5 ms·

I'm very conflicted on google. When I am an actual customer, e.g. nexus/pixel devices, g-suite, google fi, google fiber, I tend to like their products. But I

I'm very conflicted on google. When I am an actual customer, e.g. nexus/pixel devices, g-suite, google fi, google fiber, I tend to like their products. But I have long since stopped using Google Search. I use Firefox as my browser. I'm slowly transitioning my @gmail.com to my own custom domain (still hosted at g-suite though. for now). They've killed off a number of products I've used over the years. Wave. Hangouts. Reader. And more. Google could be a dozen or more companies and I'd be fine with it. In fact, I think it would be a good thing for it to be broken up along a few different lines.

bsimpson 3y ago
Google offered custom domain support to individuals decades ago, and slowly pivoted that offering to become Google Workspace. Their systems don't differentiate between personal users with a custom domain and giant-ass corporations. As such, many Google products reject logins from custom domains until the offering is beefed-up to meet enterprise demands. Music and Photos started this way, but eventually upgraded to allow custom domain accounts. Stadia was always gmail-only. Google One too. Home/Nest kind of works with a custom domain, but you can't share your devices with family members. There was a whole year there where it stopped allowing you to set reminders from a custom domain, and it still doesn't reliably work. It's been a long time since I've set up a Google account - you might be able to use a non-gmail domain now and still be treated as a person (e.g. an iCloud user who wants to login to non-gmail Google products), but stay away from any sort of Workspace account as an individual.
aworks 3y ago
I'm somehow the opposite. I'm fine with gmail and search. But I was disatisfied with my Nexus and Pixel phones, due to quality and support and with my Google Assistance device, which didn't match my use cases as well as Alexa devices. And I found good alternatives to Reader and I also switched to Microsoft 365. So a mixed result overall.

bsimpson 3y ago

Google offered custom domain support to individuals decades ago, and slowly pivoted that offering to become Google Workspace. Their systems don't differentiate between personal users with a custom domain and giant-ass corporations. As such, many Google products reject logins from custom domains until the offering is beefed-up to meet enterprise demands. Music and Photos started this way, but eventually upgraded to allow custom domain accounts. Stadia was always gmail-only. Google One too. Home/Nest kind of works with a custom domain, but you can't share your devices with family members. There was a whole year there where it stopped allowing you to set reminders from a custom domain, and it still doesn't reliably work. It's been a long time since I've set up a Google account - you might be able to use a non-gmail domain now and still be treated as a person (e.g. an iCloud user who wants to login to non-gmail Google products), but stay away from any sort of Workspace account as an individual.

aworks 3y ago

I'm somehow the opposite. I'm fine with gmail and search. But I was disatisfied with my Nexus and Pixel phones, due to quality and support and with my Google Assistance device, which didn't match my use cases as well as Alexa devices. And I found good alternatives to Reader and I also switched to Microsoft 365. So a mixed result overall.