4 ms·

I can see a market for things that are explicitly "anything but Google" growing as more and more things like this happen. Not now, probably not next year, but s

I can see a market for things that are explicitly "anything but Google" growing as more and more things like this happen. Not now, probably not next year, but soon.

dale386 13y ago
...a very niche market for techies who are aware of and take issue with Google's privacy issues.
- MartinCron 13y ago
  It's currently a very niche market for techies, my prediction is that it will grow to include a broader slice of people who feel uncomfortable with giving one organization that much power.
- pessimizer 13y ago
  ...and my mother, and the guy who works the counter at the place I get cheesesteaks.
sliverstorm 13y ago
The "Anything but Google" market is alive and well at my local Home Depot. I'd like to see them try to datalog my $20 bimetal mechanical thermostat :)
- harvestmoon 13y ago
  I've been researching money saving methods for an article, and many people do say that programmable thermostats can save 10% or so on heating bills, though.
  - sliverstorm 13y ago
    I believe it for the right person, but probably not for me. I keep my place around 60F in winter, and don't use A/C in summer.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
- MartinCron 13y ago
  That's pretty reductionist. I don't even think that the people on HN think that much alike with respect to each other. Some people care (or fear, or whatever) more or less than others.
- PavlovsCat 13y ago
  http://www.paulgraham.com/ambitious.html http://www.paulgraham.com/ambitious.html The way to win here is to build the search engine all the hackers use. A search engine whose users consisted of the top 10,000 hackers and no one else would be in a very powerful position despite its small size, just as Google was when it was that search engine. And for the first time in over a decade the idea of switching seems thinkable to me. Since anyone capable of starting this company is one of those 10,000 hackers, the route is at least straightforward: make the search engine you yourself want. Feel free to make it excessively hackerish. Make it really good for code search, for example. Would you like search queries to be Turing complete? Anything that gets you those 10,000 users is ipso facto good. That suddenly got a lot easier, when excessively hackerish just means "it's not Google and doesn't give a flying fuck about visitor stats". Imagine an artist writing their song without thinking about their audience - those are the best songs. Likewise, maybe surveying the market and doing what people want, instead of what you think they need, is a bit overrated, the road to mediocrity and ultimately failure. Well, I can hope ^^

I can see a market for things that are explicitly "anything but Google" growing as more and more things like this happen. Not now, probably not next year, but soon.

dale386 13y ago

...a very niche market for techies who are aware of and take issue with Google's privacy issues.

MartinCron 13y ago
It's currently a very niche market for techies, my prediction is that it will grow to include a broader slice of people who feel uncomfortable with giving one organization that much power.
pessimizer 13y ago
...and my mother, and the guy who works the counter at the place I get cheesesteaks.

sliverstorm 13y ago

The "Anything but Google" market is alive and well at my local Home Depot. I'd like to see them try to datalog my $20 bimetal mechanical thermostat :)

harvestmoon 13y ago
I've been researching money saving methods for an article, and many people do say that programmable thermostats can save 10% or so on heating bills, though.
- sliverstorm 13y ago
  I believe it for the right person, but probably not for me. I keep my place around 60F in winter, and don't use A/C in summer.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

MartinCron 13y ago
That's pretty reductionist. I don't even think that the people on HN think that much alike with respect to each other. Some people care (or fear, or whatever) more or less than others.
PavlovsCat 13y ago
http://www.paulgraham.com/ambitious.html http://www.paulgraham.com/ambitious.html The way to win here is to build the search engine all the hackers use. A search engine whose users consisted of the top 10,000 hackers and no one else would be in a very powerful position despite its small size, just as Google was when it was that search engine. And for the first time in over a decade the idea of switching seems thinkable to me. Since anyone capable of starting this company is one of those 10,000 hackers, the route is at least straightforward: make the search engine you yourself want. Feel free to make it excessively hackerish. Make it really good for code search, for example. Would you like search queries to be Turing complete? Anything that gets you those 10,000 users is ipso facto good. That suddenly got a lot easier, when excessively hackerish just means "it's not Google and doesn't give a flying fuck about visitor stats". Imagine an artist writing their song without thinking about their audience - those are the best songs. Likewise, maybe surveying the market and doing what people want, instead of what you think they need, is a bit overrated, the road to mediocrity and ultimately failure. Well, I can hope ^^