At what point did Google sell out and become evil?

[ultimatebob]

I'm curious... when did you guys think that Google gave up on their "Do No Evil" philosophy and start caring more about profits than ethics?

I'm personally thinking that the shift happened when they became publicly traded and started having to worry about quarterly earnings, but I'm curious what you guys think.

 

[purbeast0]

i never did. but then again i'm not one of those "hate on super-corporation" people like many people on here are.

 

[Ns1]

G+

 

[lxskllr]

I haven't paid close enough attention, but being publicly traded is a likely suspect. A publicly traded company's primary concern is the shareholder, not the customer.

 

[zerocool84]

Any of these huge software companies have been evil from the start.

 

[Newbian]

Always but it really got bad when they bought youtube and made you use gmail to have a account with them.

 

[ultimatebob]

Any of these huge software companies have been evil from the start.

Google really wasn't a software company at the start, though. They were just a really good search engine.

 

[Phoenix86]

I haven't paid close enough attention, but being publicly traded is a likely suspect. A publicly traded company's primary concern is the shareholder, not the customer.

If you aren't the customer you're the product.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I haven't paid close enough attention, but being publicly traded is a likely suspect. A publicly traded company's primary concern is the shareholder, not the customer.

Pretty much my thought as well.

They've been public for a very long time though haven't they? it only seems it is in the recent years that they've become evil, and also "Microsoftish". They love changing stuff just to change stuff, and pissing people off in the process.

Could easily be that their evil has only showed up recently and they've been evil much longer. To me what makes them evil is their agenda of classifying and tracking everything everyone does. Even if you arn't using their products you are still being tracked by them all the time through ads and what not.

 

[BoomerD]

Day one.

"Do no evil" was just a marketing slogan...not actual operating practice.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Never. I'd let Google peg me and still feel confident that they are treating me fairly and with dignity.

 

[KeithP]

Day one.

"Do no evil" was just a marketing slogan...not actual operating practice.

FWIW, their motto is actually "Don't be evil" not "Do no evil".

-KeithP

 

[Patranus]

When they entered the advertising game.
That spurred their collection of user data which they then freely hand over to the government.

 

[manly]

I haven't paid close enough attention, but being publicly traded is a likely suspect. A publicly traded company's primary concern is the shareholder, not the customer.

If I'm not mistaken, that's primarily an American disease. For example traditionally the Japanese have always taken the long view, and not quarterly profits. I think the Europeans have more or less adopted the American-centric model, but I could be wrong.

And being publicly traded isn't a guarantee that all that matters are profits. You still have outliers like Apple under Steve Jobs (I know, they were ridiculously profitable) and Amazon.com which operates razor-thin margins, focuses tremendously on customer service, and still amazingly remains a Wall Street darling.

 

[Ruptga]

There is also Costco, which believes in better profits through better employees, and in better employees through better pay, training, and turnover rates.

 

[Centauri]

I don't know that there's a connection, but in my eyes Google lost its good mojo around the time Android became a major part of their portfolio.

 

[CPA]

i never did. but then again i'm not one of those "hate on super-corporation" people like many people on here are.

+1

 

[CPA]

If I'm not mistaken, that's primarily an American disease. For example traditionally the Japanese have always taken the long view, and not quarterly profits. I think the Europeans have more or less adopted the American-centric model, but I could be wrong.

And being publicly traded isn't a guarantee that all that matters are profits. You still have outliers like Apple under Steve Jobs (I know, they were ridiculously profitable) and Amazon.com which operates razor-thin margins, focuses tremendously on customer service, and still amazingly remains a Wall Street darling.

Amazon's margins were actually negative last reporting cycle. Expect prices to rise or costs to be reduced somewhere, probably customer service.

 

[UglyCasanova]

If I'm not mistaken, that's primarily an American disease. For example traditionally the Japanese have always taken the long view, and not quarterly profits. I think the Europeans have more or less adopted the American-centric model, but I could be wrong.

And being publicly traded isn't a guarantee that all that matters are profits. You still have outliers like Apple under Steve Jobs (I know, they were ridiculously profitable) and Amazon.com which operates razor-thin margins, focuses tremendously on customer service, and still amazingly remains a Wall Street darling.

Lol. When does that long view start to kick in for the Japanese, because it's been over two decades now...

I do think that corporations are unfortunately tied to short term gains at the cost of long term strategy. There are all kinds of ideas on how to tie executive compensation to long term growth, but I'm not sure what has worked and what hasn't.

 

[Fritzo]

Google became evil when they became #1.

They didn't necessarily do anything different that made them evil, it's just a requirement in the general public's eyes that if you're on top, you're absolutely terrible. You're never successful unless a large group of people hate you.

 

[ultimatebob]

Heh... I love how the "they have always been secretly evil" option is winning right now.

Apparently there are a lot of people who think that Sergey Brin is a criminal mastermind who built a search engine as part of his plan for world domination

Sounds like a great plot for a James Bond film!

 

[BladeVenom]

FWIW, their motto is actually "Don't be evil" not "Do no evil".

-KeithP

Either way, they need to change it. How about, "Slightly less evil than our competitors."

 

[GagHalfrunt]

Day one.

"Do no evil" was just a marketing slogan...not actual operating practice.

Define "evil".


The difference between a "freedom fighter" and a "terrorist" is mostly perspective. What one person sees as patriotism another sees as disclosing government secrets. "Invasive TSA searches" or "making airlines safer". It all depends on where you come down on a given issue and Google doesn't see their actions as evil.

 

[darkewaffle]

They're not 'evil' but they've never been "the good guys" either. They're just a company; sometimes they do good, sometimes they do bad.

 

[KeithP]

Google flip flops on net neutrality
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/07/google-neutrality/

-KeithP