Google’s story over the last two decades has been a tale as old as time: enshittification for growth. The once-beloved startup—with its unofficial “Don’t Be Evil” motto—has instead become a major Internet monopolist, as a federal judge ruled on Monday, dominating the market for online search. Google is also well-known for its data-harvesting practices, for constantly killing off products, and for facilitating the rise of brain-cell-destroying YouTubers who make me Fear for Today’s Youth. (Maybe that last one is just me?)
Google’s rapid rise from “scrappy search engine with doodles” to “dystopic mega-corporation” has been remarkable in many ways, especially when you consider just how much goodwill the company squandered so quickly. Along the way, though, Google has achieved one unexpected result: In a divided America, it offers just about everyone something to hate.
Here are just a few of the players hating Google today.
All my homies hate Google
On August 5, 2024, Trump asked his supporters to stop using Google.
Did not know that. Well. Stopped clock, blind squirrel, etc.
Despite the convenience of some of its tools, the hardcore tech set increasingly prefers tech companies like Signal or even Apple, which is currently running expensive TV ads about how other browsers (read: Google’s Chrome) spy on you.
One important thing to be mentioned is that, while Apple is correct when highlighting that Chrome is a privacy nightmare, Apple and Google are cut from the same cloth and they’re both user-hostile when it comes to privacy, monopoly enforcement, censorship, etc. Both deserve the hate that they get. (Alongside Amazon, Facebook and Microsoft.)
You got that right bro. Greed breeds abuse of the customer. Mega-companies, become the worst problem the world has because of that same greed. To put it bluntly “Greed is not good” to mis-quote a 'Wall Street" movie character player by Charlie Sheen.
for the same reason we hate apple. they put a pencil pusher with no direction other than higher stock price as ceo.
I’m glad “The Man Who Killed Google Search” blew up.
You either die a hero or less be long enough to become the villain.
Corporations: Hmm, we seem to have saturated our market. How do we make line keep go up?
- Diversify our products to cater to new or niche markets.
- Accept the status quo and focus on making our existing customers happy while integrating feedback to improve and entice people to ditch our competitors?
- Make everything worse because what are they gonna do, use Bing? LOL
- Congratulate ourselves on winning capitalism, then selling our stocks to the employees so we can go enjoy our wealth and return forever.
- HAHAHAHA yeah right. Time to squeeze this shit for every red cent then cash out before the stock price crashes and move in to the next victim.
Nationalize google and turn it into a coop that is democratically controlled by worker and users. Lets us vote on their management and corporate priorities and policies.
To hell with the shareholders! They ruin everything!
At least their crawlers should be nationalised/coop/something.
I wish there were more coops. Shareholders are almost the entire reason for the mess we find ourselves in.
I’ve started to try and move away from Google as much as possible, which I knew would be difficult, but it’s proving to be harder than I thought.
I can’t do anything about my work stuff, because our company uses Google for email and cloud storage. I set up an account on Proton Mail for my personal email and file storage. I currently have an android phone, but I don’t like iPhones so I don’t really know what I want to do there. I switched back to Firefox after 15 years of using Chrome. I actually started using Bing search more. I’m looking into alternatives for the Chromecast that Google doesn’t seem interested in supporting anyway, which might just end up being a small PC hooked up to the TV.
I’m just so tired of Google services either being shut down or slowly getting worse and worse until they’re nearly unusable.
On the android front, if you don’t mind using a pixel phone then Graphene OS would be worth checking out. It’s a foss non rooted alternative to base android with a focus on privacy and security. The no root requirement means a good amount of apps like banking work properly on it. It vastly expands the app permission system and removes the special privileges to Google system apps, allowing you to remove it or limit them. It also supports sandboxing of the play store and multiple profiles so you can effectively quarantine Google requiring apps.
+1 for GrapheneOS on a Pixel. I use GrapheneOS on a Pixel 7 Pro. It’s just awesome. I will never go back. Camera is awesome too.
@StormWalker @wispy_jsp
I have been using GrapheneOs for many years, now I am using Google Pixel 8, I had to install Google Camera App to make the best use of the cameraYeah I’m with you there, the pixel camera app is a must for me too. What I love about GrapheneOS is how easy it is to block permissions. So with google pixel camera app, no network and no location permissions means that it cannot report back to google unless I allow it to. It’s a safe way to use the odd google app in a limited way when you need to. The other google app I use is the g-keyboard, because it is so much better in some ways. But again it is very restricted and I turned off the features I don’t want, like voice typing.
It’s not as hard as you’d think. https://github.com/tycrek/degoogle - This has everything you need. Definitely use Firefox. Check out Nextcloud for personal cloud/documents replacement etc. Definitely try a small PC hooked to your TV and look in to plex. Don’t use Google/Bing, stick with DuckDuckGo and if you need to, use !g or !b in your searched on ddg to get bing and google results. It’s fun exploring all the alternatives in the list.
“Brave search” seems to work good for me with Firefox. Protonmail is awesome yeah 👍🏻 There are alternatives to everything, just finding the good ones!
Wait until you learn of their role in the apartheid and genocide in Palestine
How are they involved?
https://theintercept.com/2024/04/05/google-photos-israel-gaza-facial-recognition/
I must ask though, why was it hard for you to just look it up yourself?
Would it have been just as hard for you to cite your sources in the first place?
Yes
I must ask though, why was it hard for you to just look it up yourself?
I’m lazy and you seemed to know about it based on your comment
I’m also lazy, I was on mobile and was having a complex and nuanced bowel movement at the time 😖
Yes. I hate advertising companies.
All companies enshittify themselves eventually, and the fact that those that were trying to fight it within the company were still getting shit on from within and from outside the company only hastened its fall by just removing them as a deciding factor through sheer pressure. Google really isn’t as dystopian as people put it as - for one, it’s too incompetent at starting and sticking to new ventures.
As it continues falling and eventually the traditional competitors overtake it, I think it will become apparent what a truly dystopian megacorporation actually is before Google completely becomes anything remotely close to it - Microsoft would have reached that line if they had successfully been able to sneak in Recall. DuckDuckGo fell when Bing did, smoke and mirrors… Google is pretty bad right now, just not what I would call a dystopic megacorp.
All companies enshittify themselves eventually,
This isn’t a foregone conclusion, just a number of things that are increasingly likely:
- When a place becomes “cool” and “rich”, then they get job applicants that are all in on “get rich quick” and as they get to call shots they are ready to destroy the core value to pulp out some profit. Particularly older companies like Intel, IBM and Microsoft have had time for that mindset to promote into the positions.
- Failing that, investors can rapidly corrupt existing leadership, particularly for “startups”. It might start sincere, but then when a relatively small bunch find themselves with a multi-billion dollar payday, pedal to the floor to ruin things.
- Additionally, any major player not in a position to be a part of the fun will make their knock-offs and market or monopoly their way to displace. Oh look, Microsoft Teams…
There’s a moderately successful, but also reasonably modest company that went about 50 years without getting “enshitified”. The founder was passionate about it, kept the company private, and held in until his 80s when he finally decided he really couldn’t do it anymore. Then they went public and immediately the layoffs, price hikes, and cloudification commenced, as the flood gate of enshitification opened on his retirement.
I still stand by what I said and only add an addendum, all companies enshittify themselves eventually or cease to exist before it happens.
In your counterexample, the problem is that the founders eventually die, and then the time comes for that company to be passed down, and then you are just proving my point. Even stores like LTT Store and GamersNexus’ will eventually enshittify themselves or cease to exist, because they will eventually have to pass ownership and even their owners will feel some remorse if they vanish it into the void instead of leaving it off for their family to inherit.
If it’s a small localized family business, it can exist for longer without compromising itself because it will not receive as much pressure and the services it has to concern itself are much more limited, but otherwise and even then, enshittification is as avoidable as death.
This isn’t a foregone conclusion, just a number of things that are increasingly likely:
The system incentivises it, though. I don’t like dealing in absolutes, so I am inclined to agree with you on that basis alone. However, enshittification is not a bug, it’s a feature.
It’s a pretty terrible feature then. Feature is a weird word
How about “monopolizing the ad industry, going all in on manipulative engagement farming, and making billions off of destroying the internet they helped create, and possibly democracy”
I think the headline proves most people don’t really understand how deeply Google has embedded themselves in, and farmed, well, everyone.
Google hasn’t just monopolised the ad industry, but is holding the internet itself in its clutches.
They own and control one of the biggest operating systems on the market, giving them control over peoples devices. They own and control the biggest browser engine on the market, giving them control over the internet standards; they can implement whatever the heck they want and essentially force it as a web standard. They own and control the biggest search engine on the market, giving them control over what information people can see and access.
For a lot of people, Google controls practically the entire internet access chain, and that should terrify anyone who cares about a free and open internet.
that should terrify anyone who cares about a free and open internet.
We’re way past that… right? They’ve already kinda destroyed the open web and are squeezing it for money.
Oh, but it can still get worse!
They took down the Don’t Be Evil sign.
Reminds me of a cannibal in the Deltora series who has the sign “LIVE NO EVIL” on the wall, when it’s actually “LIVE ON EVIL” but mirrored.
I don’t use Google anymore except for Google maps in my car. :) I guess they can spy on where I’m driving. But no search history.
Magic earth is a great alternative.
I came across “Organic Maps” and it’s really impressive. I now use them 50/50. The only real difference for me is that Google maps shows the traffic jams. So if it’s a long journey I use Google, but if I’m not in a rush and just need directions I use Organic.
