
Ask HN: Google employees, why is G+ more important than your users? - dsl
I would love to hear how Google pitches G+ and the disaster that is Youtube at this point internally. How do they keep morale up?
======
jmillikin
Internally, G+ is marketed as a unified login/account system. Management's
stated reasoning goes something like:

    
    
      * It's silly to force users to have separate accounts for
        Google services because most users would prefer to have
        Gmail, Docs/Drive, YouTube, Calendar, and so on under the
        same account/identity.
    
      * Users who want to have separate public identities will
        create pseudonymous "Pages" for each of their identities.
        These pages will still be owned by the same account, so
        the user only has to log in once.
    
      * Users who are strongly opposed to a unified Google account
        are a sufficiently small population that it is acceptable
        to inconvenience them if doing so improves the experience
        of every other user.
    

By itself, these arguments are reasonable and could probably have been
implemented without too much trouble (though "Pages" continues to be a
confusing and unclear term). The problem is that the new account system was
introduced at the exact same time as a social network, with the /same name/,
and that the social network decided to inject a hard requirement of Facebook-
style name validation rules into the new profile system.

Now the term "Google+" has become so strongly connected with the Google+
social network (and its infamous names policy) that any attempt to expand the
Google+ account system is met with fear and outrage. I don't think upper
management expected this or understands why the community reacted thus, just
as they didn't expect or understand why requiring a Firstname Lastname format
on the Internet was problematic.

I don't believe Google+ management is malicious, but they do seem woefully
unaware of how internet-native communities behave.

~~~
dredmorbius
It's equally silly to force users who'd established _and clearly indicated
they wished to maintain_ separate accounts for separate services, to integrate
these.

Doing so where the user had clearly indicated they didn't wish that to happen
was even worse.

Forcing users to not be able to independently toggle whether or not services
were enabled for an account is another. I neither want my pseudonymous G+
account ("Edward Morbius") nor my personal Gmail account(s) (unspecified) to
have _any_ association with YouTube. I simply cannot independently disable the
latter, and my data leaks across the services.

I've consequently been experimenting with setting up hostfile blocks of
various Google services. I'm in a weaning-off phase right now (I'm trying to
unwind my Google presence rather than just nuke it entirely in one go), and I
can assure you it's painful. A proxy front-end to YouTube would be helpful. I
already have been making extensive use of youtube-dl largely because the UX
sucks vastly less than running YouTube through a browser (and in some related
side commentary I've seen references that other folks offering streaming vs.
downloaded video saw 4x the downloads than streams, for, I suspect, similar
reasons).

So, the fact is that Google outed me (fortunately, a pseudonymous profile),
despite my clearly indicating repeatedly "no" (and documenting some of those
"no's" in earlier G+ posts. I'd even brought this up on a post of Yonatan
Zunger's, and, despite his really well-inentioned "Edward Morbius Hrm? If you
want to keep the names separate, why not simply click on that option?"
response (and I've really got no reasons to doubt his sincerity), 1) the
option isn't presented, 2) the workflow I'd think I'd go through doesn't
accomplish what I'd expect, and 3) I've reached the stage of a) having lost my
trust in the company to respect my privacy wishes and settings in future and
b) not wanting to continue jumping through hoops to fix what they broke in the
first place.

[https://plus.google.com/u/0/103389452828130864950/posts/XVFz...](https://plus.google.com/u/0/103389452828130864950/posts/XVFzdMK8xbg)

I don't know _what_ the hell's going on with Google's management team, but
something's badly broken. And I do agree with you that they utterly fail to
understand the social aspects of communities.

~~~
leoc
> It's equally silly to force users who'd established and clearly indicated
> they wished to maintain separate accounts for separate services, to
> integrate these.

[...]

> I neither want my pseudonymous G+ account ("Edward Morbius") nor my personal
> Gmail account(s) (unspecified) to have any association with YouTube.

I disagree: _in principle_ , making services and identities orthogonal is
clearly the right thing to do. Having (for example) three different, unlinked
identities, any of which can use or not use GMail, G+ or YouTube at the user's
discretion, is clearly preferable to having a YouTube account, a G+ account,
and a GMail account. If pseudonymous identity A doesn't want to use YouTube,
then "don't do that, then". If the user later decides that identity A should
post a video to YouTube after all, he/she can just do so. Under the old
system, that would require the user to either give away the connection between
(say) the G+ account and the YouTube account, or to create a fourth account -
a second YouTube account - for identity A to use on YouTube.

The problem is that in _practise_ Google is making a bags of the transition to
the new model (or what they're telling jmillikin the new model is) - whether
through incompetence, or not caring enough, or because they're duplicitous in
claiming that they really want to support multiple (externally-facing)
identities per Google user.

~~~
dredmorbius
If Google wanted to offer combined accounts going forward, that would be fine
by me. Though I'd also prefer the option of disaggregated accounts, and of
disabling specific services on accounts.

If they wanted to offer the _option_ of merging existing accounts for which
there was an underlying connection, that would also be fine. Though I'd really
prefer they not do it with interstitials.

Merging identities in express violation of stated intent, or simply not
offering the option to decline, is simply wrong, and will inevitably turn into
a major PR disaster, as this is.

~~~
leoc
No argument from me there, except that I think we'll have to see how big and
consequential the PR fallout really turns out to be.

------
jmduke
So I don't work for Google and I've never worked for Google. I do, however,
have two things you might want to keep in mind:

1\. Google, according to Wikipedia, has 46,000 employees. The number of
employees who are in a position to influence policy regarding Google+ adoption
over the Google suite of products is likely less than one hundred (or .2%). It
is entirely possible -- likely, even! -- that the other 99.8% of those
employees do not agree with the Google+ strategy. It is also entirely possible
-- likely, even! -- that those employees are encouraged to voice their
opinions internally (though voicing those opinions externally doesn't really
accomplish anything extra.)

2\. You can disagree with Google's tactics, motives, and end-goals, but I'd be
hard-pressed to find anyone who doesn't believe that the average Google
employee is very intelligent. It is entirely possible -- likely, even! -- that
one of these employees did a cost-benefit analysis somewhere along the line
(likely before Google+ was released to the public) and discovered that the
cost of pushing an umbrella identity (pissing off users, possibly lowering
retention and engagement) is outweighed by the benefits of such a strategy
(attracting 'whale' consumers, strengthening advertising profiles for
consumers).

~~~
RodericDay
I don't know what you were thinking when you added those interjections to
every other sentence but this post is condescending as hell.

~~~
jmduke
I honestly wasn't trying to be condescending, and apologize if it came off
that way. (I'll leave the original post unedited so it doesn't look like
you're crazy or anything.)

That being said, _Google employees, why is G+ more important than your users?_
is an incredibly loaded question and I think my tone might have stemmed from
that.

~~~
davidgerard
I think it's relevant to ask in the context of "just what the hell do you
think you're doing when you get up every morning to feed this thing? You do
actually have to justify that."

~~~
mbesto
Actually you don't. Let's stop pretending that any you can't trace any
product/service back to something "evil".

"Oh that MacBook you use for work...ya it was made in a sweatshop in China.
How do you justify that?"

------
mcphilip
Not a google employee, but this disgusting mistreatment of its users may
actually be a good thing if it blows up in their faces. My prediction is that
the change to automatically showing the users g+ profile pic next to comments
will be what gets them in hot water by empowering stalkers and trolls.

Here's a simple example, if you go to the video for Miley Cyrus - Wrecking
Ball, there are the usual back and forth comments arguing her merits. However,
you can now easily spot preteen girls if you were looking for that specific
demographic, and then subscribe to them for more efficient creeping.

Shame on Google. This behavior is stunningly evil.

~~~
judk
Preteen girls are not allowed to have accounts. That's COPPA.

~~~
bashinator
Are you saying that no pre-teen girls have G+ accounts? Or that because COPPA
gives Google some legislation to cover their asses if this kind of stalking
were to happen, it's OK?

------
jrockway
I have no idea what the official party line is... but doesn't it make at least
a little bit of sense to unify two social networks owned by the same company?

One thought about real names: what does your contacts database look like on
your phone? While I know a lot of people by their online handles, I also know
their real name, and I typically choose to enter that real name into my phone.
Maybe this is uncommon, but if not, if you're building a communication
platform, it does make some sense for the user-entered data to follow this
format. Is there some intrinsic reason that someone be referred to as
"Jonathan Rockway" when you send them a message via the SMS protocol, but
"jrockway" if you send that same message via Jabber? It then follows to
wonder: if you're talking to your friends via YouTube, why would you use yet
another nickname?

Maybe what people want is a unique identifier that only they know, and then
choose to share a different name with different groups of people?

I don't have any strong feelings one way or the other, but I am interested in
what other people have to say.

~~~
dizzystar
>> _While I know a lot of people by their online handles, I also know their
real name,_

This can't possibly be true. I easily interact with 100+ people on various
platforms. I don't know any of their names. I consider them "friends" in a
way, but their real names are wholly irrelevant to me.

>> _if you 're talking to your friends via YouTube_

No... You are having a discussion about the video. This is certainly not your
friends.

You can argue this, but if everyone is friends talking to each other, why are
there still so many people willing to blatantly troll people they obviously
don't know?

I'm not sure what world you are painting, but this does not reflect any
reality I am aware of.

~~~
jrockway
I define friend as someone I'd invite over to my house. Those are the people I
interact with on social networking sites and send YouTube links to.

Discussion forums are, socially, a very different thing than hanging out with
friends, even though they both involve people and saying things. That's what I
think HN collectively misses when talking about Google+ or Facebook; they
think those are Internet Discussion Forums when they are actually something
for closer friends.

You have to understand that very few people are willing to write this much on
the Internet for public consumption by total strangers -- we are very unusual
people, and most online services aren't designed for us. That's why we're
typing hundreds of words into a Web 1.0 GUI written in a custom programming
language, rather than using Facebook or G+ or Snapchat or whatever.

~~~
frostmatthew
> You have to understand that very few people are willing to write this much
> on the Internet for public consumption by total strangers -- we are very
> unusual people

Seems you're a bit out of touch with "usual people" \- or at least "usual
people" under the age of 35. I do agree HNers are unusual, but if anything I
would say they are _more_ likely to be concerned with what they share
publicly, not _less_.

~~~
obstacle1
You've missed the point entirely. That comment was about the nature of the
content posted. Facebook, snapchat, et al are essentially click-click-clicking
through pages heavy on visual stimulation and interacting through short bursts
of text, now video and images too. HN is about reading and formulating
arguments and exchanging walls of text in an environment completely free of
visual distraction.

The type of person who tends towards HN will be different from the type of
person who tends towards something like Snapchat on the above grounds.

------
mohamedmansour
Ever since Google has been integrating all their services to Google+, I have
been using Google differently now:

1) Anonymous or no commenting on YouTube 2) Using Windows 8.1 Mail app to
access Gmail. Because seeing that Google+ notification icon is distracting and
annoying me 3) Stopped rating apps on Google Play store 4) Stopped
contributing reviews to Local 5) Trying to stop using Google's Web products in
favor of apps instead because of that damn Notifications bar.

I understand using a single Google Account for all services, but linking them
all to one service where that service acts as a Social Network is not a
service I would want to use anymore. They acquired Meeboo bar, and it seems
they want every service they own have that bar and I despised that bar.
Totally the wrong direction to take.

Treating each service separately would have been better and giving the option
to the user to show that bar would have been great.

------
joeld42
Not a google employee, but here's my take. It seems like value in web
ecosystem is changing from "views" to "verbs" \-- like, share, etc.. actions
that spread content rather than passively consuming it. Google has based its
business on monetizing "views" and its competitors (fb) are building on verbs.

Also, Google has to maintain a forest of separate identities for everyone.
(youtube, gmail, g+, etc). It's super annoying just to maintain one login.
There's huge business value in consolidating those, even without adding
features.

Finally, Youtube comments are a cesspool. Even when they're not racist or
threatening, they're immature and, at best "wow that's awesome". They drive
viewers away. I bet google wants to try to do-over comments in a way that
makes them useful to people, not unsettling.

And I would hesitate to call it a disaster. Sure there's a lot of whining
about it now, especially in tech circles, but every big interface change comes
with a wave of whiners. We'll see in three or four weeks if anyone is
complaining.

They'd certainly have a much tougher time doing this if there were another
option for the masses, but for most people YouTube is it. Saying people are
going to quit watching or uploading to youtube is silly, they'll go where?
Vimeo?

They're going to keep tweaking it, people are going to adapt and learn, videos
of cats falling off objects will continue to be uploaded.

ps: "How do they keep morale up"? Free food and big piles of money. How else
do you do it?

------
yuhong
This article that was submitted to HN had a section on Vic Gundotra that
should have clues:
[http://www.slate.com/blogs/business_insider/2013/09/20/sex_a...](http://www.slate.com/blogs/business_insider/2013/09/20/sex_and_politics_at_google_it_s_a_game_of_thrones_in_mountain_view.html)

~~~
morgante
Original: [http://www.businessinsider.com/sex-and-politics-at-google-
it...](http://www.businessinsider.com/sex-and-politics-at-google-its-a-game-
of-thrones-in-mountain-view-2013-9)

------
dspeyer
Former Googler here.

The vast majority of Googlers do not approve of G+ policies. However, Google
has never been run democratically and most of the time that's probably a good
thing.

Furthermore, the management has been much less forthcoming than usual about
the thinking behind these policies. What they have said varies and usually
sounds like excuses.

In short, don't expect actual information in this thread.

~~~
zaidf
_The vast majority of Googlers do not approve of G+ policies._

For me, this is the most critical statement in the entire Google+ saga. _Most_
Google employees do not approve of a strategy that google is betting its
future on. Has this ever happened before? Probably never before. And to me, it
marks a clear beginning of the end of google as we knew it. The google we grew
up loving was a google that put product quality before anything else.
Everything else(such as market share) was a result of a good product. This is
no longer true.

~~~
nostrademons
GMail and Instant both had significant internal resistance, as did several
projects that were (rightfully, IMHO) canned. Meanwhile, Wave and Buzz were
beloved by Googlers.

Much as it pains me to admit that I'm not omniscient, there are ample examples
of products where the majority Googler consensus does not reflect the majority
market consensus. There are also ample examples of products where the initial
market consensus doesn't reflect the final market consensus. (For example,
Chrome was beloved internally by Googlers, but was met with a lot of external
skepticism when it launched, and then eventually became the dominant browser.)

------
nostromo
It seems simple, honestly. The likelihood that people will stop using YouTube
because of G+ is nil.

~~~
nacs
It's quite the opposite for me. I've started moving my stuff off of Google as
this was one of the last straws in my book. I'd already switched to using DDG
and Startpage for my searches and am currently in the process of moving my
Google apps email to my own server. When that's done I plan on deleting my
Youtube and Google accounts.

This latest Google+ push has made me realize just how far Google is willing to
go to capture more data on their users instead of focusing on providing the
best service possible as they used to.

~~~
psbp
I'm sorry, but hearing geeks talk about quitting google as if it's some
personal triumph (in nearly every google thread) makes the sentiment seem even
more tone deaf and futile.

~~~
alayne
Sometimes thought leaders need to light the way when issues are not apparent
to the masses. I have been saying for a long time that having companies own
our identities is a bad idea.

~~~
minwcnt5
What evidence is there that HN commenters are actually "thought leaders"? That
sounds like just the sort of hubris the 4chan thread makes fun of.

~~~
alayne
Writing us off as "geeks" is absurd. A lot of us are high level developers,
architects, consultants, and so on.

~~~
cdash
The public at large doesn't really give a shit if some developers, architects,
or consultants want to send a message by deleting their google accounts and
refusing to use google services.

~~~
teaneedz
They care, it just takes a little longer at times. One day, a person wakes up
and realizes that the technophiles are someplace else, all of those blogs,
videos and snippets they've been seeing hit home, and they have been
personally affected by a real name policy. It starts someplace.

~~~
magicalist
or the technophiles look up and everyone's using whatsapp while we're asking
why google isn't using XMPP anymore. This meme needs to die. Sure, gmail rode
the wave of the tech-in-crowd to success, but there are far more examples that
didn't, or did but went nowhere. If we were actually a good crystal ball it
would be a whole lot easier to invest in the market.

~~~
teaneedz
What examples might those be? When I look at many products that had the tech-
in-crowd blessing and yet failed, often it appeared to be because of lapses in
user experience and some humility.

It doesn't require a crystal ball to know when a product solves a problem for
users in a way that leaves a good taste in one's mouth.

However, I'm still discovering great products and apps from technophiles who
have found solutions to problems that impact me. I've also left detritus
behind, not because the awesome folks of HN said it was time, but because of
well reasoned thoughts that start here (I tend to favor here) and in other
technology springboards.

At the end of the day, I believe that mainstream ultimately wakes up. The
kernals for change start small though.

Personally, I don't follow a compass held by just the tech pundits or
mainstream - I head toward the smell of good user experience.

------
gkoberger
In addition to what other people have said: Googlers love Google Plus. I
haven't met a Googler (and, I know many) that doesn't love it.

After all, for them, it's not a barren wasteland. They have a very active
network (coworkers/friends). I don't think this answers your question, however
most Googlers like G+.

~~~
nostromo
It's a much better product than Facebook.

But a better social product means nothing without an active network of users.

~~~
Geee
Better in what way? G+ has confusing and horrible interface, it's slow, and
keeps asking me to import friends every single time I open up the page. That's
not 'better product' in my opinion.

~~~
wyclif
Compared to Facebook, it's beautifully designed.

~~~
dredmorbius
That ... actually makes me wince a bit. For the Facebookers.

[http://stylebot.me/styles/2446](http://stylebot.me/styles/2446)

That's what it took for me to be able to tolerate the Plus.

------
tasoeur
From what I heard from Google employees, G+ has been highly prioritized over
many projects (and some others which closed like google lab, reader, etc.).

Facing the social network giant that is Facebook, G+ has to become successful
after many past failures, and to do so, they try to force their way through,
and make it ubiquitous.

However, this Youtube chapter was probably a step too far, since very
intrusive and noticeable.

------
s-topper
YouTube comments were already a cesspool. Now, with added "shared via
Google+", it has become unbearable. I added this rule in AdBlockPlus to block
YouTube comments:

    
    
       youtube.com###watch-discussion

------
amasad
I'd be more concerned when they start forcing G+ on open platforms like the
Web and Android. Maybe it's already started with Android KitKat shipping with
Hangouts as the default messaging app.

~~~
TheLegace
The worst part is I can't even disable it if I am using my another SMS app, so
now I have to clear two notifications for my text message and 50% of the time
I usually end up in the Hangouts app where I don't want to be.

When will this madness stop?

~~~
tjohns
Your other SMS app is broken needs to update to the new API that was
introduced in KitKat, which should fix both problems:

[http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2013/10/getting-
your-...](http://android-developers.blogspot.com/2013/10/getting-your-sms-
apps-ready-for-kitkat.html)

Intercepting SMS required using a hidden API before. Now it's an officially
supported feature.

~~~
TheLegace
My apologies then. I will contact the app developer.

------
libovness
Don't forget that one of the tacit reasons for G+'s existence is simply to
have a reason to encourage G+ buttons on each page for further tracking of
what's happening on the internet. Using a single identity helps to reconcile a
unique user that help both the advertiser reach "uniques" and for Google to
better understand that user's behavior.

Back to the point: Google's ethos is to track and analyze as much of what's
happening on the Internet as possible. If, as an employee, you don't
appreciate that this is Google's bread and butter, you simply may not care
enough about these things to ever get worked up about G+'s account management.

~~~
jmillikin
From
[https://support.google.com/plus/answer/1319578](https://support.google.com/plus/answer/1319578)
:

    
    
      > The +1 button isn’t used to track your visits across the web.
      > Google doesn’t keep a persistent record of your browsing
      > history as part of the process of showing you a +1 button or
      > otherwise use the fact that you personally have visited a page
      > with the +1 button.

~~~
username223
Frankly, I don't trust enough to believe they won't change this in the future,
or even that they're telling the truth now. Tracking people is the only way
Google makes any money.

~~~
Havoc
Agreed. I recently discovered that they even track you when using incognito.
e.g. I got a youtube suggestion whilst in incognito that I had searched for 2
weeks prior & the type of search precludes the possibility of it being a co-
incidence. So much for no cookies in incognito...

~~~
jmillikin
Incognito mode doesn't block cookies, it creates a separate cookiejar. If you
have the same incognito session open for two weeks, every cookie from every
site you visited still exists. If you want cookie-clearing behavior, you'll
have to periodically close your incognito window.

~~~
Havoc
This was with a fresh incognito session, so theoretically there shouldn't be a
cookie.

A bit more trial & error shows that its possibly connected via IP...switching
IP seems to confuse it.

------
yuhong
There is also a dead comment by Gthrowaway1 in
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6732425](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6732425)

~~~
psbp
What are you linking to? The only comment about what Gthrowaway1 said is about
Gthrowaway1 deleting the comment.

~~~
r0h1n
I'm not sure if reproducing a dead comment violates some kind of unwritten HN
guideline, but here it is:

===============================================

 _Gthrowaway1 2 days ago | link [dead]

The Google bashing is well deserved. Even people at Google despise Vic
Gundotra (just check memegen.googleplex.com today), yet this incompetent
figure is allowed to continue alienating users and driving Google's brand into
the ground.

Vic, do us a favor: Go back to Microsoft and never return!

Disclaimer: I work for Google._

~~~
psn
I can't help but feel that if someone deletes their comment, its polite to
respect their wishes and keep the comment deleted.

~~~
tzs
I don't think that the person who posted that comment deleted it. I think his
account got hell banned.

------
lazyjones
I'm waiting for a Twitter video platform to settle these issues once and for
all ... Google really needs more competition where users feel they are forced
to do things because they have no choice.

~~~
alextingle
That would be awesome.

------
rhizome
These threads are already huge, but I'll take a bite.

I don't think it's G+ being more important than the users, I think it has more
to do with YouTube. Currently, G+ is for nerds who care about anonymity and
all the other things that Google is being criticized here. That's fine, I'm
one of them.

However, YouTube is a shithole and it's likely that YT people don't care as
much about _what_ they sign into as long as all their stuff is there. That
Google would try to move YT users on to G+ makes sense in a "slum
clearance[1]" way.

The Real Name vs. Nicknymity thing is a real problem, and for me I don't think
Google is handling right, but I do think they're handling it in a way that is
not out of line with the values of a stereotypical corporate bureaucracy.

Google wants to know the real names of everybody on its services, I get that,
but users who value theirs and others' internet identity do so regardless of
whether it's under a real name or a nickname. That Google has been found to be
getting back alley sex from the US Government does not help their case for
knowing who you really are.

In my more cynical moments I think comments and such are a ruse to get more
PII from their users for law enforcement purposes. But YT is also a shithole,
and the ad rates against combined-identity demographics ain't sour neither.

1\. [http://freakonomics.com/2011/09/30/the-controversial-
legacy-...](http://freakonomics.com/2011/09/30/the-controversial-legacy-of-
slum-clearance/)

------
jarsj
There used to be someone at google who would approve every UX/UI at pixel
level. She now works for Yahoo!.

------
moon_of_moon
So really the only way to identify high quality information is by what some
would call "peer reviewed, authenticated content". That means you know
something about the person who generated the content and a bunch of people
(who you also know something about) review it and vote it up. Thats why a
large percentage of high ranked search results come from wikipedia and stack
overflow/exchange and quora.

LinkedIn and Facebook are leading the market in the authenticated peer
reviewed content business, which is locked in to their platforms, and which
search engines cannot index.

Extrapolate ten years down the line, and that means a scenario where existing
search engine leadership is severely compromised.

And thats why the push for G+. Its do or die.

tl;dr: the goal is to have search access to authenticated peer reviewed
content, and to mitigate the risk of existing market leaders in that space
from cannibalizing the search business, and with it the lucrative advertising
business.

~~~
dredmorbius
_the only way to identify high quality information is by what some would call
"peer reviewed, authenticated content"._

That's not the only way.

It _is_ a method that scales.

You can also identify content yourself, based on known sources (whether fully
identified or pseudonymous), or based on the extant indicators within the text
itself.

Traditionally the issue has been resolved through editors (not necessarily
peer review) who would judge content on its merits and/or the reputation of
its author(s). As Clay Shirkey has noted, "it's not information overload, it's
filter failure", we've moved from pre-publication filters to post-publication
filters. The incentives on and for publication have also shifted, with a huge
increase in low-quality information being promoted (most of what's "viral"),
something I'm increasingly getting sick of.

As for G+, as I've posted elsewhere (and Homer Slated points out very
eloquently in a recent post), Google's formerly razor-sharp relevance
algorithms are becoming increasingly vague. It's to the point it's becoming
highly obvious to me, and it's very painfully manifested on G+ specifically.

Some of this might be attributed to SEO gaming of search, but tool design and
selectin (see "What's Hot" and the _extremely_ limited search and noise
controls on G+) make me increasingly think it's deliberate.

------
DanBC
Reading this thread I see some confusion about what YouTube and Google require
with G+ account linking.

HN is full of smart people who work with tech all day every day.

Imagine what it's like for the average person trying to create a YouTube
channel but trying to avoid leaking too much information to the creeps.

It's weird to me that Google would make things tricky for content creators on
Youtube. These aren't people posting cat videos, these are people who are
trying to build a brand and who spend time and money creating original content
- some of it is "let's play" style video, or vlogging, but some of it is young
people creating music video and sharing it. Pissing off those people leaves
YouTube a wasteland of cat videos, adverts off the telly, and chopped up tv
programmes posted without permission. Google can make lots of money off that,
but it's a shame they don't want the original content.

------
judk
G+ leadership thinks the internet is for brand management for bloggers,
photographers, etc. They aren't being sadistic, they are simply generalizing
from their own experience ad successful public strivers.

Personal private use is simply irrelevant to them. And you know, maybe it
wasted time and the world would be better if people stopped having anonymous
debates that don't win over any minds.

Google doesn't run cafes and bars, and they don't run reddit, and they don't
want to. They aren't trying to kill Reddit.

HNers write their blog posts and seek discussion here instead of in the blog's
comments. Redditors can post YouTube videos and discuss them on /r/videos

------
erikb
(not a G employee as well)

I scrolled through all the comments and at least in the first line I didn't
see this yet, so I add it to this thread: Why does <X> piss of it's users?
(doesn't need to be the big G)

A) Mostly people are using services that they don't pay for. But the service
must be awesome. This kind of user is not so attractive to competitive,
profitable companies. They don't add much but they cost much time, trouble,
energy, money. If these users go away no company really bothers, even if these
are 90% of the users. (keep in mind, I'm one of these troublesome users)

B.) Users that actually pay might not be unhappy with the results. E.g. a
company that buys advertisement space from google will not mind if Google
processes the user information more efficiently. Also a Google business
account owner will not mind that his employees can't watch Youtube videos from
his account that would be shameful to show publicly. Therefore I think the
bigger part of the interesting cutomers might actually approve of the current
changes.

C) Most users have not much power. They can basically choose between service A
and service B but often both services exploit their users the same way (see G+
and FB). So even if they are annoyed as hell they might not even go away.

Now I'm really one of the people who is unhappy with Google as it is, but I
think there are some very good reasons for them to do it.

------
gobbluth
Not a Google employee, just a satisfied member. As far as I can tell, these
are the following flaws with G+:

1) It's idiotic that my URL must be FirstnameLastname1234.

2) GDrive storage (which I use to upload 2000px G+ photos) is unfortunately
expensive when compared to Everpix's unlimited storage. Everpix would have
been quite profitable at G+'s scale, too. If Google invested this much in
photo enhancement services, why not allow us to pay $50/year for unlimited
full-size photo storage?

3) Not enough participation by other people, though it's getting there.

4) I'll never review a Google Play app or Youtube video if I'm forced to
publish everything with my real name. They should allow pseudonyms.

Seriously, are there other problems? It provides fantastic value for me in the
form of auto-awesome photos and the eventual integration of Google Voice. My
profile is completely locked down to outsiders and unifies my Google services
under a single identity.

I just don't see what the problem is. At worst, it discourages participation
on the Play Store and Youtube. In exchange, I get cool photo stuff and a
pretty great social network. There are still improvements to be made, but I
don't understand HN's antagonism. Quite frankly, G+ is welcome competition to
Facebook. G+ has better design than Facebook, respects my privacy vastly more
than Facebook, and provides incredibly valuable photo backup and enhancement.

------
adamnemecek
Somehow I don't think that someone who is a cog in the machine has much say in
this.

~~~
natch
Maybe he/she is asking the non-cogs. Let's see if they speak up forthrightly,
or give us another faux surprise "what the..." post.

------
eonil
DISCLAIMER: I'm not a Google employee. This is my guess.

Users doesn't make money for Google. Users are valuable only when they're in
_sellable_ state. Ad companies don't want to buy fully anonymous, bogus or
false profiles. They want real personal information from real human. To
increase efficiency of target reaching / marketing cost.

Until now, Google didn't need to worry about quality of their product - I mean
their _users profiles_. Because that was valuable enough. Because nobody else
could provided anything better.

But now it's a little bit different. Especially with Facebook. Facebook
provides _better product_ \- more accurate, proven, related, real personal
information. There's mostly no spamming, bogus, false account. They offer
interconnected and very clearly tasted profiles. The most fantastic thing is
all the informations are input by users themselves. So accuracy of the data is
incredible. Google' product - user profile - is mostly tracked by usage
history. So inaccurate. People refuse to input something on Google. This
degrades quality of their product.

To the marketers, Google product - user profiles - are now inferior. Nobody
wants to buy Google product anymore. Not completely useless yet, but it's not
competitive product to what Facebook provides. If this situation continues,
Google has to bargain a lot, and finally will lose the only their profitable
business - ad selling. Ad is not just an empty space on a website. Nowadays,
you can't sell ad in high price without targeting information. Google's
targeting was best in old days, but now Facebook offers even better which
makes Google product crap.

That's why Google is pushing everybody to their copy of Facebook - G+. To
survive. By making money. G+ can make money by delivering quality user
profiles to marketers. But you, the users, are just nothing if you don't offer
that informations. Because without informations, your account is just an
useless binary junk which can't make money.

If you still love Google, please, feed them your personal information. That's
the only way you can keep them (and their services) to survive. Anyway don't
forget that any further marketing junks are also your responsibility. That's
what you pay for Google stuff.

P.S.

If you think something wrong in my posting, please correct me. I also want to
know if there's any other reason.

~~~
voyou
"They want real personal information from real human."

I don't understand why they would want that. The kind of analytics data you
can get from a Google profile is _much_ more useful to advertisers than vague
demographic categories like age or location (I mean, you can guess at these
categories from Google's data, but if you know that someone _acts_ like a 23
year old woman from Austin, that's more useful for marketing purposes than
knowing that they actually _are_ a 23 year old woman from Austin).

~~~
eonil
You're right. Nobody want approximated, imitated, false, or empty data.

And you're wrong. Facebook data is not vague. People use Facebook _to write
about themselves_. And to announce it _to their friends_. People don't lie to
their friends. And that's the miracle of Facebook to marketers. People write
_truth_ on Facebook. Sheryl Sandberg knew it, so she didn't hesitate to get
aboard.

Unlike Facebook, Google data is poor. They have only approximation and best-
guess. People don't want to leave any personal stuff on Google. Google is a
device for work, not a personal entertainment. They sometimes leave bogus data
to avoid Google's tracking. Actually many people do. I had over 5 Gmail
accounts for spam mailers and crappy web-service membership. That's the
_vague_ data. They can't even dream some relationship data between users.

I don't understand your story about 23yo woman. What marketers want to know is
the only thing - _how can I find a person would like to buy my product?_.
Everything else is just a clue and device to track them down. Age, sex,
location, taste, marriage… All are just parameters. But Google has only that
stripped down parameters. No more. Those parameters are better than nothing,
but completely useless when compared to what Facebook offers.

Facebook offers: (1) whether the woman actually married or not (2) who's'
husband (3) what's their jobs = income level (4) whether they have children
and how old are the children (5) when did she moved recently. She don't need
to write about her children. Because Facebook will analyze photos and will
recognize children's age, race, sex, and current living location. In addition,
Facebook also let you know how many friends she have, and how are their
children… recursively.

If you're in a diaper company, which profile would you prefer? I won't even
consider Google data. That's just a crap when compared to Facebook profiles.

Of course, those data won't be offered as is. That's illegal. But each
companies know how to deliver those data to their customers. And obviously,
Facebook is expected to have much more fine gained control on choosing
advertising target. Marketers also know the difference of that methodology.
"You can pin-point bombing on Facebook."

~~~
voyou
I think you underestimate how much Google knows about people. It seems to me
that what you _say_ is much less relevant to marketers than what you _do_ ,
and in what you do, it's not obvious to me that Facebook has a big advantage.

On Facebook, you might fill in a field saying that you are married or that you
have kids of a certain age. Google knows that you have made a number of
searches about diaper price, or quality, or about using cloth diapers, and
have spent time on, say, price comparison web sites or parenting forums. From
this kind of Google data, advertisers would know to send you adverts
emphasising the price of their diapers (rather than trying to sell you high
quality, expensive, diapers), and they know this with _more_ confidence than
they could extrapolate from what you say on Facebook.

It's true that Facebook also has data about what you do (commenting and liking
on particular updates and photos, for instance, and web traffic data from Like
buttons on pages), but note that this doesn't depend, any more than Google's
data depends, on the user being truthful about their own real-world identity.

------
mcculley
If you reframe this question as "Why are your customers more important than
your users?" it has an obvious answer.

------
dewiz
Something that Google fails to understand, is that the company unifying the
authentication experience cannot be the same company unifying the web
experience.

I like having one authentication service provider, but I cannot have this
provider holding hostage my services, my data, my history etc.

In this sense Microsoft is better, because they focus more on the product and
less on the identity (since the business model is around licenses this makes
sense). However this could change soon... Bing, Office365 etc.

If Google wants to win this battle they need to allow users to expose
themselves with nicknames at least, different names per service even.
Internally they will have their unique ID to which they can attach their
marketing business model. However, I will still feel something is wrong about
one company knowing so much about me.

------
powera
This question should really be "VicG and Larry: why is G+ more important than
your users".

------
vinitool76
I don't get what all the fuss is all about. Why would you want to hide your
identity unless you are writing something crappy or being a troll on Youtube
or Play Store. A single sign-on service is a great decision and that't the way
things should be when you have multiple services from same company.

You guys don't mind using all services like Spotify, Quora etc that are so
closely tied up with Facebook login. But when google tries to integrate it's
own services it is so wrong? What are we, Hypocrites?

Coming to Google+, it is a much better designed and well thought off social
network. What is the whole issue about?

~~~
redwood
Try thinking this through. If necessary try to imagine what it's like in
others' shoes. Please try to grant this the critical evaluation it deserves.

~~~
vinitool76
I have thought about this. Don't you think that the crowd at HN just goes too
hard on anything Google does? Frankly i don't feel anything wrong is have a
SSO for all google apps. There are always a way to hide identity if you truly
want to be anonymous.

Agreed, there are some concerns as well. But again, aren't we living in an age
where all our data is being sold to marketing agencies and companies. FB has
been doing it since ever.

------
djvu9
I guess the real reason could be that they try to sell ads on YouTube to
advertisers with a competitive rate (compared to popular episodes) because
they now can reach the targeted audience directly. The integration is somehow
a "solid" evidence to advertisers.

------
shadowmint
Don't be silly; that would violate the 'do not discuss this topic' order...

------
motters
I think Google will do what Google wants to do and that there are other
agendas in play.

The reasonable thing would be to give people the option of uniting their
different accounts for purposes of convenience, or not as they so choose.

------
rcjordan
The current crop of Youtube commentors are the target of this purge, not
collateral damage. Big G's high$$ advertisers aren't interested in being
associated with free-form comments.

------
airtonix
How is it a disaster? I keep hearing this from people who like to peddle filth
on youtube. People who love Apple, people who have no problems giving up their
privacy with Facebook.

------
jrs99
g+ needs to succeed. if it don't, then google is done. Search with no ads is
something a startup can figure out. video with no ads is something a startup
can figure out.

------
Narkov
Users != customers. Customers > users.

~~~
davidgerard
To be fair, even Google's paying customers get really pissed off at being
treated like the users.

------
meerita
I'm sure this is not developers fault. I'm sure it's management.

------
googlemployee1
I work pretty high up at Google, and I (obviously) made this account to post
in this thread. Google is effectively "dead" in my opinion, and this mirrors
(at least in my experience) the feelings of many of our other higher-ups who
are concerned with technology rather than the business. Everything has
stagnated, it's no longer fun to work here, and it's entirely about making
money now. The claims that we don't bend over for government agencies is
entirely bullshit. Most of what they wanted was done without question (though
I can't say how much of a choice we had). The company will continue, but
you'll see us fall out of style, in a similar fashion to what has happened to
Microsoft.

~~~
sidcool
[Not a Google employee] Effectively dead? Their share prices are soaring.
Android is killing the competition. Google Glass and Self Driving cars are
hep. They have the best talent at their disposal. I am a Google fanboy, so my
view might be skewed here, but they indeed are prospering, probably to the
dismay of many; but the truth stands.

~~~
ddebernardy
That means little. Ballmer oversaw very profitable years in Microsoft history.
But MS is no less of an undead cash-cow today.

