Open letter to Google
January 30, 2010
Dear Google,
I love you. Let’s get that cleared at the outset. You are one of the few companies that I admire and trust. I have watched your stupendous rise over the past years and marveled at your vision and unwavering faith in your core principles. As your loyal customer, I take pride in your belief that an open, social, magnanimous approach will pay off in the long run. I watch with awe as you commit to long term goals, and put your money where your mouth is – which few others dare do.
You see a world of plenty where others see scarcity. Your creativity results in products and services that millions use and love.
However, in spite of all that, I believe there is room for improvement. While you create 100s of products and services, many of them get left by the wayside when you decide they are not worth pursuing. This leaves any users of these products in a very awkward position.
Examples include your Gtalk messenger, and the Gmail notifier, both of which I use. The Gmail notifier has not seen any improvement in years, and there does not seem to be a proper support cycle for it either. An example of this is the fact that though HTTPS was made compulsory for Gmail, the notifier has not been updated to support this. An ugly registry hack has to be downloaded for the notifier to enable HTTPS support.
Similarly, Gtalk seems to have fallen out of favor, and I can see why. You would prefer to have a web browser based presence, which you are pushing across all products. You have developed an amazing in-email video conferencing client for Gmail. As a result, the Gtalk messenger lacks any of the ‘advanced’ capabilities like video chatting that the in-email client does.
For me, the Gmail notifier and Gtalk messenger are the preferred modes of using your service. I understand that you often try and experiment with services to see which ones would make sense, and which ones wouldn’t.
However, you should never abandon customers with half-hearted attempts like the Gmail notifier and Gtalk messenger. This will end up creating friction and discontent in the long run.
If you provide a service or product, please ensure that you intend to fully support it and its users. Else, do not make it available. A few exceptions are fine, but abandoning a product should never be an easy decision for you. Also, putting the ‘beta’ label on a product in no way excuses you from providing the highest level of service and support.
In conclusion, I would suggest you listen to customers more – in our collective whines you will often find gems that just might take your service and products to the next level, and help you find your next gigantic success where you least expect to find it.
Your loyal fan,
Donniel
P.S. I love the Nexus One! It’s not available in Dubai, though, so I can’t get my hands on it anytime soon 
Send me one please? 
Google and China: My two cents
January 22, 2010
Google’s exit from China has caused major waves in not just the technology circles, but even in living rooms and water-cooler discussions everywhere. This is for good reason, as both China and Google are super-heavy-weights, and major movers-and-shakers.
Any decisions they make impact the lives of millions, if not billions of people worldwide, and so it’s not surprising that there is so much discussion over their threats to pull out of China over what appears to be an attempt by the Chinese government to hack into Google’s infrastructure. This was purportedly to hack into the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists (at least two attempts were partially successful).
While there isn’t exactly a wealth of evidence confirming the role of the Chinese government in these attacks, China’s extremely poor track record when it comes to human rights, and their readiness to aggressively target ‘unfriendlies’ suggests this is quite feasible. Further, Google would not have blamed the Chinese government were it not extremely sure that they were responsible. Remember – while they haven’t named the Chinese government, their actions and response have clearly shown they believe the government to be responsible.
Much has been said about Google’s possible motivations, which mainly fell into the main categories of:
- A corporate decision, stemming from their failure to make a significant foothold into the Chinese market, or because there was a great threat to their proprietary property (code, data)
- An ethical decision, possibly fueled by co-founder Sergey Brin’s ideals and an internal belief in their slogan ‘do no evil’
There is also a lot of criticism leveled against Google, since it was widely believed that entering the Chinese market at the cost of censoring results according to the Chinese government wishes was a sell-out.
Personally, I believe that this was a laudable and extremely courageous move by Google. I was one of those who was disappointed by Google’s cop-outs when they agreed to censor their search results for China. While I didn’t think that it made Google ‘evil’ (as many believed), I did felt that they had diluted their core ethics and principles. Google did claim that by allowing the Chinese people greater access to information, they were doing more good than harm, and arguably this was true.
In any case, I certainly do not believe that Google’s present move was because of purely corporate reasons – though my first reaction was that an attack on their proprietary code would be the biggest blow to Google in its short history. The first stated reason: that Google was pulling out because it failed to gain a foothold into the Chinese market, and was using this attack as an excuse is ludicrous. Google has a 21% share in the Chinese market, and is second only to the Baidu search engine. It’s revenues were ‘only’ somewhere between 300-600 million dollars. That is by no means a failure, even if Google wasn’t turning a profit (which I doubt). Google is known for its long term strategies – it often adopts long-term strategies, at the cost of immediate profits. Tons of examples abound, including the open source Chrome, Chrome OS, Android, Google Voice service, Gmail, et al. At present, it has only one primary source of revenue – Google AdSense, and a portion of this is exactly what it is sacrificing when pulling out of China.
It makes no sense to me that a company would leave the world’s most promising, most lucrative market because it failed to utterly dominate it! Since when is a 21% market share, and revenues in the 100s of millions of dollars a bad thing?! Remember that Google also does not lead in a number of other countries, including Japan and South Korea, where Yahoo and Naver respectively lead.
Also, just because Google hasn’t been able to dominate yet wouldn’t mean that a pull-out was the answer. Far from it. Google has the cash, the resources and the time - the Chinese market will only expand in the coming years, meaning that 21% will grow to many millions of users more.
Further, the search engine market share is only one of Google’s main concerns in China – it also depends upon a highly trained Chinese workforce (which develops solutions for Google’s global offerings). Google also stands to lose millions of sales of its Android powered handsets – which Google believes will be one of its core offerings and revenue generators in the coming years. China has been a lucrative market for Android handsets, and Google will definitely take a hit in Android sales if it pulls out of China. Staying in the Chinese market is critical to these concerns.
The second stated possibility, that Google was worried about its proprietary data and code holds more water, it would appear. Google search is one of the only products that Google has said it will not open up the source code for, and with good reason. Also, compromising the data of user searches, IP addresses, emails, etc., would be devastating for Google – even if only the business perspective was considered.
However, I don’t think this would have warranted a Google exit, and such a public denouncement of the Chinese government’s attacks (though it did not name them, it was clear a finger was being pointed at the Chinese government). The reaction would have been different – maybe a press release, followed by some massive restructuring of its Chinese operations.
What happened, however, seems to be more of a ‘scorched earth’ exit policy, as has been widely reported. Google has quite decisively severed ties with the Chinese government, to the point of possibly losing out on ALL its revenue sources – present and future in the market. That does not to me, sound like a purely security-oriented reaction. It is quite clearly, a political decision, and one that could only come from the topmost echelons of Google. Without being able to back it up with any proof, I suspect that this was a decision that occupied the hearts and minds of the co-founders for mostly ethical reasons.
I am not saying that there was no business rationale behind it – that would be naivety. However, I think the driver was not business, but ethical. Google as I have mentioned, has been known to take a long term approach to decisions, and in their minds, this might be the most sensible business decision in the long term.
We will have to wait and see how this plays out, and whether Google’s gamble is successful in the long run. I, for one, applaud Google, and hope that this is a decisive moment, that shapes history beyond just a business perspective. I would love to see more wide-spread support for Google, possibly with more companies revolting against China’s government’s dictatorial shackles. I would hope the Chinese public offers support for Google as well, and forces a gradual and lasting change in the government’s policies and outlooks. After all, very few want a future with China as a bully forcing companies and people to bend to its wills to do evil. China would do well to changes its ways and adopt Google’s mantra as its own, and do no evil.
The purpose of life
January 22, 2010
(This post is best read while stoned or drunk)
Ladies and gentlemen. I am going to do what numerous philosophers, scientists, religious nuts, movie protagonists and cats have tried to do for centuries.
I am going to uncover the meaning of life. Or if not that, at least the purpose of life. And I am going to do it in one sitting.
Calm down, now, calm down ladies, no need to cause a scene. Yes, I am available, thank you for asking.
Why?
Why? Err…’cause that’s what I do. I…solve stuff. And…uncover mysteries. Like the Famous Five. You know, those teens who went about solving mysteries? The ones Enyd Blyton wrote about?
* tumbleweed *
Well, in any case, that’s not the point. That’s a discussion for another day, ‘mkay?
The purpose of life
Like ever teenage boy spurned by a hot chick, I set out asking “Why? Why are we here? Why does she prefer that arrogant asshole over me?”. I spent long hours thinking about the meaning of life, the purpose of it, but I got nowhere. I had quit believing in a greater power, a ‘God’ some time ago, so I couldn’t just raise my eyes lovingly into the air and declare “our purpose on this Earth is to love and praise God almighty”.
I suspect that was assisted by my lingering suspicion that I might be God myself. I mean, c’mon. Have you seen me? My dog and I had long discussions about this over the summer vacations, but we couldn’t reach a conclusion. I mean, my dog didn’t say much, but would listen intently with his ears up, and I would explain my point of view. I gathered this meant that I was right, or that my dog thought I was nuts. I was never able to decide which.
Then I grew into adulthood. Actually, that’s what I have been told. I have yet to really understand what that means, but have gleaned that it’s mostly got something to do with more body hair and being able to buy booze.
In any case, I continued thinking about this question, and discussing it with my friends. Reading books didn’t help much either. The prevalent view that the only purpose of life was to transfer your genetic code to your offspring seemed somehow unsatisfactory.
Sure, nature seems to suggest so. Every living organism’s primary motivation seems to be to ensure that it produces offspring (a thoroughly enjoyable endeavor in many cases). This overrides other seemingly basic drives like survival, even. For example, consider the case of the Praying Mantis. The female initiates sex by biting off the male’s head. Ouch.
“Honey, I’m home. How about some – aargh, my hea-”
Yikes. Then there’s the case of the female spider. After her eggs hatch, the baby spiders eat their mother. That’s their first meal. I’m not even going to try and locate a reference to back that up, because it’s way too icky. Yuck.
Hold on while I go take a swig of wine to calm my nerves. I hate spiders.
Aaaanyways. The point is that you will find various examples in nature of organisms that are willing to sacrifice themselves for the sake of their offspring. This is extremely curious behavior, if you think about it.
Keeping aside sentimental retorts of “that’s love, dodo-head”, this does not make any sense. Actually, even the fact that we think that we are willing to sacrifice our lives for our loved ones does not make sense. In fact, this was one of the clues that helped me find…
THE PURPOSE OF LIFE
Oh wait…the intro credits were a bit late. My bad.
In any case, after my extensive research (read the back covers of a couple of science-y looking books), it appears that scientists believe that the sole purpose of life is to transmit your genetic information to the next generation. I am almost certainly mis-stating their actual statement, and am 89.8733% sure I have fucked up somehow. But I shall continue blundering ahead, as I am wont to do. In this way, I shall make my point, and unveil
THE PURPOSE OF LIFE
Oh shi…I did it again, didn’t I?
Do you have a point, dork?
Yes. It’s that I believe it ain’t that simple, darlin’.
While most natural phenomenon seem to suggest that they are correct, and that every living organism’s primary intention seems to be to pass on their genetic imprint – be it via sexual reproduction, splitting into two, copying themselves over (think virii), they seem to be interested only in ensuring that their genetic code (DNA) gets transferred on to the next generation. They do this even at the cost of their own survival. By dying to ensure that the next generation survives, they pass on their code.
There is no other possible purpose in life, that even comes close to being the answer:
- Survival: Nope, I just proved decisively that this cannot be the case above.
- To praise and love an everliving God: Back in the nuthouse, jackass. Oh, fer Chrissakes. How was the spider mom showing her love for God when… * runs off and barfs in the corner *
- Fun!
- Evolution: Maybe the purpose of life is to evolve? By evolving over time, organisms can…yup, back to square one.
- World domination: Again, why?
- …see why this is so confusing?
So where does that leave us? Nowhere? Not quite! Hidden in those options is the correct answer. It’s not the first one. Not the last one either. Yes, I mean….
FUN!
Settle down, people, settle down. There’ll be plenty of time for a Q & A session later (yeah, right, like I’m going to listen to somebody else’s point of view!).
It’s not as simple as that. You see, fun is not an accurate term. I can generalize it more by calling it “Contentment”. The purpose of life is Contentment.
I claim that every living organism strives for contentment. Be it a germ, a ravenous monkey, a marauding tiger, or the mighty human. We all are searching for contentment.
What the heck does that mean?
Well, different things for different organisms. For a lower organism, contentment means being able to survive and reproduce. It would be useful to pull out Maslow’s heirarchy of needs at this point.
- Self-actualization
- Esteem
- Love/Belonging
- Safety
- Physiological
Maslow, this really clever dude, felt that any human being has needs ranging from the basic to the advanced. Starting from the basic physiological needs of breathing, food, water, sex (booyah!), sleep, homeostatis (the need for a stable environment), excretion moving up to self-actualization (achieving morality, creativity, spontaneity, problem solving, yada yada).
While I haven’t bothered reading the full description of his, I think he’s on to something. It makes sense that a similar pyramid of needs can be applied to any organism. It might look like this (in order from basic to advanced, with basic at the top):
- Survival
- Survival of genes into the future
- Contentment
I further claim, that these are not necessarily at the same time. You might have an organism pursue surival and contentment at the same time. Or SG (survival of its genes, shortened, ’cause I’m lazy) and contentment. Or survival and SG. Or all 3 at the same time.
The first one if obvious. In order to fulfill any of the following needs, the organism needs to survive.
The second one is ‘Survival of genes into the future’. Creating offspring falls into this state.
The last one is contentment. This is basically a state where the organism is happy with its lot in life. Yup, that’s intentionally vague. But what’s important is that the organism is striving in earnest to achieve a state of contentment.
Now let’s apply these goals to organisms to get a better understanding of what I mean.
To begin with, let me talk about why I think scientists are wrong about propagation of genes being the only purpose of life. It might be one of the primary needs/goals, but not the only one.
Imagine a young organism. A baby spid…err…kangaroo. Let’s say it is happily grazing on grass in a meadow, when it spots a crocodile who got lost on the way to the deposit money in the river bank. Get it? Bank! Haha…err…in any case, the ‘roo’s scared shitless.
Do you think it gives a fuck about marrying a nice girl and making babies at that point? Do you? Huh? Well, don’t say that it wants to survive only to do so – I say, prove it!
To further prove my point, consider humans who don’t want babies. I’m sure scientists have thought about this, and again, there’s a 85.39893% chance I’m talking out my ass about this. But to me, it seems that these folks aren’t interested in propagating their genes.
They are, however, interested in 1 and 3. They want to survive, and they are looking for contentment. You dig?
Similarly, such folk might be willing to die for a cause they believe in – in which case they give up survival for contentment (though shortlived). An example would be somebody dying for ‘their country’ (which is another weird, fluid concept).
If propagation of genes was such a strong imperative, I don’t think it would be swept aside so easily. I mean, c’mon! We’re talking about the goddammed purpose of life here, people! You think that we would be able to sweep it aside so easily if it was ‘the prime directive’?!
Scientists say that many of our desires and actions are designed to ultimately result in reproduction, via impressing females, etc. That seems like a weak argument to me.
I would argue that the strongest imperatives would be the most obvious, and the most powerful. SG is definitely one of these, but so is survival. So is contentment, for humans, at least.
What about other organisms, you ask? Well, think about an organism that can only give birth once in life, or is unable to do so. Being unable to ensure SG, it would have no goals in life, right? But we see that this isn’t the case. Even if the need for SG was absent, the organism would continue to work towards survival, and contentment (seeking pleasure is a trait many organisms share).
I can’t say microorganisms share this need for contentment. But they do seem to strongly desire survival and SG. But I don’t think that weakens my argument. I contend that these organisms have this need absent, because they are not developed enough to seek it.
…and to conclude
I think I might be on to something. Or not. Surprisingly, I wasn’t drunk when I wrote this, though I have trouble believing this myself. Maybe I was dehydrated or something. Anyways, I’m sure somebody will come along and smack some sense into me sometime soon.
Till then I’ll just behave like this post isn’t a crock of shit, and walk around all haughty-like. 
