It's just HN. It's just like the reaction to AMP on this board. Most clients like the feature if it speeds up the site and brings more visitors to the site. Here, you'd think it represents the end of the internet or something.
If we have to be fair, Google didn't build a browser, an email service, a free DNS service, and free hosting/optimization service (AMP) just because, y'know, whatever.
I tend to roll my eyes at the blind hatred of corporations, but we also have to have both feet firmly on the ground, that these products and services are strictly tied to long-term plans for ROI. What kind of a ROI would the biggest advertising network have? Tracking, profiling and serving profiled ads.
Look at gmail: I pay $60/year-ish for Fastmail. Gmail is at least that good. So is the purpose of gmail to have a cross device stable identifier? Absolutely. Are people realizing tons of value from it for free? Also yes.
I expect to get a gmail type service paying only the "price" of having some unobtrusive ads when I'm on the gmail site, nothing else.
I absolutely do not agree to google using anything from gmail to generate a stable user id for advertising, or e.g. show me ads in google search results or youtube videos, based on analysis of email content.
If Google can't provide what I expect (a free mail service paid only by ads on gmail dot com) they should tell me that they want $X per year and I'd happily pay it. It's not that I don't want to fund the operations of services, it's that I'm always assumed to rather pay with my information than with dollars.
