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Google figured out how to create a classless suite of internet services for anyone on Earth with an internet connection to use. I struggle to see how this didn'
by WarmWash 3mo ago
Google figured out how to create a classless suite of internet services for anyone on Earth with an internet connection to use. I struggle to see how this didn't meet their original goals, what people celebrated about Google, and what made Google such an attractive place for people like the author to work.
What's fascinating is that Google gets virtually zero recognition for this (Google services are largely taken for granted), and beyond that, Google is one of the most hated corporations for it.
So if we use Google as a case study for "progressive business", having mostly succeeded at giving the poorest people one Earth an equal product to the richest people on Earth, what is the takeaway?
- mannanj 3mo agoWhich product(s) are equal to the products richest people on earth use?
- vineyardmike 3mo agoBillionaires use Gmail alongside impoverished people across the world.
- izacus 3mo agoGoogle Maps, YouTube, Google Search, Google Docs, GMail and even Google phones.
- WarmWash 3mo agoIt should be read as the same product from google, not the same product across the market of products. We can snag on technicalities like Pixel phones, yt premium, and gemini quotas, but by and large, a kid in the Indian slums is using the same Google suite as a house wife in the Hamptons.
- mannanj 3mo agoOK sure, Google deserves credit for that. On the other hand, they also directly contribute to the technical addiction and attention economy that has created more depression and a lower quality of life for most people on earth. Maybe google taking responsibility for that can help improve their reputation. is the correct answer what you are saying though, to pretend this other bad thing hasn't happened and only say google can do good?
- gghackernewsgg 3mo ago> that has created more depression and a lower quality of life for most people on earth. Very strong claim. Any sources for the "most people on Earth" part?
- mannanj 3mo agoMost people on earth: Let's just look at how many people use technology. How many use it? And how many are obviously also using it more than 4 hours/day to consume information in a fashion that doesnt' serve their health, connection or wellbeing? Those statistics are widely known and accepted. Do you need me to provide evidence from that?
- warkdarrior 3mo agoYes, please point to the statistics showing that most people on Earth are depressed.
- mannanj 3mo ago
- alwa 3mo agoI mean… not to put too fine a point on it, but… jeevacation@gmail.com
- mannanj 3mo agoah. so this is a Jefrey Epstein email, not sure if its his. are you saying the emails implicate a difference in what systems the rich use versus normal people? something like that?
- arjie 3mo agoIn general, this is just the Copenhagen Interpretation of Ethics combined with armchair quarterbacking. Google’s services, like Amazon’s, create unbelievably large amounts of value for people of which these companies capture a tiny fraction. However, these are fairly popular brands with positive associations for the majority of people. Online commentary is from a self-selected group and cynicism stands in as the poor man’s substitute for analysis.
- pluralmonad 3mo agoFirst time I've heard somebody call recognizing the evils of ad tech cynicism.
- smalltorch 3mo agoWell, they aren't hated for the tech they built, that is cool and easily appreciated. People don't like google because they turned it into a way to sell people to others for a profit in essence. Over time more and more intrusive to the point where they are no longer worth any of the services they offer. Like a creepy stalker following you every where you go, at some point you need a restraining order. Most people don't even realize the creepy stalker exists though.
- jeffbee 3mo ago> People don't like google I only wanted to clarify that you must have implied that this statement applies among people who don't like Google, but whatever their reasons, those people are few. In aggregate, Google has a strong reputation and is one of the most well-liked businesses on Earth. It is on par with Cheerios. Disliking Google for "creepy stalker" reasons is not a mainstream thing.
- pluralmonad 3mo agoYour clarification aligns perfectly with the final statement in GPs comment. Most people do not realize the extent and invasiveness of googles voyeurism.
- jeffbee 3mo ago[flagged]
- godwinson__4-8 3mo agoWrong. Most people don't care and think it's a fair exchange. This trend of infantilizing people instead of acknowledging other adults may not share your perspective is pretty irritating. People want free stuff. Most people understand their lives are boring and that really no one cares. Their "data" is only valuable in aggregate. In return they get "free" services. How does this betray anyone's understanding? No one at Google is watching you have sex. They don't care. Your own government is more likely to spy on you in such a "voyeuristic" manner. Google doesn't give a shit. Have you been on the ad buying side? There are far more invasive data collectors than Google, delivering consumers far less utility. It seems like the only person not making the correct realizations here is you. People are told time and time again by people like you about how invasive Google is. Yet they keep using it. What should we do, send them to your personally owned indoctrination camps? No one cares. Believe people when they vote with their time and their wallet. You don't get to tell people what they think because in your mind they are insufficiently brainwashed. "Most people would agree with me if they knew what I knew" after repeated evidence to the contrary is akin to psychosis.
- skybrian 3mo agoYes, both rich and poor people will use Google's free services. It's sort of like how a can of Coke is the same no matter who you are. But also, Google sells plenty of "premium" products to people who are willing to pay, starting with YouTube premium. And I'm getting lots of upsells when using Google Meet these days.
- Ferret7446 3mo agoIt's the age old topic of whether people would rather pay for a product or get ads. Everyone says they'll pay, but like an addict that says they'll quit, they all opt for the ads
- shevy-java 3mo agoThey de-facto created a monopoly. You can reason that its services are useful, but without also pointing out that they established a de-facto monopoly, this "analysis" is very incomplete. > what people celebrated about Google When exactly? Google initially was not anywhere near as problematic as it is today. I don't see many celebrate Google these days. > what made Google such an attractive place for people like the author to work. Was it ever? It also feels it used to be more attractive in the past. Nowadays you do not see any such yubilant posts about Google anymore. People complain a lot more about Google. > What's fascinating is that Google gets virtually zero recognition for this (Google services are largely taken for granted), and beyond that, Google is one of the most hated corporations for it. That's also not true. Some of Google's service are still popular such as Google Maps. You see very little criticism about it. But in other parts, Google revealed how truly evil it is. Be it the fight against ublock origin or Google locking down Android or dominating the www via abusing adChromium. Nope, sorry, the criticism against Google is totally warranted. Years ago I did not understand the de-google movement. Now I am of the opposite opinion and even more extreme. I think Google has to be removed from this planet as entity. Someone needs to chop it up. The US courts are too corrupt and bribed to change anything. I think the people need to fix Google, by no longer using it. This is difficult, I get it; I am still using Google, such as youtube. That's actually my biggest use case of Google. The browser (thorium) is the second loophole here but in theory I could use firefox. > So if we use Google as a case study for "progressive business", having mostly succeeded at giving the poorest people one Earth an equal product to the richest people on Earth, what is the takeaway? That's like saying Al Capone is a saint. You try to connect evil with good. There is no connection here. Google remains an evil corporation even if it makes useful services. But it also kills existing services - look at the Google graveyard. Look how they crippled its search engine. Google pisses off people - why do you not see this? You basically wrote an eulogy for Google here. No specific criticism at all.
- jjtheblunt 3mo agowhat monopoly did they create? it seems they have competitors in everything they do.
- 3mo ago
- jmyeet 3mo ago> Google is one of the most hated corporations for it. This is such a terminally online take. It's important to not look at the bubble you're in and get fooled into thinking it's a representative microcosm when it almost never is. I'm reminded of when Quora was hyped up on HN and in Silicon Valley in general. VCs were waxing lyrical about how "everyone" they knew was using it but "everyone" here was "everyone they knew", which is a subset of "everyone in the VC/SV space". Google is not hated by the general public. My basis for this is the 2025 Harris poll on company reputation [1]. [1]: https://www.axios.com/2025/05/20/axios-harris-poll-company-reputation-ranking https://www.axios.com/2025/05/20/axios-harris-poll-company-r...
- godelski 3mo ago> What's fascinating is that Google gets virtually zero recognition for this, and beyond that, Google is one of the most hated corporations for it. The hate it's about what they did with the power they gained. You can both love and hate something at the same time. Humans have complexity and nuance, don't dismiss that. It's also worth noting that complaints are more vocal than complements. If things are working well then it's usually quiet. Nothing to say. But when shit goes wrong people talk because they want it fixed. Don't let this bias fool you into thinking that appreciation isn't happening. Appreciation is generally silent while hatred is vocal. That's not isolated to the internet either
- dismalaf 3mo ago> The hate it's about what they did with the power they gained. Which is??? Serve ads without selling data? I'm not sure if y'all are aware, but CC companies sell your data. Your telecom provider sells your data. Banks sell your data. Google figured out a system to sell access while keeping your privacy. And somehow they're more hated than people who just straight up give your data away. If most people hate Google all this proves is that most people are retarded.
- godwinson__4-8 3mo agoI share your sentiments re google exactly. But the credit card and banks point is also understated. Google innovates. CCs are basically a monopoly/duopoly, a private tax on an economy where increasingly everyone uses credit for everything. They make money on these transaction costs and banks issuing them make money charging insane interest when your neighbors fall behind, trapping them in a debt cycle. And yes, your purchases get aggregated into data sales. Have credit cards innovated? Has your bank innovated? At least with Google their services are largely good and they actually innovate at shocking scale. Especially if you are paying for their products it is hard to argue Drive or YouTube haven't gotten better. You're complaining about ads but you want YouTube to be free? Who is going to pay for it? Meanwhile has your credit card gotten better? Why is the CEO of MasterCard making millions of dollars? If you had to pick the thing in your pocket that is preying on you and you pick your phone, you're not thinking clearly. The answer is your credit card.
- hn_throwaway_99 3mo ago> What's fascinating is that Google gets virtually zero recognition for this (Google services are largely taken for granted), and beyond that, Google is one of the most hated corporations for it. I feel like this is some majorly false revisionist history. At least in my circles, Google was revered and lauded up until 2010-2012 or so, whenever enshittification started in earnest. And this isn't just some outsider opinion. Look at some of the original early Google communication where they highlighted how their ads were always separate and easily identifiable from organic results, and how that eroded over the years. Heck, there was a front page article today on NYTimes, https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/20/technology/google-ai-open-web.html https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/20/technology/google-ai-open..., talking about how Google used to be an "open Internet champion" and is now an "AI gatekeeper". Google's corporate ethos from their early years is basically unrecognizable today, and that's why people hate them. The hate towards Google only started picking up steam as they snowballed into deciding (like pretty much all corporate enterprises) that growth at all costs is the only purpose of corporations, and when they became the poster child (rightfully so IMO) for surveillance capitalism.
- kccqzy 3mo agoThe New York Times is actually part of the reason why Google’s reputation went downhill. Somewhere around 2010–2015, the NYT and other traditional newspapers finally woke up and realized that their traditional job of disseminating information to the masses had been supplanted by a new generation of tech companies including Google and Meta. So the NYT and other newspapers soured their opinions around the time. If you read the NYT, just like many intellectuals do for priding themselves for reading a serious publication, your opinions of Google would have drastically changed around that timeframe too. However among my circle of friends (who are in general not readers of the NYT), the main reason Google became hated was shutting down products (starting from Reader, culminating in Inbox) and launching duplicative products (how many chat apps did Google have). The hate had absolutely nothing to do with surveillance capitalism. If anything people hated Meta for that; Google’s role in surveillance capitalism was basically nil compared to Meta.
- atomicfiredoll 3mo ago
- asdewqqwer 3mo agoWell, maybe because of the two ungrateful college students who dared to write in their essay the following notorious statement: > We expect that advertising funded search engines will be inherently biased towards the advertisers and away from the needs of the consumers. I highly recommend you to blame these two guys for their lack of recognition of how great Google is, here is their name: Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page. You do realize > having mostly succeeded at giving the poorest people one Earth an equal product to the richest people on Earth is equivalent in this scenario of saying: > having mostly succeeded at exploiting the poorest people one Earth an equal amount to the richest people on Earth. While the poorest people have less already, right?
- warshinder 3mo agoThis is how I feel about excel whenever someone dismisses msft. The ultimate software for the anyman.
- regularization 3mo ago> So if we use Google as a case study for "progressive business", having mostly succeeded at giving the poorest people one Earth an equal product to the richest people on Earth, what is the takeaway? How should the people of Gaza thank Google for Google's Project Nimbus etc. targeting them for blockade starvation and bombings? As Anatole France said - they have to work before the laws' majestic equality, which forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.
- frollogaston 3mo agoGoogle refused to do contracts with the US military but was then fine doing them with Israel. Some of the original employees were pretty clear about their personal reasons for this.
- csallen 3mo ago1. Vocal minority will be, by definition, the loudest. And complainers/haters tend to be more vocal. Studies have looked at which emotions lead people to share, and outrage tops the list; satisfaction barely ranks. 2. Speaking of satisfaction, there is hedonic adaption to consider. None of us walk around day to day screaming, "Oh my god, airplanes! Computers! Tropical fruit! WiFi! Indoor plumbing!" We just acclimate, and it becomes background noise. 3. I think, culturally, there is just massive distrust for corporations. Look at any Hollywood movie or popular work of fiction. If there's a corporation, it's inherently evil, and helmed by some sort of sociopath who wants to harm as many people as possible.
- aucisson_masque 3mo agoLove Google for what it once was, hate it for what it became.
- JKCalhoun 3mo agoI suppose the takeaway for me is: don't serve up SEO shit.
- Centigonal 3mo agoGoogle is loved for the things they built that cause people to love Google (GMail, Search, Drive, K8s, Android, Patents, Books, Nest, Wave, Workspace, YouTube) and Google is hated for the things they built that cause people to hate Google (the targeted advertising money machine, Google+, the many negative second-order effects of their loved products). I don't see these two things being mutually exclusive. On balance, I think more people have a positive opinion of Google than do for Microsoft, Amazon, or Facebook. Also, humans are a pretty tough audience when it comes to utilities, with that hedonistic adaptation and all. You don't see many people walking around waxing lyrical about the wonders of modern sanitation, water purification, and plumbing -- but people do complain about water bills.
- BobbyTables2 3mo agoWhat’s also fascinating is that such a company has zero provision for human-involved tech support… If you can’t login, you’re screwed. My library is free (to me), but I can still get someone to help me if the card doesn’t work…
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- inigyou 3mo agoNobody hated Google for making search, they hated Google for converting search from search into a money grab.
- Grimblewald 3mo agoI think google hate is summarised nicely by their removal of the "do no evil" slogan.