Thread

Breaking Up with Google Play: Why Conversations Is Now Free

708 points · 296 comments · ezst

4chandaily · 1790423618 · focus · HN ↗
Customer support has gotten so terrible. Now that all big companies have terrible support, none of them are punished for it. You can still occasionally find people who give a shit in small business, but that is it. Google is probably one of the worst offenders of all. I don't know what the solution is, it seems like the only way to get any satisfaction on an issue at a big corp anymore is a social medial call-out like this one.
If you are here, thank you for Conversations, Daniel, it has been my go-to for years for communicating with friends and family.
1. utopiah · 1790425016 · focus · HN ↗
  That's because you the user are not the customer of Google and such services. You are actually the product being sold to the customer, namely advertising companies, by Google.
  The farmer take care of his pigs but only to the point they get slaughtered.
  1. 4chandaily · 1790425554 · focus · HN ↗
    This gotcha only works if you are a user of only their free services.
    When Google charges me a monthly fee for storage, takes a percentage of my Play Store sales, or manufactures a Pixel that I purchase from their online store, I am absolutely their customer. I may also be providing data they will sell, but I am still paying them for goods or services and that makes me a customer.
    The problem is that they continue treating their customers like livestock, and it seems they have little incentive to change.
    StilesCrisis · 1790426317 · focus · HN ↗
    The real problem here is that all those businesses are rounding errors on the balance sheet compared to ads, so the CEO doesn't care (or even know) about the issues and isn't motivated to improve anything.
    saghm · 1790428183 · focus · HN ↗
    Then have they repeatedly fought so hard legally to get to keep extracting three revenue? If they didn't care about it, they wouldn't do it in the first place.
    The problem is that there's no pressure on them to act any differently. If they made 100x as much money from app purchases, they wouldn't suddenly treat app developers better just because of that. They might treat them better if the app developers had better alternatives, but that would also be enough to force Google to behave differently even with the current amount of revenue.
    StilesCrisis · 1790433915 · focus · HN ↗
    Android and Chrome exist as moats primarily. Pichai came up in Chrome and understands moats. Obviously if you can get the moat to be self-funding (Google Play IAP revenue) even better. Things like "the developer experience on Android is bad" don't prevent the moat from doing its job, but "Google and Chrome aren't defaults on Android" are very much losing the moat.
    saghm · 1790439294 · focus · HN ↗
    I don't disagree with this. I don't honestly see how it relates to your previous comment that I responded to though. It seems more like support for my rebuttal, which is that the moat is what matters, not whether the revenue is a "rounding error" compared to their other businesses.
    StilesCrisis · 1790441492 · focus · HN ↗
    This article in one sentence: "the developer of a small app switches to a third-party app store because Google Play ignores him." This doesn't hurt the balance sheet ($150 a month to Google is nothing), and doesn't affect the moat (this app isn't strategically meaningful and didn't even go away--it just moved).
    saghm · 1790447459 · focus · HN ↗
    They chose to not monetize at all anymore because they decide it's not worth the hassle due to having other sources of income. If they didn't have the other sources of income, it doesn't sound like he'd choose to move somewhere else.
    mitxela · 1790428324 · focus · HN ↗
    They can treat their customers like livestock because their customers are okay with it. Why is that?
    My hypothesis: turkeys think the farm is an amazing life until the week before Thanksgiving. Nobody really groks that Google is shit until it's too late.
    fn-mote · 1790429269 · focus · HN ↗
    These pithy sayings are not adding to the dialog.
    Please try to engage more deeply.
    For example, connect your turkeys more explicitly to a point you are making about Google. When is Thanksgiving coming? What will it look like?
    mitxela · 1790429703 · focus · HN ↗
    That's every time Google does something bad to a customer. Such as the one who was banned for his son's medical photos. Or the one who was tricked into enabling passkeys and then couldn't sign in any more and called support.
  2. lukan · 1790425585 · focus · HN ↗
    Except we read here stories of ad customers - their main buisness - here indicating they don't give a shit about them either.
    They are just so big, they can afford not giving a shit at all.
    philipallstar · 1790427544 · focus · HN ↗
    [dead]
    lukan · 1790427643 · focus · HN ↗
    Are you sure you replied to my comment?
    philipallstar · 1790427737 · focus · HN ↗
    Yep! It appeared right underneath it.
    lukan · 1790427818 · focus · HN ↗
    So where exactly did I wrote anything like that?
    "your idea that people use them for no reason"
    I definitely know my reasons why I still use google despite knowing they don't care about me. That does not change the complaint.
    philipallstar · 1790429979 · focus · HN ↗
    I'm not talking about what you know. I'm talking about what you wrote: They are just so big
    That's not why.
    Dylan16807 · 1790466589 · focus · HN ↗
    What's not why? This is getting confusing. I don't see any connection between "google is so big they can afford not giving a shit" and "the idea that people use them for no reason".
  3. Loquebantur · 1790426191 · focus · HN ↗
    Google has captured what really is a public utility and should be either state-owned or heavily regulated.
    (Long) distance communications, just like public roads, breathable air, potable drinking water and so on do not fit into a "free market economy" paradigm.
    They simply don't fulfill the basic requirements that make the "market" idea work.
    Specifically, a free market needs goods from different suppliers to be easily interchangeable. You cannot sensibly build multiple roads parallel to each other, or have multiple water pipes installed and you have only one airway to breath through.
    philipallstar · 1790427476 · focus · HN ↗
    Nothing has been captured, any more than a company inventing anything has "captured" it.
    And there are other companies: Apple, Samsung, Huawei, Tencent MyApp, Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, Honor, K Telecom T-Store, Jio, MTN Play.
    Not even close to a captured utility. And if it were, which state on the planet should own it?
    Matl · 1790427809 · focus · HN ↗
    > there are other companies: Apple, Samsung, Huawei, Tencent MyApp, Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, Honor,
    Tell me about the different OSes each of Samsung, Huawei, Tencent MyApp, Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, Honor etc. run then that we can choose from.
    It's like saying Windows doesn't have a monopoly in the PC space because HP, Dell, Lenovo, ASUS.
    pjmlp · 1790427928 · focus · HN ↗
    Except OEMS don't ship Windows forks with their own SDKs, UI frameworks, custom L&F, alternative stores.
    Contrary to Google, Microsoft has a clear position on what OEMs are allowed to do with Windows.
    mitxela · 1790428233 · focus · HN ↗
    Google lets these forks do anything they want except things that take away money from Google.
    pjmlp · 1790434758 · focus · HN ↗
    Xioami, Huawei and Samsung have their own stores.
    Matl · 1790436620 · focus · HN ↗
    Why are you pretending anyone uses them? These phones ship with Google Play and that's what people use.
    pjmlp · 1790441733 · focus · HN ↗
    Because people do use them as well, especially outside Western countries.
    Dylan16807 · 1790466281 · focus · HN ↗
    Too bad I'm in a western country. I'm glad parts of the world escaped the duopoly but my part still needs to be fixed.
    pjmlp · 1790494307 · focus · HN ↗
    Get a Jolla.
    mitxela · 1790445212 · focus · HN ↗
    Does this fact take money away from Google?
    pjmlp · 1790445822 · focus · HN ↗
    Naturally.
    Matl · 1790428424 · focus · HN ↗
    Android OEMs largely don't do that either except for some specific markets where Google isn't a thing. Google does have rules for when you want to be certified and have Google Play and Google services on board, which you mostly do in the West and so OEMs comply.
    Sure, they may ship a Samsung skin or preload some of their own junk, same as on Windows. That doesn't make what they ship a different OS.
    The one exception would be HarmonyOS, but that's somewhat China specific.
    pjmlp · 1790434776 · focus · HN ↗
    Xioami, Huawei and Samsung all have the points I mentioned, with Android forks.
    Harmony NEXT is no longer based on Android.
    Matl · 1790436559 · focus · HN ↗
    > Xioami, Huawei and Samsung all have the points I mentioned, with Android forks
    If I buy a Samsung phone in North America or Europe today I get Google Play as the main app store, Google services etc. and if I want to develop an app for a Samsung Android phone, I use the official Google SDK and Kotlin like for every other Android phone.
    They have their own skin and store, but nobody really uses that. Google Play it is, be it Samsung or Xioami. They're very far from offering any kind of genuine alternative to Google Play, Google or Android. Their stores are junkware no different than ASUS preinstalling some antivirus nobody wants.
    > Harmony NEXT is no longer based on Android.
    That's my point. Huawei is the only OEM offering something different, but not easy to get in Western markets and thus doesn't have app mindshare.
    pjmlp · 1790441529 · focus · HN ↗
    Nothing prevents you from using Samsung, Xiaomi or Huawei stores and cloud services, Google Play is only the main store if you configure it as such.
    Google SDK naturally doesn't have the support for OEMs specific features.
    Leaving just one Samsung example here, too lazy to dump everything else,
    <a href="https://developer.samsung.com/mobile/galaxy-sdk-getting-started.html" rel="nofollow">https://developer.samsung.com/mobile/galaxy-sdk-getting-star...
    I am yet to see anyone disable OneUI, MIUI, HyperOS, EMUI for bare bones AOSP UI.
    Matl · 1790504762 · focus · HN ↗
    You seem to not understand, among other things, what a duopoly is.
    pjmlp · 1790579083 · focus · HN ↗
    Oh I do understand, those who don't understand are those without any clue about market legislation.
    It is not their opinion that matters, rather what the law says and how many players are in the market, regardless of their size.
    philipallstar · 1790431229 · focus · HN ↗
    > Tell me about the different OSes each of Samsung, Huawei, Tencent MyApp, Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, Honor etc. run then that we can choose from.
    Other companies using Google's incredible R&D spend and selling phones that use it is not Google's failing.
    And we're talking app stores. They all have app stores disconnected from Google's app store.
    > It's like saying Windows doesn't have a monopoly in the PC space because HP, Dell, Lenovo, ASUS.
    No, on two counts. One: - and it's the same with Android - Apple exists, and so there's definitely not a monopoly from a lowercase personal computing perspective. Two: the conversation is about app stores. There are many app stores. It's like saying Microsoft doesn't have a PC hardware monopoly because HP, Dell, Lenovo, ASUS.
    Matl · 1790431702 · focus · HN ↗
    > They all have app stores disconnected from Google's app store
    No they don't. Certainly not ones where my bank app or Netflix is. This is being obtuse on purpose.
    philipallstar · 1790439401 · focus · HN ↗
    > No they don't.
    Yes. They do.
    > Certainly not ones where my bank app or Netflix is.
    Blaming Google for this is just insanity.
    > This is being obtuse on purpose.
    Agreed.
    margalabargala · 1790431837 · focus · HN ↗
    > Other companies using Google's incredible R&D spend and selling phones that use it is not Google's failing
    On the contrary. I disagree.
    It's possible to build something so successful and difficult that it rises to the level of public utility.
    philipallstar · 1790439347 · focus · HN ↗
    Why not say that Samsung's phone manufacturing is a public utility? That's successful and difficult.
    margalabargala · 1790440198 · focus · HN ↗
    Samsung is, as pointed out elsewhere in the thread, one among many. Like Dell. It's different in kind, not in degree.
    If you make that comparison you clearly don't understand the point being brought up by others here. Which is fine. I'm not going to convince you, I'm just informing you how I'll be voting.
    Loquebantur · 1790428124 · focus · HN ↗
    You're deluding yourself.
    Pretending, some other company could come stroll along and take over Google's turf, completely ignores the underlying reality.
    People don't talk on two phones at once, they only use one search engine regularly and they even only use one browser to surf the internet.
    That bottleneck leads to market capture due to inevitable logical reasons, not because I say so.
    If you want autonomous states, each one has to control their own infrastructure. Just don't forget to question your assumptions.
    WarmWash · 1790433800 · focus · HN ↗
    Ad blocking is what cements googles place.
    But try telling the internet that their "morally pure" addiction to skirting compensation is actually what is killing (killed?) the web.
    Every competitor dies in the cradle because 40% of the internet won't pay them while using their service.
    Youtube with ad-blocking is the best video service on the internet, and no one can touch that.
    pydry · 1790432724 · focus · HN ↗
    it doesnt need to be a utility. they just need to crack down on every attempt google uses to kill the competition.
    There should be an agency you can complain to for monopolies which has the power to dictate new rules to the monopolist with far reaching power to crack down on anything that smells like anti competitive behavior.
    e.g.
    - force banking apps that try to secure themselves with google play services to make that dependency optional.
    - force google to stop blocking newpipe, aurora, etc.
    - force google pay to make itself available on any platform that wants to integrate it (apple, graphene)
    - force google to allow alternative app stores to become first class citizens.
    arrosenberg · 1790441349 · focus · HN ↗
    That never works in the US, the monopolist will just wait it out 4-8 years until there is a friendly administration. You have to break them up any time you have the chance, it’s the only effective remedy.
    kmeisthax · 1790451814 · focus · HN ↗
    That's the legal paradigm that we used to stop the railroads from choking America. But the real killer of their power was the Interstate Highway System - i.e. government funded infrastructure. Prior to the IHS there wasn't really ANY nationally funded infra[0] of that scale, we'd outsourced building it to private industry instead. After that it's basically assumed that infrastructure was the government's job, to the point where even the most conservative among us would point to "roads" as a thing governments do well and should be empowered in doing.
    So anyway, the US government should run an open-access, quad-track railroad and fiber backbone along every highway. Maximize the ROI on that ROW. Also they should nationalize Android and iOS.
    [0] Because slavery. The South really, REALLY hated any government roads because it diminished the economic power of literally owning a lot of people. Hell, one of the stipulations of the Confederate Constitution was to strip the General Welfare clause out of the constitution.
    pydry · 1790507805 · focus · HN ↗
    I still think nationalizing is a bad idea. There is no legitimate competition between railroads whereas mobile ecosystems can compete.
    Mobile app stores are more like banks - a big problem when there are not a lot but a problem that can be remedied by having the government compete (e.g. with a post office bank).
    The government could set up a competing app store, that might not be a bad idea, actually. They could hardly do a worse job than google and apple at vetting app developers and it would put a firecracker up google and apples ass.
    mindslight · 1790441597 · focus · HN ↗
    While I agree with where you're coming from, I think you're overstating it just a little. It only seems like something that should be considered a public utility because Google has anticompetitively bundled what should be several distinct types of products together as one take-it-or-leave-it package. Android (really Google Play Services) should not be tied to the Play Store App (think how MS was forced to include a browser choice screen in the EU). Likewise the Play Store Curation/Hosting Service should not be tied to the Play Store App (ie Aurora store etc should work and be fully supported by Play Store Curation/Hosting Service through the Service having a well-documented open API). Then Play Store Curation/Hosting Service would have to compete on its own merits, rather than anticompetitive tying with two instances of Metcalfe's law (Android users plus app developers).
    jolmg · 1790447995 · focus · HN ↗
    > Google has captured what really is a public utility and should be either state-owned or heavily regulated.
    I think part of what makes a utility a utility is that the nature of the service is naturally a monopoly. For example, you can only realistically have one set of waterways, so the company providing tap water as a service is a utility. Same with power lines, you can only realistically have one set, so the electricity-supplying company is a utility. With phone/internet service, I imagine that also requires sharing infrastructure.
    Google doesn't fit in that paradigm. The nature of their services don't naturally require sharing resources to compete. They a monopoly simply because they amassed a ton a money to do things that other people can't, like drive on all roads on Earth with special cameras, or host however many videos there are on YouTube, serving those videos throughout the world, and even pay livable wages to the creators of the videos.
  4. charcircuit · 1790429216 · focus · HN ↗
    With such a perversion of definitions why not call the stock holders the true customers? Services can have multiple classes of users. Some YouTube users can be content creators. Some users can watch Shorts. Some can watch long term videos. Some can pay to run ad campaigns. This idea that there is only one true kind of "customer" is not how people think of these services.
2. anal_reactor · 1790433510 · focus · HN ↗
  I remember that once my flight was cancelled and I figured out that if I buy a bus ticket "right now" I'd be able to reach my destination in a sensible time. I quickly bought the ticket... for the wrong day.
  I called the bus company, a native speaker of my language immediately picked up, rescheduled the ticket, and told me to pay €2 extra to the bus driver.
  I was shocked that customer support could be so simple.
  BTW I spent 6 hours total spread along 12 months calling an Indian customer service before I got my money back for the cancelled flight.
3. crazybonkersai · 1790446179 · focus · HN ↗
  Some eight years ago I worked on a Chrome extension with monetization support. I could not get payment working using Google APIs, no matter what I tried it errored with obscure undocumented error messages. Finally I reached out to their customer support and got swift overly friendly response. Several messages later, I still got these overly friendly elaborated messages, but the issue did not proceed anywhere. I kept explaining my problem and they assured me that they are working on it. Eventually I got bounced to their Android support (my problem concerned Chrome store), which made me think either they were taking a piss or used this tactique on purpose. I eventually abandoned the whole idea. Nowadays I would attribute their response to chatbots considering how elaborated and friendly, but yet totally useless their messages were, but this was before LLMs
  1. bornfreddy · 1790522085 · focus · HN ↗
    > Nowadays I would attribute their response to chatbots considering how elaborated and friendly, but yet totally useless their messages were, but this was before LLMs
    Outsourcing was a predecessor of LLMs.
4. winrid · 1790461301 · focus · HN ↗
  Punish them. I'm leaving trustpilot because I realized I was talking to an LLM during renewal. Fuck em.
5. tokioyoyo · 1790470676 · focus · HN ↗
  Isn’t because every single data point has shown in the last decade that people whine, but still use the services because of free/cheap/etc.? So you calculate retention, and how much investment in customer support will improve your numbers. In the end, you realize it only matters for customers who are paying the most, and that’s where the AMs come into the play.
  Obviously not the same everywhere, but generally it’s true and holds up.
  1. andrekandre · 1790474183 · focus · HN ↗
    > but still use the services because of free/cheap/etc
    it may be a crazy idea, but if they ever made a law that said 'free trial not withstanding, services must be payed for and not free' i wonder if that would fix the issue real fast...
    (of course a side effect might be that half the economy implodes but thats besides the point ^^)
    tokioyoyo · 1790483051 · focus · HN ↗
    What exactly is the issue? Consumers complain about the bad parts of it, yet overwhelmingly use it. Sure, temporary dissatisfaction is there, but they still make it obvious with their choices that they want to use the offered product.
    andrekandre · 1790507561 · focus · HN ↗
    they overwhelmingly use it because its free, but if they even had to pay one cent i'd bet they'd loose half their customers and start shopping around on different metrics of quality
    making things free causes a loss of price signal, so i'd say it would be a good idea to restore that...
    tokioyoyo · 1790555059 · focus · HN ↗
    I’m confused though. Customers, overwhelmingly, want the free service with crappy issues. So an intervention would just be anti-consumer? We’d optimize the quality, but people wouldn’t use it.
    andrekandre · 1790571589 · focus · HN ↗
    > So an intervention would just be anti-consumer?
    maybe? but you are paying for it with you data and usage, you just don't realize it (in addition to being subsequently manipulated by it); that could also probably considered anti-consumer imho...
    > but people wouldn’t use it.
    yep, thats right. thats why i think having a price signal where the actual cost is upfront; now you don't discover later your data is being used against you as a "cost" but consider upfront 'do i really wanna pay for this or do something else' etc
    said in another way, i feel like giving the customer upfront knowledge about what something actually costs is more pro-consumer because now we can make informed choices
    tokioyoyo · 1790582744 · focus · HN ↗
    > you are paying for it with you data and usage, you just don't realize it
    I don't think this (people not realizing it) is true. We've heard this argument since early 2010s, and the general attitude of population is "ok, cool, so what?". Even people like me, who know that I'm paying it with my data, still overwhelmingly prefer using such services.
    For every scandal about data leakage, 3rd party access and etc., the social media websites are still top used apps. People don't want their privacy/secrets/photos to be available to people they know, or might know. They don't really care about "giant faceless company"/government, even though they say they do.
    I wish this was not true.

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