5 ms·

What is disturbing is that this direct contact is the exception and not the norm for their level of customer service. This shows how complacent Google is in the

by m-p-3 4y ago

What is disturbing is that this direct contact is the exception and not the norm for their level of customer service. This shows how complacent Google is in their almost dominant position, and will only go to an acceptable level of support if their moderator's AI dark-patterns makes them look bad.

margalabargala 4y ago
I'm still willing to celebrate this happening. An exception to normally bad behavior, and the first instance of a genuine change in approach, look identical. Example: how many people here were skeptical of Microsoft having a change of heart regarding open source back in 2012? And now a decade later, it's clear that was genuine.
- xigoi 4y ago
  I'm still not convinced about that. For one, they're running the biggest closed-source Git hosting service (GitHub) and exploiting open-source projects to fuel their paid proprietary service (Copilot).
  - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
    Open-source does not mean “I won’t try to earn money from this.”
    - xigoi 4y ago
      But it does mean “the source is available”, which it isn't for both GitHub and Copilot.
      - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
        When were GitHub and copilot announced to be open source?
        xigoi 4y ago
        Nowhere. But I don't think it's fair for proprietary code to use open-source code, especially if it's licensed under the GPL. And having the biggest collection of open-source software run on a proprietary system is just absurd.
        mhio 4y ago
        How far do you take that stance though? At that level, should anyone even be using Linux or BSD?
- mulmen 4y ago
  You had me until that example. There is no way I will ever trust Microsoft. Nothing is clear about Microsoft embracing open source. Github isn’t open source. Neither is Windows, SQL Server, or Office. And I’m not thrilled about their involvement with Linux. EEE is in their blood. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me thrice, you’re Microsoft.
  - margalabargala 4y ago
    I'm not surprised that there are people with this view, but I can't agree. They've had 4 years to ruin github, and haven't. Open-sourcing .NET Core, VS Code, powershell, etc and actively creating/supporting WSL is a huge change from their behavior in the 90s. I don't use any of their software, but watching from a distance they appear to have been moving in a "good" direction for the last decade.
    - mulmen 4y ago
      The problem with Microsoft isn’t the licensing. It’s the constant quest for control and the abuse of power. Look at Windows 10 dark patterns. I prefer that the organization responsible for those abuses stays away from Linux, and anything else I actually use.
      - margalabargala 4y ago
        I don't think Microsoft is a "good" company. Agree with all the Win10 dark patterns, not to mention news like this from today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31600848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31600848 As you say, the problem with Microsoft isn't the licensing. 25 years ago, licensing was among the problems with Microsoft. Today it is not. This is an aspect of Microsoft changing, for the better. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_and_open_source#Initial_stance_on_open_source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_and_open_source#Init...
  - jstummbillig 4y ago
    If there is nothing that could ever convince you, you will be increasingly wrong and ignorable. I don't know why anyone would willfully choose obsolescence and wear it as a badge of honor.
- bogwog 4y ago
  > And now a decade later, it's clear that was genuine. It's certainly not "clear". Just because they make a code editor you like doesn't mean they're not planning to fuck you over the moment they reach some internal milestones and priorities get shuffled around. The tech industry moves fast, but the one thing you can always count on is that you should never trust Microsoft, neither as a consumer nor as a business partner. EDIT: unless you're a masochist
- jancsika 4y ago
  > An exception to normally bad behavior, and the first instance of a genuine change in approach, look identical. No, they probably don't. Take for example this example prank by the Yes Men: > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiWlvBro9eI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiWlvBro9eI The beauty of the prank was that the company then had to send a real spokesperson out to explicitly state that "Steve, yes," was the wrong answer to the question, "Do you now accept responsibility for what happened?" In fact I'll boldly claim you have never seen a genuine change in approach from a company of this size that wasn't forced by a settlement with the government or criminal prosecution(s). Edit: I'll go ahead and admit I'd love to read about the exceptions to my last paragraph, but only in terms of companies the size of Google.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  > I'm still willing to celebrate this happening. An exception to normally bad behavior, and the first instance of a genuine change in approach, look identical. That why they do it. For you. If the story that got some play in the media gets very publicly fixed (after being completely promoted from the regular support flow), people will will defend them, although nothing has changed.
- teddyh 4y ago
  > it's clear that was genuine. And yet, barely six months ago… https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29579994 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29579994
deleted 4y ago
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jstummbillig 4y ago
Or it just shows that supporting a couple of billion people is an unprecedented problem and the solutions are still in the works. It shows what you want it to show.
- spookthesunset 4y ago
  I think people forget about the scale a company like google has to operate at.
  - BeefWellington 4y ago
    Simply saying "scale" is not an automatic pass for these kinds of failures. If anything, their scale should permit them to easily do better.
    - pessimizer 4y ago
      Dysconomies of scale? Sounds like Google should be arguing that they should be broken up if these are inevitable.
  - abofh 4y ago
    Which only demonstrates the unconscionability of their behavior. If I have an issue with Amazon, I get a person. If I have an issue with stripe, I get a person. If I have an issue with literally any other vendor I have a relationship with, I get a person. With Google, I have a lovely time chatting with auto responders. They choose to enter the market and fail to serve their customers - that's on them, failure at scale is still failure.
    - jstummbillig 4y ago
      There are countless companies who operate on a much smaller scale than Google that will give you a very hard time trying to get in touch with a (competent) human, which you should easily be able to acknowledge if you live in the same world I do and are being honest. Also I have talked to Google support staff of different levels on numerous occasions. Not saying it's great (I would rate my experience as average across all their products but I am aware that the n is too small to be significant), just that being polemic and pretending it doesn't exist is not helping any serious discourse. The only thing we learn here is that everyone is trying to figure shit out all the time and customer support is a hard problem.
brnt 4y ago
It's core to Google to 'automate' customer interaction. It's the same dark pattern as Byzantine bureaucracy, just without the personell expenses. It serves as a filter; Google's and bureaucracy's interest is to do the absolute minimum, and it works. Just like with bureaucracy, the winning move is to avoid playing, or not working with the system but around it.
dan-robertson 4y ago
I thought the norm was ‘to get support at Google you should reach out to personal contacts there or hit the front page of HN/get a lot of retweets/otherwise become obvious (in a non-harassing way) to many Google employees’ so this sounds like the norm to me? Maybe we just have different views of what the norm is or what ‘the norm’ means as a phrase.
fluidcruft 4y ago
It's exactly trivial to install F-Droid and once you've done that, then why even care about the trials and tribulations of closed-source serfs of the Google Play Store?
deleted 4y ago
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- deleted 4y ago
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by m-p-3 4y ago

margalabargala 4y ago

I'm still willing to celebrate this happening. An exception to normally bad behavior, and the first instance of a genuine change in approach, look identical. Example: how many people here were skeptical of Microsoft having a change of heart regarding open source back in 2012? And now a decade later, it's clear that was genuine.

xigoi 4y ago
I'm still not convinced about that. For one, they're running the biggest closed-source Git hosting service (GitHub) and exploiting open-source projects to fuel their paid proprietary service (Copilot).
- TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
  Open-source does not mean “I won’t try to earn money from this.”
  - xigoi 4y ago
    But it does mean “the source is available”, which it isn't for both GitHub and Copilot.
    - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
      When were GitHub and copilot announced to be open source?
      - xigoi 4y ago
        Nowhere. But I don't think it's fair for proprietary code to use open-source code, especially if it's licensed under the GPL. And having the biggest collection of open-source software run on a proprietary system is just absurd.
        mhio 4y ago
        How far do you take that stance though? At that level, should anyone even be using Linux or BSD?
mulmen 4y ago
You had me until that example. There is no way I will ever trust Microsoft. Nothing is clear about Microsoft embracing open source. Github isn’t open source. Neither is Windows, SQL Server, or Office. And I’m not thrilled about their involvement with Linux. EEE is in their blood. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me thrice, you’re Microsoft.
- margalabargala 4y ago
  I'm not surprised that there are people with this view, but I can't agree. They've had 4 years to ruin github, and haven't. Open-sourcing .NET Core, VS Code, powershell, etc and actively creating/supporting WSL is a huge change from their behavior in the 90s. I don't use any of their software, but watching from a distance they appear to have been moving in a "good" direction for the last decade.
  - mulmen 4y ago
    The problem with Microsoft isn’t the licensing. It’s the constant quest for control and the abuse of power. Look at Windows 10 dark patterns. I prefer that the organization responsible for those abuses stays away from Linux, and anything else I actually use.
    - margalabargala 4y ago
      I don't think Microsoft is a "good" company. Agree with all the Win10 dark patterns, not to mention news like this from today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31600848 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31600848 As you say, the problem with Microsoft isn't the licensing. 25 years ago, licensing was among the problems with Microsoft. Today it is not. This is an aspect of Microsoft changing, for the better. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_and_open_source#Initial_stance_on_open_source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_and_open_source#Init...
- jstummbillig 4y ago
  If there is nothing that could ever convince you, you will be increasingly wrong and ignorable. I don't know why anyone would willfully choose obsolescence and wear it as a badge of honor.
bogwog 4y ago
> And now a decade later, it's clear that was genuine. It's certainly not "clear". Just because they make a code editor you like doesn't mean they're not planning to fuck you over the moment they reach some internal milestones and priorities get shuffled around. The tech industry moves fast, but the one thing you can always count on is that you should never trust Microsoft, neither as a consumer nor as a business partner. EDIT: unless you're a masochist
jancsika 4y ago
> An exception to normally bad behavior, and the first instance of a genuine change in approach, look identical. No, they probably don't. Take for example this example prank by the Yes Men: > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiWlvBro9eI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiWlvBro9eI The beauty of the prank was that the company then had to send a real spokesperson out to explicitly state that "Steve, yes," was the wrong answer to the question, "Do you now accept responsibility for what happened?" In fact I'll boldly claim you have never seen a genuine change in approach from a company of this size that wasn't forced by a settlement with the government or criminal prosecution(s). Edit: I'll go ahead and admit I'd love to read about the exceptions to my last paragraph, but only in terms of companies the size of Google.
pessimizer 4y ago
> I'm still willing to celebrate this happening. An exception to normally bad behavior, and the first instance of a genuine change in approach, look identical. That why they do it. For you. If the story that got some play in the media gets very publicly fixed (after being completely promoted from the regular support flow), people will will defend them, although nothing has changed.
teddyh 4y ago
> it's clear that was genuine. And yet, barely six months ago… https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29579994 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29579994

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

jstummbillig 4y ago

Or it just shows that supporting a couple of billion people is an unprecedented problem and the solutions are still in the works. It shows what you want it to show.

spookthesunset 4y ago
I think people forget about the scale a company like google has to operate at.
- BeefWellington 4y ago
  Simply saying "scale" is not an automatic pass for these kinds of failures. If anything, their scale should permit them to easily do better.
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    Dysconomies of scale? Sounds like Google should be arguing that they should be broken up if these are inevitable.
- abofh 4y ago
  Which only demonstrates the unconscionability of their behavior. If I have an issue with Amazon, I get a person. If I have an issue with stripe, I get a person. If I have an issue with literally any other vendor I have a relationship with, I get a person. With Google, I have a lovely time chatting with auto responders. They choose to enter the market and fail to serve their customers - that's on them, failure at scale is still failure.
  - jstummbillig 4y ago
    There are countless companies who operate on a much smaller scale than Google that will give you a very hard time trying to get in touch with a (competent) human, which you should easily be able to acknowledge if you live in the same world I do and are being honest. Also I have talked to Google support staff of different levels on numerous occasions. Not saying it's great (I would rate my experience as average across all their products but I am aware that the n is too small to be significant), just that being polemic and pretending it doesn't exist is not helping any serious discourse. The only thing we learn here is that everyone is trying to figure shit out all the time and customer support is a hard problem.

brnt 4y ago

It's core to Google to 'automate' customer interaction. It's the same dark pattern as Byzantine bureaucracy, just without the personell expenses. It serves as a filter; Google's and bureaucracy's interest is to do the absolute minimum, and it works. Just like with bureaucracy, the winning move is to avoid playing, or not working with the system but around it.

dan-robertson 4y ago

I thought the norm was ‘to get support at Google you should reach out to personal contacts there or hit the front page of HN/get a lot of retweets/otherwise become obvious (in a non-harassing way) to many Google employees’ so this sounds like the norm to me? Maybe we just have different views of what the norm is or what ‘the norm’ means as a phrase.

fluidcruft 4y ago

It's exactly trivial to install F-Droid and once you've done that, then why even care about the trials and tribulations of closed-source serfs of the Google Play Store?

deleted 4y ago

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deleted 4y ago
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