Showing messages 1 through 8 of 8.

• any evidence of badness/evil?
  2007-11-24 14:20:10 ga427 [Reply | View]
  
  1. Google is getting very large and powerful, and power corrupts. Plus, as you get large, there is more opportunity for badness/evil, and more damage that can be done, accidentally or deliberately. (I'm not crazy about the DoubleClick acquisition, by the way, for this reason). Hopefully this is offset by controls that eliminate excesses but don't stifle creativity.
  
  Still, Google explicitly raised the bar for themselves by publicly and famously stating that "don't be evil". Isn't raising the bar for yourself good?
  
  Obviously people will pound you if you slip up, but that, too, is good. You've effectively asked the world to watch you, and help you not be evil by being an extra set of eyes.
  
  Can anybody point to an example where Google has been evil?
  
  2. I think the Google in China thing, altho getting close to the line, was ok. The age discrimination case with the ex Alta Vista guy appears to be a matter for the courts, not systemic discrimination.
  
  I also don't like the amount of their legalese - Google should, IMHO, keep their lawyers on a shorter leash.
  
  But is this evil? I think not.
  
  3. Or is this a game being played by dirty companies desperately hoping to redirect focus away from their misdeeds?
  
  I really don't understand why Google is being criticized these days.
  
  I trust everybody remembers that only Google went to court (and won) when the US government demanded to snoop on their searches (arguably, an illegal act since they didn't have proper authority, by the way) - AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft all rolled over, very disgustingly (as did the telcos).
  
  I wish more companies would make a public statement of ethics and follow them, starting with telling the truth.
  
  4. Another measure of how ethical a company is the amount of money it pays in fines (ignoring patent trolls), how often it is charged, how often it is convicted. Google is in rather good shape here, contrasted, with, say, Microsoft.

• any evidence of badness/evil?
  2007-11-24 14:08:58 ga427 [Reply | View]
  
  1. Google is getting very large and powerful, and power corrupts. Plus, as you get large, there is more opportunity for badness/evil, and more damage that can be done, accidentally or deliberately. (I'm not crazy about the DoubleClick acquisition, by the way, for this reason). Hopefully this is offset by controls that eliminate excesses but don't stifle creativity.
  
  Still, Google explicitly raised the bar for themselves by publicly and famously stating that "don't be evil". Isn't raising the bar for yourself good?
  
  Obviously people will pound you if you slip up, but that, too, is good. You've effectively asked the world to watch you, and help you not be evil by being an extra set of eyes.
  
  Can anybody point to an example where Google has been evil?
  
  2. I think the Google in China thing, altho getting close to the line, was ok. The age discrimination case with the ex Alta Vista guy appears to be a matter for the courts, not systemic discrimination.
  
  I also don't like the amount of their legalese - Google should, IMHO, keep their lawyers on a shorter leash.
  
  But is this evil? I think not.
  
  3. Or is this a game being played by dirty companies desperately hoping to redirect focus away from their misdeeds?
  
  I really don't understand why Google is being criticized these days.
  
  I trust everybody remembers that only Google went to court (and won) when the US government demanded to snoop on their searches (arguably, an illegal act since they didn't have proper authority, by the way) - AOL, Yahoo, Microsoft all rolled over, very disgustingly (as did the telcos).
  
  I wish more companies would make a public statement of ethics and follow them, starting with telling the truth.
  
  4. Another measure of how ethical a company is the amount of money it pays in fines (ignoring patent trolls), how often it is charged, how often it is convicted. Google is in rather good shape here, contrasted, with, say, Microsoft.

• Google and phones
  2007-11-14 10:08:09 jonawebb [Reply | View]
  
  They are trying to create a developer community which will support a free flow of business opportunities to Google. This is good for developers because the carriers have fragmented the development platform and made life very difficult. E.g., the Nokia platform has multiple different non-backwards-compatible OSs. J2ME is platform-independent, but hobbled compared to what the phone can really do. It's a mess. What we need is a good common development platform. OHA and Android could be it but it will need a lot of cooperation from the carriers to make it happen. So we'll see.
  The alternative is the Apple approach, which is to take control of the platform away from the carrier and make one very attractive development target. They'll eventually release their SDK. But you can bet Apple will keep control of their product.
• Google and phones
  2007-11-14 11:19:57 jwenting [Reply | View]
  
  it's good for developers only if you as a developer are content to submit to Google's domination of your world.

• Is good
  2007-11-13 09:12:18 ibantxuyn [Reply | View]
  
  this is good for all, don't be evil :-)
  
  google != agent smith from matrix
• Is good
  2007-11-13 22:30:53 jwenting [Reply | View]
  
  If they're not, they're deceptively similar in modus operandi and appearance...

  And agent Smith almost certainly considered himself to be "not evil", but a fighting for all that's good. Of course anyone explicitly calling themselves "not evil" has something to hide, just like only totalitarian groups call themselves democratic. Google is aggressively working towards a world where they're in total control of all information people have access to, as well as knowing everything about everyone. If that's not a dystopian scenario I don't know what is.

• Open what
  2007-11-11 01:40:23 jack_jia [Reply | View]
  
  I think Google is trying to open the mobile phones from the control of carriers and some other companies such as Apple.
• Open what
  2007-11-11 21:40:38 jwenting [Reply | View]
  
  no, Google is trying to take control of phones and networks away from the carriers and concentrate it in itself.