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From Google's About page:

"Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful."

Last time when Google was intentionally blocking Google maps and then deprecated ActiveSync on Windows Phone someone suggested Google should updated it to the following:(which seems quite true given how much of the world's crowdsourced video content is on YouTube):

"Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful, except on Windows Phone".

Also, I see this post being flagged a lot, stay classy, Google fans on HN.




I imagine that there is a great deal of YouTube content which Google is obligated to revenue share advertising money on (Vevo music videos, among other content) -- Google can't fulfill those obligations if those videos are showing up on WinMo without ads.

Today's remarks about XMPP interop from Page really bother me. In the late 90s, Microsoft was the vendor that wanted interop/federation (on MSN) and nobody took them up on it either.


>Google can't fulfill those obligations if those videos are showing up on WinMo without ads.

The mobile YouTube site that Google serves to Windows Phone devices does not display any ads. Therefore an ad-free app for WP does nothing to change the situation that WP users don't see ads on YouTube.

Now, it is possible that some of Google's content is licensed in such a way that only their mobile site is exempt from displaying ads while any native apps are not. However, a C&D hardly seems like the proper course of action here, given that Microsoft says they are willing to display Google's ads.


> The mobile YouTube site that Google serves to Windows Phone devices does not display any ads.

Right, but the mobile YouTube site could exclude videos that require ads to be shown.

> Therefore an ad-free app for WP does nothing to change the situation that WP users don't see ads on YouTube.

It's possible (although I don't own a WP so I don't know) that the app for WP shows videos that it "shouldn't" without ads.


The mobile YouTube site that Google serves to Windows Phone devices presumably doesn't play videos that are marked as unavailable on mobile, whereas Microsoft's app apparently ignores that flag and plays them anyway.


If Google didn't send a C&D, I'd say there's a good chance that another company would. Don't forget that pesky download button.


Google is the new Microsoft. All this "Don't do evil" bullshit is just another illusion to sell more ads. That's all Google has ever been and ever will be. A fucking Ad company. Over 97% of their revenues prove that. If they can't plaster ads on your shit and sell your data, expect a nice big blue, red, yellow and green fuck you.


Microsofts openness about MSN was because they were the underdogs. As they gained users their desire for openness evaporated.


How are people able to see if a post is being flagged a lot? Is there a karma level for that?


The ranking in the front page is affected by flagging. Usually, the more points a post has and the more recent it is, the higher it is ranked. But flagging pushes it down. So if you see a 100 point post submitted 10 hours ago above a 150 point post submitted 6 hours ago, it means that the 150 point post got flagged a lot.


Posts with much less points are shown higher up in the page than this post. That is usually an indication of the post being flagged.


See this thread for more details

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5716010


Expect that there's nothing stopping people from using the website.


Also, I see this post being flagged a lot, stay classy, Google fans on HN.

Or, perhaps there are those of us who see the ensuing flame war on this particular stream of non-ending google vs microsoft cage match flame wars and don't want to see them any more.


I find it particularly interesting when people complain about the ActiveSync thing. Did you know that Microsoft patented it, and Google has to pay a license for each user? I can entirely understand why they block it from Microsoft devices if they are also forced to pay a license for them.


I don't have an issue with them pulling it, but they did it suddenly and gave MS very less time for a workaround and increased the time only after public shaming.

MS implemented CardDAV and CalDAV standards as Google wanted, and as part of spring cleaning round 2, those are deprecated and replaced with their own proprietary new API!

http://www.zdnet.com/google-do-what-you-want-with-reader-but...


> MS implemented CardDAV and CalDAV standards as Google wanted

Not in any released product, they haven't. The update is expected "later this summer"[1] and, as you certainly know, CalDAV isn't being deprecated or replaced, you just need to get whitelisted to access it. They could certainly use that to shut out Microsoft, but there's been no indication that that's been done, and we would certainly have heard a leak about it by now if they had been...

[1] http://blogs.windows.com/windows_phone/b/windowsphone/archiv...


I doubt it was suddenly, though of course I am just spinning conjecture: What I imagined happened is that Google told Microsoft that it's kind of ridiculous that they have to pay an ActiveSync license for Microsoft devices (which could have used other APIs...but wouldn't you know it Microsoft chose the one that made them even more money), some negotiating happened, Microsoft said stuff it, so Google pulled ActiveSync. It is truly a ridiculous situation that Google has to pay Microsoft to provide services to Microsoft users.

I'm no Google apologist (Page's statements about lets all work together etc were utterly ridiculous. I understand that he probably actually believes what he was saying, not realizing the destruction they lay in their wake), but Microsoft almost always has a nasty stink coming off of their complaints.




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