beta period will not ever have to pay for users accepted during that period (provided Google continues to offer the service)." The original version of the TOS from August 2006 read as follows: https://web.archive.org/web/20061029132431/https://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20061029132431/https://www.googl... "16. Modification. Except as provided in Section 17, Google reserves the right to change or modify any of the terms and conditions contained in this Agreement or any policy governing Google Apps, at any time, by posting the new agreement at http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html or such URL as Google may provide. Customer is responsible for regularly reviewing any updates to this Agreement. Any changes or modifications to this Agreement will become binding (i) when made in a writing executed by both parties, (ii) by Customer's online acceptance of updated terms, or (iii) after Customer's continued use of Google Apps after such terms have been updated by Google." "17. No Fees. Provided that Google continues to offer Google Apps for Your Domain to Customer, Google will continue to provide a version of Google Apps for Your Domain (with substantially the same services as those provided as of the Effective Date) free of charge to Customer; provided that such commitment (i) applies only to End User Accounts created during the period when the Google Hosted Services are considered a beta service (the "Beta Period") by Google (such Beta Period determination at Google's sole discretion) and (ii) may not apply to new opt-in services added by Google to the Google Apps for Your Domain in the future. For sake of clarity, Google reserves the right to offer a premium version of Google Apps for Your Domain for a fee." In mid 2007 the language was changed to read the following: https://web.archive.org/web/20070407174217/http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20070407174217/http://www.google... "17. Modification. Except as provided in Section 18, Google reserves the right to change or modify any of the terms and conditions contained in this Agreement or any policy governing the Service, at any time, by posting the new agreement at http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/admins/terms.html or such URL as Google may provide. Customer is responsible for regularly reviewing any updates to this Agreement. Any changes or modifications to this Agreement will become binding (i) when made in a writing executed by both parties, (ii) by Customer's online acceptance of updated terms, or (iii) after Customer's continued use of the Service after such terms have been updated by Google." "18. Fees. Provided that Google continues to offer the Service to Customer, Google will continue to provide a version of the Service (with substantially the same services as those provided as of the Effective Date) free of charge to Customer; provided that such commitment: (i) does not apply to the Domain Service described in Section 4 above; and (ii) may not apply to new opt-in services added by Google to the Service in the future. For sake of clarity, Google reserves the right to offer a premium version of the Service for a fee." This version was persisting thru at least March of 2011: https://web.archive.org/web/20110330181415/http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/terms/standard_terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20110330181415/http://www.google... However by December of 2011, that language was gone: https://web.archive.org/web/20111231230542/http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en/terms/standard_terms.html https://web.archive.org/web/20111231230542/http://www.google...

midrus 5y ago

A workaround that might work if you only care about not losing your custom email address: Transfer your custom domain to Google Domains (you have to pay for your domain registration as usual), as they allow to set up free email forwarding to your free gmail account. This only works if you just want to not lose your email address (as me). Of course this is not a solution if you also rely on calendar, docs, etc...

midrus 5y ago
(*) and don't trust this forwarding is going to be free forever. They might come next year saying forwarding is $100 per message.