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This seems very pedantic, and doesn't change what i said at all. I'm happy to change it to "wifi helps with a bunch of features they have". AGPS is not even th

This seems very pedantic, and doesn't change what i said at all. I'm happy to change it to "wifi helps with a bunch of features they have". AGPS is not even the only one. Wifi scanning is happening in the phone anyway to know when to switch networks, etc, so they are saving power when it is used instead of cell phone.

dylan604 5y ago
Not when I've turned off the WiFi to conserve battery while out and about not anywhere near wifi signals. Unfortunately, because I've decided to use Bluetooth earbuds, I now leave the bluetooth radio on as well. Until then, that was kept off specifically to avoid bluetooth tracking. GPS is just fine for Garmin, TomToms, etc. Why suddenly for a phone that has WiFi in them Maps suddenly "requires" wifi is just not convincing me of anything other than Googs wants all the data.
pdonis 5y ago
> doesn't change what i said at all Yes, it does. See below. > I'm happy to change it to "wifi helps with a bunch of features they have". This does change what you said, because "a bunch of features they have" is not at all the same as "GPS, a feature which pretty much everybody wants to use and wants to start fast". > Wifi scanning is happening in the phone anyway to know when to switch networks, etc Not if wifi is turned off. If I'm in my car, for example, I might well turn wifi off to prevent the phone from wasting power scanning for wifi networks that aren't there. But I'm still going to have my cell phone connection on. > they are saving power when it is used instead of cell phone. Nonsense. See above. Plus, the cell phone antenna is always scanning too, but on a phone it is far less likely to be turned off to prevent that than wifi is. What I really can't understand is how any of this is connected to your (correct) claim that search is hard and content curation is hard and so we shouldn't expect Google, or anyone else, to just magically solve it. Google could easily serve the needs of users much better than it does, even if it can't do it perfectly. But it won't because it's not in the business of serving user needs, it's in the business of serving advertiser needs, and serving users is just a by-product. If Google really wants to solve the problems of users, instead of advertisers, it should have users pay them instead of advertisers. But of course it won't since it has spent more than two decades now getting users used to the idea that search and other "hard" services should magically appear for free, and hoping those users won't notice that they are actually the product, not the customer.
- DannyBee 5y ago
  "Google could easily serve the needs of users much better than it does, even if it can't do it perfectly. But it won't because it's not in the business of serving user needs, it's in the business of serving advertiser needs, and serving users is just a by-product." This is such a uncharitable assumption i don't even know where to begin. Nobody can serve everyone well. Trying is a quick ticket to failure. The choice not to serve certain people is clearly the correct one, even if one could theoretically do more than you do now. Why isn't the simpler, more charitable answer that they are just serving the majority of their large userbase, or whoever in that user base they care about? Why is it everyone who feels like they aren't served has to decide the reason is because someone is doing the wrong thing, rather than "guess i'm not the user they are looking for". As for whether you can do more - Good strategy (and product choices) are framed as mutually exclusive choices: https://hbr.org/2012/09/bringing-science-to-the-art-of-strategy https://hbr.org/2012/09/bringing-science-to-the-art-of-strat... That is always going to make someone upset, because yes, you could do something more than you do for them. That doesn't make that path make any sense. Trying to do more of everything for everyone is pretending that you don't need to make choices, and that those choices don't have consequences (for example, what users you will retain or not). That is, as i said, a quick ticket to failure.
  - pdonis 5y ago
    > Nobody can serve everyone well. I never claimed that anyone could. You are attacking a straw man. You are completely ignoring the actual point I made, which is that Google is a business, and every business serves the needs of those who pay it money, and in Google's case that is not its users, it's advertisers. So serving user needs has to be a by-product. > Why isn't the simpler, more charitable answer that they are just serving the majority of their large userbase, or whoever in that user base they care about? Why isn't the simpler, more obvious answer the one I gave, that Google, like every business, serves its paying customers first, and users are not paying customers? You seem to be going to extraordinary lengths to ignore this obvious fact.
  - andrepd 5y ago
    On the contrary, yours is a befuddlingly charitable explanation. Why on earth would an advertisement company like google, a joint-stock company, be "trying to serve the users' needs"?? They make money by pushing as many ads onto users as possible, almost by definition they must be doing the opposite of serving the users' needs x)
b112 5y ago
My wifi is never on. This attitude is what is broken at google. You do a thing (wifi alway on), so clearly everyone does, and therefore clearly we should force it!
- DannyBee 5y ago
  Yes, it's everyone else's fault they don't cater to you. How dare they. Why do you think you know their users better than they do? What data do you even have? The much simpler explanation, given that the product doesn't seem to be failing by any measure, is that maybe you just aren't who they are targeting? One of the main reasons products fail is because they try to please everyone, and have so many knobs that the UI is horrible. Good product design requires choice. You don't like those choices. Okay, awesome, it's not the product for you. That doesn't make it the wrong choice, or a bad design. It just means you aren't in the user base they are catering to. Most of the time, if it turns out the user base thy are catering to is unsustainable, the product will fail, and something that does cater to that user base will take over. So how is this not a uniformly good thing? The market has products for people who like different things - those users will decide what wins or not.
  - dylan604 5y ago
    Clearly, being a google hiring person means you will never see the other side of this. So I really feel like every reply is just wasted electrons. Google does not need WiFi in order to give directions to locations in the Maps application. However, gaining access to WiFi locations is beneficial to Googs in other fashions. They choose to force people to do it for their gain, not the benefit of the Maps user. Now, you're trying to say that because some people are technically aware about things and have become vocal and push back against the tide that is Googs' overreaching into people's lives is some how in the wrong. You also seem to be implying that the fact that the vast majority of people are not vocal on the point makes it okay even though they have no idea what is actually occurring. Since they are not complaining, everything is okay, right? That's not how that works.
  - b112 5y ago
    You literally have zero idea what you are talking about. The location options for wifi or not, are in android settings, part of system wide settings. No change to google maps will make this setting disappear. It is not an extra control google maps can drop. Your entire UI tact us baseless, and makes zero sense. You're been spreading misinformation and misconceptions through this entire thread. Can you at least argue with facts?

dylan604 5y ago

Not when I've turned off the WiFi to conserve battery while out and about not anywhere near wifi signals. Unfortunately, because I've decided to use Bluetooth earbuds, I now leave the bluetooth radio on as well. Until then, that was kept off specifically to avoid bluetooth tracking. GPS is just fine for Garmin, TomToms, etc. Why suddenly for a phone that has WiFi in them Maps suddenly "requires" wifi is just not convincing me of anything other than Googs wants all the data.

pdonis 5y ago

> doesn't change what i said at all Yes, it does. See below. > I'm happy to change it to "wifi helps with a bunch of features they have". This does change what you said, because "a bunch of features they have" is not at all the same as "GPS, a feature which pretty much everybody wants to use and wants to start fast". > Wifi scanning is happening in the phone anyway to know when to switch networks, etc Not if wifi is turned off. If I'm in my car, for example, I might well turn wifi off to prevent the phone from wasting power scanning for wifi networks that aren't there. But I'm still going to have my cell phone connection on. > they are saving power when it is used instead of cell phone. Nonsense. See above. Plus, the cell phone antenna is always scanning too, but on a phone it is far less likely to be turned off to prevent that than wifi is. What I really can't understand is how any of this is connected to your (correct) claim that search is hard and content curation is hard and so we shouldn't expect Google, or anyone else, to just magically solve it. Google could easily serve the needs of users much better than it does, even if it can't do it perfectly. But it won't because it's not in the business of serving user needs, it's in the business of serving advertiser needs, and serving users is just a by-product. If Google really wants to solve the problems of users, instead of advertisers, it should have users pay them instead of advertisers. But of course it won't since it has spent more than two decades now getting users used to the idea that search and other "hard" services should magically appear for free, and hoping those users won't notice that they are actually the product, not the customer.

DannyBee 5y ago
"Google could easily serve the needs of users much better than it does, even if it can't do it perfectly. But it won't because it's not in the business of serving user needs, it's in the business of serving advertiser needs, and serving users is just a by-product." This is such a uncharitable assumption i don't even know where to begin. Nobody can serve everyone well. Trying is a quick ticket to failure. The choice not to serve certain people is clearly the correct one, even if one could theoretically do more than you do now. Why isn't the simpler, more charitable answer that they are just serving the majority of their large userbase, or whoever in that user base they care about? Why is it everyone who feels like they aren't served has to decide the reason is because someone is doing the wrong thing, rather than "guess i'm not the user they are looking for". As for whether you can do more - Good strategy (and product choices) are framed as mutually exclusive choices: https://hbr.org/2012/09/bringing-science-to-the-art-of-strategy https://hbr.org/2012/09/bringing-science-to-the-art-of-strat... That is always going to make someone upset, because yes, you could do something more than you do for them. That doesn't make that path make any sense. Trying to do more of everything for everyone is pretending that you don't need to make choices, and that those choices don't have consequences (for example, what users you will retain or not). That is, as i said, a quick ticket to failure.
- pdonis 5y ago
  > Nobody can serve everyone well. I never claimed that anyone could. You are attacking a straw man. You are completely ignoring the actual point I made, which is that Google is a business, and every business serves the needs of those who pay it money, and in Google's case that is not its users, it's advertisers. So serving user needs has to be a by-product. > Why isn't the simpler, more charitable answer that they are just serving the majority of their large userbase, or whoever in that user base they care about? Why isn't the simpler, more obvious answer the one I gave, that Google, like every business, serves its paying customers first, and users are not paying customers? You seem to be going to extraordinary lengths to ignore this obvious fact.
- andrepd 5y ago
  On the contrary, yours is a befuddlingly charitable explanation. Why on earth would an advertisement company like google, a joint-stock company, be "trying to serve the users' needs"?? They make money by pushing as many ads onto users as possible, almost by definition they must be doing the opposite of serving the users' needs x)

b112 5y ago

My wifi is never on. This attitude is what is broken at google. You do a thing (wifi alway on), so clearly everyone does, and therefore clearly we should force it!

DannyBee 5y ago
Yes, it's everyone else's fault they don't cater to you. How dare they. Why do you think you know their users better than they do? What data do you even have? The much simpler explanation, given that the product doesn't seem to be failing by any measure, is that maybe you just aren't who they are targeting? One of the main reasons products fail is because they try to please everyone, and have so many knobs that the UI is horrible. Good product design requires choice. You don't like those choices. Okay, awesome, it's not the product for you. That doesn't make it the wrong choice, or a bad design. It just means you aren't in the user base they are catering to. Most of the time, if it turns out the user base thy are catering to is unsustainable, the product will fail, and something that does cater to that user base will take over. So how is this not a uniformly good thing? The market has products for people who like different things - those users will decide what wins or not.
- dylan604 5y ago
  Clearly, being a google hiring person means you will never see the other side of this. So I really feel like every reply is just wasted electrons. Google does not need WiFi in order to give directions to locations in the Maps application. However, gaining access to WiFi locations is beneficial to Googs in other fashions. They choose to force people to do it for their gain, not the benefit of the Maps user. Now, you're trying to say that because some people are technically aware about things and have become vocal and push back against the tide that is Googs' overreaching into people's lives is some how in the wrong. You also seem to be implying that the fact that the vast majority of people are not vocal on the point makes it okay even though they have no idea what is actually occurring. Since they are not complaining, everything is okay, right? That's not how that works.
- b112 5y ago
  You literally have zero idea what you are talking about. The location options for wifi or not, are in android settings, part of system wide settings. No change to google maps will make this setting disappear. It is not an extra control google maps can drop. Your entire UI tact us baseless, and makes zero sense. You're been spreading misinformation and misconceptions through this entire thread. Can you at least argue with facts?