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>Google's average employees aren't quite as smart as public perception portrays. Intelligence is a funny thing. People can be the world’s foremost expert in wh

>Google's average employees aren't quite as smart as public perception portrays. Intelligence is a funny thing. People can be the world’s foremost expert in whatever the heck, don’t matter for my point, and be utterly incompetent in every other area of their life if someone else is picking up for them. Think of career scientists giving humiliating public speeches for the first time since high school (industry conferences notwithstanding). That’s not their specialty and they have no reason to be talented at public speaking if they’re not trained in public relations and speaking. Don’t expect a Googler to be able to tie their shoes, drive a car, navigate public transportation or experience empathy just because they get high scores in leetcode. They’re not dependent skills and assuming they are is a sure sign of insufficient critical thought. As far as your solution goes, hard pass. Providing support should be required by law. If you run a service that people depend on for any of the requirements of modern life then you should provide real live human support 24/7/365 or be liable for treble damages and equal fines for all harm this corner cutting costs. If my power goes out my electric company contacts me and tells me how they’re responding before I can even dig out their number. Google is equally important and the sooner people accept the new reality these technocrats have created for us the better off we’ll all be.

logicalmonster 4y ago
> Providing support should be required by law. I'm always extremely wary of the unintended consequences of legislation, and I think such a requirement could create really negative incentives. If organizations were forced to be on the hook for customer service of anything they put online, creating any free stuff would present a business risk. You could say goodbye to many free services online with such a path forward.
- CogitoCogito 4y ago
  > You could say goodbye to many free services online with such a path forward. Maybe that's worth it?
  - sfe22 4y ago
    Not for me, but got some good news for you. If you just use services that meet your needs (offer customer service to your standard), you are already set. Don’t try to use the monopoly that is supposed to work for all of us against me and many others. That makes one a tyrant.
- KptMarchewa 4y ago
  Maybe not "anything they put online" but "anything they put online and require account, reserving an option to terminate it without any human appeal path". I don't need support for Google Search, but would definitely need it for Gmail.
cardosof 4y ago
>Providing support should be required by law. If you run a service that people depend on for any of the requirements of modern life then you should provide real live human support 24/7/365 or be liable for treble damages and equal fines for all harm this corner cutting costs. Yes, exactly this! Unfortunately many people will see this as socialism and reject this kind of regulation.
- edmundsauto 4y ago
  A lot of people also believe the unintended consequences would either take away many things people love, or that it would be so commonly violated as to be toothless and become legislative tech debt.
nonameiguess 4y ago
Your solution would be an unfunded mandate. That's fine if you accept the tradeoffs, but as others have said, the practical upshot is that open-registration services like free Google accounts would just not exist any more. The electrical company's situation is not comparable. You can only get an account by proving you own a property they already run a line to, and at some point, they need to go out and physically run that line to hook you into their grid. If registering a Google account was similar, then sure, they could be expected to provide a similar level of service, but no more anonymous accounts, no more duplicate accounts from the same person, and no 10 figure user base. This, of course, would mean they're no longer as important to you as electricity because the network size is likely the reason you think that.
blindmute 4y ago
I disagree. The service is free; they aren't obligated to do anything. If you want support, pay for it, via Fastmail or the like. People think they are entitled to not only a free email provider, but also free drive storage, free google docs, free search, free SSO, free calendar, and now free support. You're not entitled to any of that.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]

logicalmonster 4y ago

> Providing support should be required by law. I'm always extremely wary of the unintended consequences of legislation, and I think such a requirement could create really negative incentives. If organizations were forced to be on the hook for customer service of anything they put online, creating any free stuff would present a business risk. You could say goodbye to many free services online with such a path forward.

CogitoCogito 4y ago
> You could say goodbye to many free services online with such a path forward. Maybe that's worth it?
- sfe22 4y ago
  Not for me, but got some good news for you. If you just use services that meet your needs (offer customer service to your standard), you are already set. Don’t try to use the monopoly that is supposed to work for all of us against me and many others. That makes one a tyrant.
KptMarchewa 4y ago
Maybe not "anything they put online" but "anything they put online and require account, reserving an option to terminate it without any human appeal path". I don't need support for Google Search, but would definitely need it for Gmail.

cardosof 4y ago

>Providing support should be required by law. If you run a service that people depend on for any of the requirements of modern life then you should provide real live human support 24/7/365 or be liable for treble damages and equal fines for all harm this corner cutting costs. Yes, exactly this! Unfortunately many people will see this as socialism and reject this kind of regulation.

edmundsauto 4y ago
A lot of people also believe the unintended consequences would either take away many things people love, or that it would be so commonly violated as to be toothless and become legislative tech debt.

nonameiguess 4y ago

Your solution would be an unfunded mandate. That's fine if you accept the tradeoffs, but as others have said, the practical upshot is that open-registration services like free Google accounts would just not exist any more. The electrical company's situation is not comparable. You can only get an account by proving you own a property they already run a line to, and at some point, they need to go out and physically run that line to hook you into their grid. If registering a Google account was similar, then sure, they could be expected to provide a similar level of service, but no more anonymous accounts, no more duplicate accounts from the same person, and no 10 figure user base. This, of course, would mean they're no longer as important to you as electricity because the network size is likely the reason you think that.

blindmute 4y ago

I disagree. The service is free; they aren't obligated to do anything. If you want support, pay for it, via Fastmail or the like. People think they are entitled to not only a free email provider, but also free drive storage, free google docs, free search, free SSO, free calendar, and now free support. You're not entitled to any of that.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]