
Bullshit - brianwillis
http://www.marco.org/2011/12/29/bullshit
======
nostromo
With Apple, I'm the customer, not a marketer. This makes me comfortable with
our relationship. I don't really care about Ping or app store approval
policies, so, meh...

With Google, I can see their ability to become a shady company pretty easily,
but it is just too damn easy to switch search engines. Bing isn't so bad you
know.

But Facebook knows so much about me, and the network effects are so strong --
this is the company I feel most unpleasantly stuck to. Not "Comcast stuck"
mind you, but still, more "stuck" than I'd like. It's like my friends keep
having parties at a bar I'm not super fond of... and I keep going.

~~~
riffraff
> but it is just too damn easy to switch search engines.

and personal email, and collaboration tools, and project mailing lists, and
photo service, and maps service, and video hosting..

If you consider google as the search engine maybe not, but if you consider
google the company the it's downright scary how hard it would be to get out of
their grasp, IMO.

~~~
jrockway
I don't think it would be that hard. You're one MX record change away from
changing your mailhost without anyone ever knowing. You can continue using
your gmail.com address without ever seeing ads by connecting with IMAP. You
can get maps from anywhere, including Open Street Map. You can move your
photos from Picassa to your own machine and to Flickr, if you desire. Google
Chat is XMPP, so you can get a new "chat provider" and still talk to all your
old contacts.

People use Google's services because they're excellent, not because they are
locked in. Google makes it very easy to leave and take your data with you.
Google contributes as much of their internal software to the Free Software
community as they can. They do need to make money, but they're trying to do it
the old fashioned way: make products people they like. And that's refreshing
in a world where Microsoft makes their own email protocol and Apple sells
computers that you can't hack.

This is not "downright scary". It's downright refreshing.

(Yes, advertising is an annoying business model, but I don't think it will
last much longer for Google. People hate advertising and the feeling of being
"told what to think". The good news is that Google's products will still work
even if you have to pay a few bucks a month for them. Right now, that's not in
Google's interests, because advertising money is the easiest money to make.
But in a few years, I think we'll see less advertising and more customer
focus, as advertisers realize that nobody wants their overpriced shit
anymore.)

~~~
riffraff
I believe you are arguing against something I didn't posit. Google certainly
has a lecit business and has gained success because of good products, and it's
easy to "liberate" a lot of data.

My point was that while changing search engine is easy:

* migrating all your data is way harder

* opting out of some google online services (e.g. maps) does not free me from third parties relying on them (e.g. android, iphone)

* I can't change the habits of the rest of the world, so I'm stuck with them if I want to join ai-class.org, read something on blogger or peruse a project mailing list on groups.

* the fact that the services are good _is_ a lockin, as it makes it harder to get off of them

Just this. Changing search engine is easy, opting out of google's products is,
at least for me, much much harder.

I love google the company and their products, it just seems nearly impossible
to get out of their reach without resorting to RMS-style "I email myself web
pages I want to read" estremisms.

~~~
jrockway
So your complaint is that other people use Blogger blogs, so you can't opt out
of Google? That's interesting, but it seems like what you really want is to
opt out of tracking in general. Google tracks you, sure, but so do a bunch of
shade-ball sites you've never heard of. Why would you trust a company you've
never heard of over a company that actively lets you opt out of tracking and
migrate away from their services?

I don't think you need to email yourself web pages, but I do think you need to
use Tor or some other anonymous HTTP proxy. If you are paranoid about the
"paper trail" that browsing the web leavers, then you need to take measures to
make that paper trail less useful. Complaining about "lock in" to services
that other people uses, though, is just confusing the issue; the Internet has
never let you choose what service providers other people use, and you will
have to live with that.

------
blinkingled
Marco, Gruber, MG have their own BS :

    
    
      *Android is NOT open
    

It gets stated as absolute fact only by Apple and its hardcore followers
(Steve Jobs said Windows is open not Android first, DF, MG and MA have been
religiously snarking out on any chance to declare Android not open.)

It is BS because all 3 of them do this only to promote what they subscribe to
- i.e. they have no consequence from Android not being open (they use and
promote iOS which is epitome of closed which in turn means they don't really
care about open - they only care about pointing it out in an attempt to
nullify the claimed Android advantage against iOS - hey it's not really open
anyways, so get in on our team. Which to me is a obnoxious or even a little
evil, cotradictory and self-promoting reason to complain about not being
open.)

~~~
KeithMajhor
In all seriousness. What does "open" even mean? I've noticed that no one is
saying "open source". Not that I know what that really means either. Android
isn't developed in the open they just release the source code. That's the only
real difference from Windows 7. So is this all just relative to the phone
market? It's "open" as far as phones go?

I get the feeling "open" is not something you can _be_. It's a continuum.
Things can be more or less "open" but nothing can actually _be_ "open".

~~~
nl
Android _is_ Open Source[1], which has a real definition[2] that means
something. You can fork it, and create your own distribution (as Amazon has
shown).

It is open in other ways, too - Android phones can load applications from
sources other than the Market (unless that feature has been disabled by your
carrier - which goes back to the first point).

Most Android phones have a sdcard slot, too, which allows you to get your
photos (and other files) off the phone easily. For many people that's what
they mean when they say it is more open.

Others like the multiple form factors, or the different sizes. These aren't
just theoretical things - I've heard people use them as examples of
"openness".

Of course "open" is a continuum, but there _are_ ways that Android is "open"
that really matter.

[1] Android 3.x wasn't open source. As noted elsewhere, that is a legitimate
complaint that applied between February and November 2011. It is worth noting
that Android 3.x was a tablet only release, though - Android 2.3 (which is
Open Source) remained the OS for phones until Android 4.0 was released, which
unified the tablet & phone streams.

[2] <http://www.opensource.org/osd.html>

~~~
jballanc
Out of curiosity, would you call OS X "open"? You can find enough of the
source for OS X to create a booting OS here: <http://opensource.apple.com/> .
Obviously, this isn't _all_ of OS X, but then not _all_ of the Android OS is
"open" either.

I'm not trying to be contrarian, but I think the people criticizing Adroid for
not being "open" are primarily picking on precisely the vagueness that you
have highlighted. There _are_ ways that Android is "open" that really
matter...to _you_. For other people, there are ways that Android is not "open"
that really matter. Just ask Stallman, for example.

~~~
notatoad
no, OSX is not open. you can't take the published source code and compile it
into a useable copy of OSX.

you can take the published android source code and create a useable copy of
android from it. the entire operating system is there. android is open source.
the people criticizing android for not being open are either lying, or have
forgotten that we have moved on from the 3.0 branch which was not open.

~~~
jballanc
You can take the published source code and compile a useable copy of OS X. In
fact, for many years the OpenDarwin project did just that. What you could
_not_ do is run the Aqua GUI or many of the default applications that come
with a Mac bought in the store.

But that's the point. Sure, you can compile and run "Android", but is it the
same as the OS that runs on a phone I buy from Verizon? Android phones sell
with proprietary software that is most definitely _not_ open. Macintosh
computers sell with proprietary software that is most definitely _not_ open.
But enough elements of both _are_ open to the point that you can boot a device
and accomplish real work.

~~~
blinkingled
_What you could not do is run the Aqua GUI or many of the default applications
that come with a Mac bought in the store_

Which isn't very useful at all. Android on the other hand allows you to run
Market, Apps, Amazon Apps, your own in house apps on your device of choice by
using the provided source code. You will have to write your drivers may be but
that's not nearly the same as write your CF or Aqua or OpenGL implementation
plus a ton of other things to make stock OS X apps works. That goes into
practically impossible category.

So in other less terse wording - you can call Darwin open source but you
cannot really call OS X open source.

~~~
jballanc
Sure, that's essentially my point: Parts of the Android stack are _open_ and
parts of the OS X stack are _open_. Whether or not the _important_ parts are
open depends on who you are. Take, for example, the other story on HN today
about HTC finally opening their bootloader. That, to me, is much more
important than any other part of Android being _open_.

~~~
jamesgeck0
"Open", in this context, means open source. HTC's bootloader has always been
open source, as far as I know. It's been set up to only boot signed kernels,
but that's "open" as in, "customers can modify their devices" not as in,
"customers can view and modify the source code we put on the device."

HTC's locking the bootloader isn't exactly an issue with Android's openness.
It's an issue with the openness of HTC.

------
arctangent
> Facebook: "Our users want to interact with brands."

As distasteful as the hacker crowd may find it, this is probably a true
statement.

A significant number of people (in the developed world) really do construct a
large part of their personal identity by buying branded products from
companies in order to signal something about themselves.

There's a section on this on the Wikipedia page for "Brand":

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brand#Attitude_branding_and_ico...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brand#Attitude_branding_and_iconic_brands)

~~~
potatolicious
What yeswecan said, but to expand: people _like_ brands - they will gladly and
openly declare their brand allegiances on their profiles. We saw this _before_
Pages even came out.

What people _don't_ want to do is to be constantly bombarded by bullshit
communications from said brands. In many ways, openly declaring your brand
preferences is signaling - the "liking" of brands is for _their friends_ , not
an enthusiastic wish to receive "special offers" from you. What they dislike
even more are the highly intrusive ways brands are marketing themselves on
Facebook.

It's great that you're running a promotion for a brand I like. No, I will not
let you post to my wall as me. No, I will not spam 15 of my friends with your
stupid offer before actually _receiving_ said promo. No, I don't want to be
forced to "Like" your stupid brand before I can even look at your page.

Brands, I want to receive pertinent information from you. If Starbucks is
opening a new store in my area, I totally want to hear about it. What I don't
want to hear are bullshit "news stories" concocted by your marketing
department that is entirely content-free and screams like a cheap attempt to
keep your name in my head.

~~~
Pheter
But it works, which is why they do it.

~~~
rfergie
I work with some brands on trying to measure this and in many cases I'm not
sure it does work.

The typical process works like this:

1\. Brand creates facebook page

2\. People who really, really love the brand connect with the page.

3\. The brand observes that people who have connected with them on social
media are excellent customers.

4\. The brand tries to increase the number of connected users by offering
promotions and similar.

5\. The new connections do not have the same value as the originals because
they are attracted only by the offers and promotions. Which the brand then
needs to keep offering otherwise "engagement" and other similar metrics drop
off.

6\. The original connections, the brands best and most enthusiastic customers,
are now trained to only purchase when a discount is offered. Margins suffer
all round.

It can appear that social media offers an easy way to create revenue. The long
term effects are much harder to measure (because there is a huge lag between
action and measurement) but they are often negative.

~~~
look_lookatme
Everyone stops thinking about it after 4, because connections are measurable
and thus reportable by the media planners at whatever agency the brand has
hired to do their social. It's simply a metric and few people at real
companies think about it, they just see the numbers and think it's working.
This is because agencies tell them it will and that's the worst part about it
all.

Social's value is seeing how people react to your brand, absorbing their
feedback, connecting directly... but the planners have reduced it to numbers,
like they do everything, and sucked the life out it.

~~~
rfergie
I completely agree. It looks like it is working and agencies/whoever is
running social don't look any deeper because why would you when everything is
fine?

------
jacoblyles
When I think of something being "bullshit", I think it is totally false. But
many of these points are part-truths, not complete falsehoods.

For example, Google tracks lots of personal data to make their products
better. So the sentence "We solicit all of your personal information and track
everything you do to make things better for you" is partially true. Of course,
something is in it for Google too. When they add new features to a product
driven by personal data mining, they seek to grow market share. They also use
your personal data to target ads at you better. And they may be using it for
further research projects that you don't know about.

But the statement has a lot of truth to it. That's not the normal definition
of "bullshit".

~~~
padolsey
The sentence from Google is a falsehood. It claims that the tracking is done
for the user, and implies that this is their only intention. The actual truth
is that Google only does what's "good" for the user as long as it improves
their market position and/or makes them money. To have a position of "well,
they do care about theirs users, even if it is to make money off of them" is
intellectually dishonest because you're ignoring the implications of this --
that Google, in the end, has a drive to improve its own profits and market
share. Obviously Google is made up of lots of different people and there are
non-corporate wings that do actual good things, but this doesn't excuse the
basic profit motive that must exist. Google doesn't care if you're getting the
best experience from Facebook... they still want you to use Google+. They only
want to target ads at me so that I click on them and they get more money.

Google cares about my online wellbeing as much as Colgate cares about my
teeth.

~~~
nl
Now that _is_ Bullshit.

Yes, Google makes money from their advertising.

But Google does things that directly limit their ability to make money from
advertising, when those decisons are in the interest of consumers.

Take the whole design and UX of Chrome. There are many, many ways Google could
have changed the design to make more money from it, and yet they haven't
because they aren't in the interests of the users.

Additionally many (both at Google and elsewhere) believe (and can show
evidence) that advertising can _improve_ the user experience when it is done
properly.

Companies (especially those with a share structure like Google's) can exist to
care about more than just making money.

~~~
padolsey
Also, could you provide an example of where advertising improves the user
experience?

~~~
jlees
In today's heavily SEOd world, sometimes the AdWords ads are actually more
helpful than the first 10 results. It's always a sad moment when that happens,
but in certain verticals it's becoming almost inevitable despite everyone's
best efforts.

An example (there are probably many better): I was looking for spas in London
the other day, and a lot of the results seemed pretty dodgy - tantric therapy?
no thanks! - but the ads for Groupon and competing services reminded me that I
might be able to get a good daily deal and led me to explore quite a few
options that weren't in the search results.

Disclaimer: I work for Google, but not on any advertising-related products
(unless you want to take the stand that _every_ Google product is advertising-
related; thought I'd head off that reply in advance).

~~~
pandeiro
Similarly with health-related queries. When you have a serious problem, you're
after any kind of information that might help. In my personal case, several of
the ads returned more interesting info than the first few pages of algorithm-
ranked results.

------
edw519
You forgot the biggest bullshit of all, Marco.

Hacker News users:

I'm so mad that the government is doing <xyz>!

I'm so mad that big business is doing <xyz>!

I'm so mad that venture capitalists are doing <xyz>!

I'm so mad that angel investors are doing <xyz>!

I'm so mad that <xyz> got funding!

I'm so mad that language <abc> doesn't do <xyz>!

I'm so mad that I can't jailbreak <xyz>!

I'm so mad that I'm actually expected to pay for <xyz>!

I'm so mad that more people don't visit my blog!

I'm so mad that so many people visit blog <xyz>!

I'm so mad that person <xyz> is a jerk!

So what did you build today?

Nothing. I can't focus.

~~~
funkah
If you think Hacker News sucks that bad, you're free to go read reddit and
bitch about the users there. This comment is shitty and cynical and you should
feel bad about it.

~~~
tptacek
Compare:

[http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/comments&q=by%3Ae...](http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/comments&q=by%3Aedw519&sortby=points+desc)

to:

[http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/comments&q=by%3Af...](http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/comments&q=by%3Afunkah&sortby=points+desc&start=0)

A superficial cheap shot would be to note that you have to go _nine pages_
into Ed's results to find a comment scored as low as 'funkah's top-scored
comment. Less superficial observations follow readily from actually reading
the two sets of comments.

Veteran status readily accounts for the spectacularly high amount of karma Ed
has here. That and name recognition surely biases the score on any given
recent Ed comment upwards. But the difference in tone, effort, and craft
between Ed's comments and 'funkah's is hard to miss; put more succinctly, the
reason Ed has an _average_ comment score of _27_ (27!) and 'funkah has an
average of 2 is that Ed doesn't write things like "This comment is shitty and
cynical and you should feel bad about it." He's more likely to draw an ASCII
art picture.

I point this out mostly because 15 minutes spent reading the best of Ed on HN
is time well spent, and so there you have it: a convenient link off this
stupid thread.

~~~
bnegreve
Maybe I am missing your point, but I think that judging comments on the basis
of their authors karma is a bad idea.

~~~
tptacek
If we're talking about my comments, I agree. If we're talking about Ed's, no.
I'm not interested in a nerdy argument about whether we should have karma at
all.

------
rmoriz
There was a very good talk at 28c3 that should remember everyone, that Apple
and Google are not working for the public interest (as some fans still
believe)

Partly NSFW:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vh07lA9EmIc>

or:

<http://ondemand.28c3.fem-net.de/events/4676.html>

~~~
ugh
Those guys are funny! “They sell a product! How evil!”

~~~
drivebyacct2
Read the comments on this page, most of the criticism here is just that. "You
are the product", thus everything is bad. Google/Apple make good stuff, so
they're evil, hold power and are "dangerous"

------
armandososa
I always, always, always find what I want from Google. So whatever they are
doing is, in some way, for my benefit.

And even if I was ready to pay for every website/service I use (which I'm
not), ads are not going away. So when they do whatever they are doing to show
me better ads I'd say that's on my benefit too.

I'm not a Google unconditional fan (I hate Android, love iOS) and certainly
they can do better. But implying they don't benefit the end user is what I
find bullshit-y.

And I think that's a very poorly written article, btw. Marco can do a lot
better.

------
brador
I know this guy is one of the HN celebrity set, but can we please modify that
title to something more meaningful?

Something like:

"Bullshit - what companies really mean?"

------
zobzu
Deeply agree on that list.

But there are _some_ o at least _one_ company that I'd actually trust more
than others, and support, and that's Mozilla. Because there's no share
holders. Because it's owned by non-profit. And because their track record is
perfect so far. Everything's open. All the development is in the open, not
just the code.

Everything's made for our best interest actually.

~~~
bru
What about Opera?

Their software is unfortunately proprietary, but I trust them. As far as I
know, they never sold any data they got though their proxies with Opera Mini.
And they got a lot.

~~~
zobzu
I'm liking the opera guys. they do good stuff and they're small, yet still
alive.

That being said, it doesn't make them good on the open source front. They're
proprietary. They don't develop in the open.

So while I like them and their product, I don't trust them the way I can trust
Mozilla.

In other words:

I don't trust Google, MS, Opera, or any other such company. They make good
products (yes, even MS), but again it's a different matter.

------
vacri
Devoid of anything new or insightful, this article sounds like a teen being
'edgy'.

~~~
nirvdrum
My thoughts exactly. It feels like upvotes for the author, not the content.

------
smackfu
Did marco make his blog much more link-baity, or has it always been like this?
It seems like he is playing to the crowd now.

~~~
Jgrubb
I don't know, but I can't believe I'm becoming one of those old fogies who's
getting tired of blog posts with *shit in the title.

------
sneak
Does Apple actually claim that their app review process is in _everyone's_
best interests, or just their customers (which is frequently at 180-degree
odds with sketchy devs)?

------
rickmb
Apple's bullshit is strictly business. Google's and Facebook's bullshits
affects peoples privacy, and, if they live in a country that values privacy,
actually violates their fundamental rights.

Facebook and Google are engaged in open warfare against social values and
legal restrictions that are prevalent in most of the world (especially outside
the US), and the lies they tell about it can not simply be categorized as
"bullshit" you can decide to tolerate on a individual basis.

~~~
statictype
Do you have any citations for this? I'm curious to see how Google is
unknowingly violating people's privacy to the point that it's borderline
illegal in certain countries.

Facebook on the other hand, I can easily believe they're doing that.

~~~
msbarnett
> Do you have any citations for this? I'm curious to see how Google is
> unknowingly violating people's privacy to the point that it's borderline
> illegal in certain countries.

There's nothing unknowing or borderline about it.

Canada's privacy commissioner rules Google violated Canadians fundamental
right to privacy: [http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/oct/19/google-
stre...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/oct/19/google-street-view-
privacy-canada)

France fines Google over privacy violations:
[http://mashable.com/2011/03/21/france-fine-google-street-
vie...](http://mashable.com/2011/03/21/france-fine-google-street-view/)

Korean police raid Google offices in Seoul over privacy violations:
[http://gawker.com/5798135/police-raid-google-for-privacy-
vio...](http://gawker.com/5798135/police-raid-google-for-privacy-
violations++in-korea)

FTC settles with Google over privacy violations:
[http://wjlta.wordpress.com/2011/11/18/ftc-settlement-over-
go...](http://wjlta.wordpress.com/2011/11/18/ftc-settlement-over-google-buzzs-
privacy-violations-gets-stamp-of-approval/)

------
Angostura
And my personal favourite:

"A single word expletive as a headline isn't just a way of getting cheap
pageviews"

------
dragons
Microsoft must be ticked off that they were left out of the list.

~~~
krallja
What is a Microsoft?

------
razzaj
I can think of this as well.

an "IT security company" : 1 - We secure your network 2 - Our site is down for
maintenance

------
alpb
Just wondering, why are we valuing this blog post that talks about a first
world problem and brings no solution or anything critic or productive? Are we
biased against Marco.org?

~~~
Hari_Seldon
I'm confused, what is wrong with talking about a first world problem? and what
do you mean by "Are we biased against Marco.org"?

------
droithomme
Yes, it's true the things listed are bullshit. Yes, I guess we can take it or
leave it.

Sometimes the "take it or leave it" position ends up being presented in a way
that it is framed that those of us who choose not to partake in the rape of
our liberties are backwards luddites (non-facebook member here, also got their
domains blocked to kill their insidious tracking). I hope that criticism of
those who say "no" is not where this article series (if that's what it is) is
headed.

~~~
veidr
They're all bullshit _except_ the 'Android is open' thing. That's just a plain
fucking fact.

Despite the incessant barrage of snarky 'open' jokes from professional Apple
frother John Gruber (typically redeemed somewhat by being funny) and M.G.
"Mini-Gruber" Siegler (not so much), you can go _download_ _the_ _fucking_
_source_ _code_ :

<http://source.android.com/source/downloading.html>

Sure, tons of manufacturers will sell you junky locked down Android-based
phones (which they can do because... _tada_... it's open), you can also just
go buy the unlocked phone that Google offers, and install whatever the hell
you want on it.

And if you really want to root your phone and install your own build of the
OS, it's basically as easy as ↑↑↓↓←→←→BA and _boom_ -you're-done.

For any reasonable value of open, Android is. Claiming otherwise is just some
weird kind of (apparently contagious) gobbledygook nonsense making the rounds
among people emotionally invested in iOS. (Which I do _use_ btw; although
Android is _open_ , it is still not _good_ enough for me yet.)

~~~
epo
"Android is open" is BS for the plain and simple fact that (time delayed)
source code availability is of no consequence to the vast majority of Android
users. They say it as though it means something, it means nothing, rather like
water vendors claiming "100% fat free" on a bottle of water.

Marco didn't say the claim was factually incorrect, he said it was BS, it is.

~~~
veidr
Although I'd love to have a few bottles of your fat-free water, it's a bogus
analogy. It's more like claiming "100% trans fat free" on a package of
cookies. That the vast majority of eaters don't care about or even know what
trans fats are doesn't make the statement less true, or less relevant to those
who do know and care.

Android's openness is consequential _to_ _those_ _who_ _care_ _about_
_openness_. And almost every Android user I know (yes, all fairly technical)
likes that aspect and indeed takes advantage of it.

To such people, the open aspects -- both the fact that the OS is open source,
_and_ that they can install whatever apps they want without having to find a
buffer overflow bug in the OS somewhere to exploit first -- are attractive.

The "vast majority of users" aren't the arbiter of whether or not something is
consequential to me, or to the other people who generally prefer their systems
to be more open.

~~~
makomk
Not really. Android's "openness" doesn't include the ability to actually
modify the software running on your device, which means that on its own it's
useless to everyone except hardware manufacturers. It's only on the rare
occasions when those manufacturers actually choose to do more than is required
on them and open up their hardware to modifications that "openness" is of any
value at all.

~~~
drivebyacct2
I don't really get what you're saying here. Some Android devices have locked
bootloaders, but that doesn't affect the openness of AOSP. If anything, you're
making an argument for GPLv3 which would require Android OEM's to allow for
open bootloaders and (S-OFF (htc)).

But I can assure you, my Galaxy Nexus is running a CM9 alpha that I built from
source last night.

~~~
ootachi
Replace "some Android devices" with "the vast majority of Android devices".
That is Marco's point.

~~~
drivebyacct2
All HTC devices since September, most devices from <=2010 (and many, many more
with community support); all Samsung/LG devices; some early Moto devices (and
all if you don't count the kernel via the community) can have custom software
installed.

And if that's Marco's point, it's pretty damn poor. How does what Motorola
does with the bootloader of their phone have to do with the code that Google
puts out exactly?

~~~
ootachi
As has been explained many times in the past, Android's relative openness
compared to iOS at the source code level does not translate to measurable
benefits for the majority of users because of carrier/manufacturer lockdown.

Rooting is a security exploit, and I don't consider it relevant to whether the
OS is practically open.

~~~
drivebyacct2
Now you're just shifting around your position. I thought it was about the
unlocked nature of bootloaders? Yes, in my last post I included some that
require "root" but, #1, not all of those root methods are through user-facing
security exploits, and #2, most of them allow custom software out of the box
from the manufacturer (specifically without rooting or really any work at
all), I noted the ones that require "community" support. Your characterization
is disingenuous.

Now it's about the openness at the source code level? I think you should look
up the CM statistics. There is a measurable percentage (or may tenth of a
percent) of Android users that run custom software, so I benefit from that. I
and others will only buy devices that will have CM support.

Further, the open nature of Android _absolutely_ trickles down to the users.
There are a dozen different (and with different physical form factor) Android
models that are free on contract to buy. There is only one WP7 that I'm aware
of that that is true for. Lower development costs are passed on to users, I've
discussed this further somewhere else on this thread.

------
dewiz
Marco why don't you transform the post in a poll ? ;)

------
terminus
Quite disingenuous to state that "Android is open" is bullshit and at the same
time the article finds no mention of Apple's overarching "closed is better for
you" attitude.

(Yes, the article hints at Apple's closed-ness. However, only relatively
minor, disconnected, issues. Not the overall attitude.)

------
jballanc
Only one I really take issue with is:

> Nobody wants a [popular new product category that Apple doesn’t make yet].

To be honest, when you hear that from an executive at Apple, I believe they
are being sincere. You have to understand that Apple does not think of the
iPhone as "a cell phone that plays music" or the iPad as "a tablet computer"
or the MacBook Air as "a netbook". Yes, this is parsing things rather finely,
but if you think that doing so is somehow irrelevant, then I would assert that
you don't understand Apple and the way they do things.

------
angus77
"Bullshit" is a lack of concern over whether what you've said was true or not.

"We’re not tracking you when you’re logged out" was a straight up lie.

------
smokinn
I would like to see a list of Amazon's bullshit.

~~~
rmoriz
"There are two kinds of companies, those that work to try to charge more and
those that work to charge less. We will be the second." — Jeff Bezos

"We expect all our businesses to have a positive impact on our top and bottom
lines. Profitability is very important to us or we wouldn't be in this
business. " — Jeff Bezos

"We see our customers as invited guests to a party, and we are the hosts. It's
our job every day to make every important aspect of the customer experience a
little bit better." — Jeff Bezos

~~~
redditmigrant
How is this bullshit? >"We expect all our businesses to have a positive impact
on our top and bottom lines. Profitability is very important to us or we
wouldn't be in this business. "

If anything thats being upfront that Amazon is a business in the business of
making money.

~~~
vl
Probably parent implied that many AWS services are run at zero margin or at
loss to block competition from entering.

~~~
nl
Given that you can get anything AWS does cheaper elsewhere I don't think argue
that.

AWS's advantages are many, but price isn't really a critical one.

------
antirez
If you focus on the news title itself, without clicking, it suddenly starts to
make sense:

Bullshit (marco.org)

------
aangjie
Am beginning to go with google nowadays...:-P

------
JoyxBen
Brilliant. Now for an interesting theory of why there is so much bullshit see
Harry Frankfurt's essay "On Bullshit" (Google it) :)

------
halfbrown
Well said! We choose to take the bad with the good... Though sometimes
companies make it tough for us to appreciate the good.

------
citadrianne
And another one from Google: There's no reason to delete things, ever.

------
linker3000
Wot, no Twitter?

------
orionlogic
New to realities of capitalism? Good morning America.

------
jsavimbi
You'd be surprised at the number of people who use Twitter for the sole
purpose of following their favorite chelebrities, ergo interacting with
brands. I'm going to put my toe in the water and assume the same applies to
Facebook.

~~~
chc
Celebrities may have brands built around them, but they are not simply brands.
I know a lot of people who spend a significant amount of time talking to
celebrities on Twitter, and they tend to draw that distinction too: If they
perceive the celebrity is an interesting _person_ , they'll interact. But if
the celebrity just seems to be presenting a "brand," they're much more
passive, because interacting with a brand tends to feel hollow.

~~~
jsavimbi
I wouldn't call the fifty thousand @paulg followers to be passive, exactly, as
I see a lot of interaction and he only tweets about the business, nothing
personal or news breaking. (I don't follow him on twitter, btw.)

And aside from his personal distaste for the artist Dale Chihuly, I havent
derived much about him from either his essays or speeches, so please don't
tell me that he's met all 50k of his followers and somehow convinced them that
he's a great guy. So do fifty thousand people want to interact with a brand or
not?

~~~
chc
You're drawing weird lines that I wouldn't agree with. It's a false dichotomy
to say "Either these people have met this guy and know him intimately or they
want to interact with a brand." I didn't know any of my friends very well
before I became friends with them, but they still interested me enough with
what I did know of them that I wanted to know more. That's not called
"interacting with a brand", it's called "interacting with people." I'll
probably never be good friends with Paul Graham, but I theoretically _could_.
Nobody will ever be friends with a brand.

People follow Paul Graham because they are interested in his ideas and
influence on the industry, not because they "want to interact with a brand."

~~~
jsavimbi
Even if he's not sharing any of his ideas or extending any of his influences
to his followers? Wes Welker signed up to Twitter a week ago (under his own
brand/name) and now has 175K followers, all of whom presumably want to
interact or at least be associated with (a form of interaction) Wes Welker,
the football player. They'll never get close to interacting with the person
outside of a charity event or a sly hookup, so why call bullshit when a social
media company claims that its user do in fact want to interact with brands
when they, and we, have evidence that they do?

I don't think OP's premise holds true in all cases and it's equally valid to
assume that people are interacting with a brand when they're following,
liking, friending, retweeting or mentioning personified brands, human or bot.

------
ellie42
Microsoft: "Next generation web is coming"

Hacker News: "We don't read it"

~~~
guelo
HN: these discusions are more intelligent than reddit's.

------
portentint
At, [insert airline name here], we care about you.

------
ychung
On that list, I think FB has the worst "bullshits".

------
muyuu
I disagree about the last line, not "everyone" has their bullshit. These 3 do
have and spread massive amounts of bullshit, however.

~~~
Joeri
I've never met a person that didn't have some level of bullshit going on. We
all do it, so by extensions all our group efforts end up doing it. The book
"why we make mistakes" has a good explanation based on how our mind works why
it's part of the human experience to peddle a load of crock.

~~~
muyuu
Yep, but I wouldn't equate slipping on occasion in some bullshit to have
bullshit at the very core of your operation, as is the case with these three
companies.

I know I do all I possibly can not to bullshit anyone. This may limit me in
some respects but so do all principles.

------
jeremysalwen
GNU: -Spokesman has poor personal hygiene.

------
p0wn3d
Remember back in the 70's and 80's before cable TV? We only had channels 3,6,
and 7. We loved TV but couldn't stand the commercials every 5 minutes. The
internet has turned into one big TV commercial. Websites are now 10% content
and 90% ads. It is so sad that we let this get out of control. Don't get me
started on social networking and how they exist to be the big TV commercial to
make boatloads of cash.

