> Gmail's success is entirely predicated on the health of the global email ecosystem
That depends on what you define as "health".
> Email itself, of course has a huge network effect, and that is because you can email anyone in the world, regardless of what email system they use
If that's the case, then why does Gmail system explicitly thwart this objective, as described by this very article?
> If we lose an open, healthy ecosystem with many providers, we'll destroy the base we stand on
And that's exactly what Gmail is doing when it does what is described in the article.
> we care deeply about having positive relationships with developers and all our users
You personally might, but your company does not. What your company cares about is advertising revenue. If your company really cared about users, it would figure out a way to let them pay directly for your company's services (not just Gmail but search, maps, etc.) so you could see directly from users how valuable those services were, instead of having any benefit to users be a side effect of trying to capture their eyeballs for advertisers.
It's too bad that Google has no incentive to allow a premium/ad-free experience as that implies having ads is a negative thing, which basically undermines their entire business model.
I would pay quite a lot for google-class services with a binding contract that limits their options for spying on me and is 100% ad free. Instead, I spend an inordinate amount of time configuring my computers to avoid accidentally using their free “services”...
No, they haven't; they've been given no opportunity to vote. Such an opportunity would be, for example, Google offering its basic search service for pay to users. Of course they would have to offer some incentive, some benefit that free users (more precisely, ad-supported users) don't get, but we already know how that works: the obvious benefit is no ads. I would certainly pay for an ad-free Google.
> They have G Suite, and they also tried a more consumer oriented version but no one wanted to pay.
I have paid them for years for photo storage. Looking for somewhere to move it in case their AI suddenly decides it doesn't like me (I've already went through a reCaptcha party after trying to dig up some documentation for some special error messages that I felt should be out there somewhere.)
> I would love it if more of the Internet were based on payments and micro-payments but consumers have voted decisively against that.
Didn't have a chance at all to vote.
They could have earned a lot more on than than than they do from me not clicking on the dumbest ads I know about.
> They could have earned a lot more on than than than they do from me not clicking on the dumbest ads I know about.
Then they would have - they are a for-profit company.
My assertion that consumers are not willing to pay if they can get something 'free' (ie. with targetted ads) is hardly new or controversial.
How many news sources do you pay for? I pay for my news and take a very keen interest in its quality, but the media outlets have an extremely difficult time convincing enough people to care enough to pay even for their news - the most important thing of all.
>> They could have earned a lot more on than than than they do from me not clicking on the dumbest ads I know about.
> Then they would have - they are a for-profit company.
I doubt they ever considered me as a person, only as male 25-65 => show ads for scammy dating sites.
> How many news sources do you pay for?
2 newspapers, +used blendle a while ago, ready to pay for more when I can pay pr read.
I also have paid other things like an tech/art channel on a video site etc.
(I guess I'm not the only HNer that does this?)
> but the media outlets have an extremely difficult time convincing enough people to care enough to pay even for their news - the most important thing of all.
Around here that might be because my choice is either a two hour drive to somewhere that sells that paper printed, -or to sign up for an auto-renewing subscription.
I could of course sign up and cancel but I already has too much on my plate (more than two kids, trying to be active in my communities etc.)
That depends on what you define as "health".
> Email itself, of course has a huge network effect, and that is because you can email anyone in the world, regardless of what email system they use
If that's the case, then why does Gmail system explicitly thwart this objective, as described by this very article?
> If we lose an open, healthy ecosystem with many providers, we'll destroy the base we stand on
And that's exactly what Gmail is doing when it does what is described in the article.
> we care deeply about having positive relationships with developers and all our users
You personally might, but your company does not. What your company cares about is advertising revenue. If your company really cared about users, it would figure out a way to let them pay directly for your company's services (not just Gmail but search, maps, etc.) so you could see directly from users how valuable those services were, instead of having any benefit to users be a side effect of trying to capture their eyeballs for advertisers.