Ah... I didn't realize that had been published. I really wasn't trying to hide it, but as a Google employee I have to be circumspect about things that aren't yet public.
As the Gizmodo article mentions, Google is working on a fix for this which address this issue. In case it's not clear from the article this only affect Google Prepaid card balances. If you've put your Citibank MasterCard in Google Wallet an attacker can't gain access to it. Adding a "real" card requires typing in the card number. It's just for the Prepaid card there's this kind of behind-the-scenes credit card number which is tied to the phone.
However, I did just get off the phone with Money Network (the company that manages the Google Prepaid card on Google Wallet. After speaking with them and doing a little reading, I discovered that the phone owner is not liable for fraudulent charges. You must notify them as soon as possible though (855-492-5538, toll free).
Right. Just like any other credit card, except that Money Network explicitly agrees to lower your liability to $0 from the legally-allowed $50.
In practice, what this means is that if someone gets your phone, clears the Wallet app data, then uses Wallet to spend your pre-paid balance, Money Network will give you back the money they spent, transferring it to your new phone.
Why? Because my posts make it harder for people to spread misinformation?
You've mentioned the opt-out thing on several posts already.
It's something that not many people seem to know about, and it's important, so I like to tell people about it whenever I get a chance.
Why does it have to be opt out?
Actually it's all opt in. You opt in by using Google's services. Unlike some of the competition, Google provides you a way to use their services and opt out of the part of the services that involve collecting information to personalize your experience.
being a Google employee you don't seem to be able to think by yourself anymore.
You have no basis for this assertion. If you think anything I've said is wrong, or illogical, by all means feel free to call me on it.
The key thing to keep in mind about the various Google Wallet deficiencies is that they all require the attacker to get your phone and root it... and he still has less information about and/or ability to use your card than if he'd gotten your credit card. That's not to say that the Wallet issues don't need to be addressed, but it does mean that carrying your credit card in your phone is more secure than carrying your credit card in your wallet.
Bottom line: Google Wallet security isn't as good as it could be, but it's still better than plastic.
Oh, I guess there is one way plastic might be more secure... the phone conducts transactions via RF, so there's still the possibility of someone doing a payment transaction with your phone while it's in your pocket, without your knowledge. Google Wallet addresses that risk in three ways. First, NFC is very short range. 1-2 centimeters with off-the-shelf equipment, perhaps 10 cm in the lab. Second, if your screen is turned off, the NFC payment is disabled. Third, if you haven't entered you PIN in the last few minutes (15?), NFC payment is disabled. In addition, all of the normal credit card risk management infrastructure is still in place, as well as the legal limitations on your liability.
Honestly, the biggest problem with Google Wallet isn't security, it's acceptance. Unless you want to eat at McDonald's a lot, it's fairly difficult to find merchants who can accept it.
The basic assumption of Google now is that it's for dumb fucks.
The basic assumption of Google is that it's for everyone. The fact is that most users don't know how to tweak their query arguments to get the answer they want -- not because they're dumb but because they're not geeks. Users misspell things, use the wrong terms, etc. Google's goal is to help them find what they're looking for, even when they screw up.
There's no doubt that as the web has changed from a geek playground to something that absolutely everyone uses, and as Google has changed to accommodate that, that the geek experience has in many ways degraded. For example, I don't like it when Google Search "corrects" my spelling -- because it's nearly always wrong, and I nearly always meant what I wrote. But the fact is that most queries contain misspelled words. That's not a guess, Google has mountains of data to prove it.
In theory, at least, your complaint can be addressed by more personalization. I expect that at some point in the future Google will realize I know how to spell and stop trying to correct my spelling, for example.
And to date google didn't even manage to show me a single ad that actually interested me. In like a decade!
Yep, Google fully understands that ad personalization isn't where it should be. The goal is that not only should Google show you ads that interest you, it should show you only ads that interest you. Any ad you see that you don't click on is a failure on Google's part -- which means that Google fails nearly all of the time. It succeeds more than anyone else does, which is why it makes so much money, but that doesn't mean anyone at Google thinks the current situation is good enough.
Consider a library, and the librarian: "Hello good sir, here's some books that might interest you!!!!
When I was a kid, the local librarian did that. I spent enough time in the library that she knew what authors I liked to read and always let me know when a new book came in that I'd want -- and she was almost always right. The library also posted a list of new books that arrived, broken down by category. That list was also very successful, IMO, because although most of what it contained was uninteresting to me, it was unobtrusive, not in my face.
That library did on a very tiny scale, the same job that Google is trying to do. The librarian's recommendations were in my face and would have been annoying if they were wrong... but they were right. The list's recommendations were usually wrong, but still useful at highlighting a variety of things I might like when I chose to look. And, of course, the library as a whole was searchable and browseable.
Anyway, my main point is that this is Google's theory, that given enough data and sufficiently powerful analytics, Google can make it easier for you to find and use the information you need, including information about products you might want to buy. Google's official mission is to "organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful". That's a crazy-ambitious goal, but Google is serious about it, and has recognized that the sheer volume of information means that making it accessible and useful requires figuring out what people are interested in.
But, if you don't like personalization, you're free to opt out and Google won't try to help you in that way.
I have to wonder... by accepting the Google cookie on a website that runs analytics have you now accepted the new all-services privacy policy?
My understanding is that the new policy goes into effect on March 1, and that any usage of Google's services after that date constitutes acceptance of the policy. However, I don't think visiting a site using Google analytics would constitute you using Google services.
Per the Google Analytics privacy policy (http://www.google.com/intl/en/analytics/privacyoverview.html), the uses that Google can make of the data collected by Google Analytics are controlled by the owners of the sites you visit. So, essentially, if the sites you visit choose to share their data with Google, then Google can use it. If they don't, Google can't, even if Google Analytics is collecting data on behalf of the site.
BUT, if you don't want that, you can also opt out of Google Analytics. In that case, your visits will not be tracked by Google at all, and won't be part of the Analytics information given to the site you visited. Of course, the site may still track you with other tracking services or through its own logs.
All you have to do to "opt out" of Google tracking is... keep a Google tracking cookie on you everywhere you go.
Well, yes. There has to be some way for Google's systems to know that they should not log or aggregate information about your requests.
When it comes to security of Google's own, internal information they go to great lengths to limit who can access it because they know they cannot rely on contractually-enforced trust of their own employees but when it comes to security of your information they insist that you rely on no-contract-whatsoever trust of Google.
The privacy policy is an enforceable contract, I believe (IANAL).
Google really doesn't want to track you against your will. Google's theory is that with personalization Google can help you find what you want -- including what you want to buy -- so much better than without it, that you'll want Google to know as much as possible about you so it can be as helpful as possible to you. But if you don't like that deal, Google doesn't want to force it on you.
As I pointed out to the AC, you don't actually have to be logged in. Opt-outs are specified by a persistent browser cookie. For cases where it's not persistent enough you can install a Chrome extension which makes sure it never gets removed.
Which requires you to be logged in. Nice try, arrogant Google asshole.
No, it doesn't.
Opt-outs are stored in a cookie, so Google gets them even when you're not logged in. Now, that cookie can get lost in lots of different ways, so Google also provides a Chrome plugin called "keep my opt-outs" which ensures that your opt-out cookie is always replaced whenever it is deleted.
Does it prevent them from getting data from employers and say "match/no match" ? Because this would not be giving the data, just using what was given to them to provides a service.
I think that's still clearly providing personally identifiable information (PII), even sensitive PII.
That's not against their privacy policy, and nothing private leave google servers.
The match/no match bit is a highly compressed form of the original private information. The fact that it has been dramatically compressed by an employer-specified transformation doesn't change that.
That's my view, anyway, and I think most Googlers would see it the same way.
I am fully addicted to google. I use all the products of google and integrate them to get most out of it. However, now i feel like my privacy is lost in some way.
Google provides tools that allow you to see and control what Google stores about you, and to opt out of tracking and ad personalization.
Does not matter what Google would do, just wait until all those data "leak" in some breach and the blackhats get their hands on it.
That's always possible, of course. As someone who works on securing data at Google, though, I have to say that I think your data is safer in Google's servers than just about anywhere. Almost certainly safer than on your own computer. Prior to joining Google I spent 15 years working as a security and privacy consultant for companies all over the world, big and small, so I have a pretty good feel for the state of information security around the world. In my expert opinion, Google does an excellent job. Far better than, for example, your bank.
I'm not sure how much I'm free to say here, so I'm not going to give any details. I'll just say that Google has excellent security infrastructure, and uses it well. Google's security operations teams review everything that remotely touches on security or privacy, and they're world class. Much of my work touches on the cryptographic security infrastructure, and I love the fact that I get my designs and implementations reviewed by serious cryptographers. I also love the fact that in the year I've been with Google I've never yet had any potential security issue I raised be ignored. It's no accident that Google is one of the few major sites on the web that uses SSL for basically all of its user-facing pages -- it's clearly indicative of the "secure by default" mentality of Google engineers.
Even better, most of the security focus at Google isn't directed at keeping the data secure from outside hackers -- most of the threat analyses that I write are focused on preventing abuses by insiders. Not because Google doesn't trust its employees, but because insiders have the most access. If you can make it impossible for employees to access data, you can be pretty sure that it's secure from outside hackers.
Of course, sometimes employees have to be able to get to information. To address that Google has extensive logging infrastructure and systems to identify potential abuses -- and accessing information without a good reason is a firing offense, regardless of whether or not you actually misuse it.
Nothing is perfect, of course, and no real system is invulnerable, so I won't say breaches are impossible. I will say that they're unlikely.
You don't get it... this isn't about your privacy or making results better, it's about getting people to use Chrome.
Google doesn't care if people use Chrome or not, except to the degree that it motivates other browser makers to push their implementations in directions Google wants. Chrome is all about influencing IE, Firefox, Safari and Opera, pushing them to compete in the ways that Google wants them to compete -- ways that make it possible for Google to build a complete suite of software tools that are browser and operating-system agnostic and work just as well as any local application.
In short: Chrome is part of Google's strategy to kill Microsoft Windows and Apple OS X. Not in the sense that Windows and OS X cease to exist, or to be popular, but in the sense that they cease to be a competitive advantage for Microsoft and Apple, because everything is on the web and your OS is irrelevant.
Is that the sound of the GP's post going over your head? Because he's absolutely right. There are many excellent technical solutions to the question of waste disposal, but all of them are rendered infeasible by political considerations.
No one has really found a good way to evaluate a programmers efficiency, mostly because if they do their job right they are not doing the same thing every day so their output will vary.
I think lots of metrics have been devised that provide useful information -- but only if the programmers don't know what they are, and only if the people interpreting the metrics have a clue. As soon as people know they're being measured they adjust their behavior to optimize the measurements, so unless you can measure exactly what you want to optimize (and software development is far too complex for this to be easy, and may be too hard for it to be possible), then any metric will ultimately be counterproductive if used slavishly. Also, any metric is at best a partial picture, so the users of the numbers have to understand what the numbers do and do not tell them.
You're a douche. In an economy where many people have been unemployed for so long that they're just dropping out of the workforce altogether, you're fretting over "FUD" because your company did a normal thing and switched products? Get over it. Do you realize how insane you have to be to take platform wars so seriously that you actually quit your job and avoid any other jobs that have anything to do with Microsoft products? For god's sake, get some perspective.
Bah.
If you don't like your job -- for absolutely any reason at all -- and can find one you like better, do it! Heck, even if you like your job it's a good idea to always keep your eyes open for what else might be available.
I can completely understand not enjoying working on MS platforms, because I don't. Not that I won't or can't, and not that it makes me hate my life or anything, but I don't enjoy it as much as *nix, and since I'm capable of finding, getting and keeping a job that I do enjoy more, why the hell wouldn't I? If the OP can find something more to his liking, more power to him.
And if you're an unemployed MS expert, his moving to a job he likes better creates an opening for you. Regardless, it makes no sense whatsoever for him to keep a job he doesn't like just because you're out of work.
1. Gift Cards. Often have expiration dates or monthly service fees that eat away the value of the card even though the card has been paid for with real cash and the company keeps, and usually reinvests, this cash. And the card is no longer redeemable if the company goes bankrupt.
Somewhat. Dormancy fees can't kick in unless the card is unused for 12 months and expiration dates have to be at least five years out. All of the money still evaporates in a bankruptcy.
The "accidental" deletion of email when closing a G+ account at the beginning
Never happened. Shutdowns of G+ accounts got conflated with the case of a guy who got all his Google services shut off due to using them to trade kiddie porn. Mix that with a bunch of Google hatred and the meme got started, but it never actually happened.
requiring real names and 18+ years old
I suppose. The real name requirement was to make it easier to connect with people you know and to keep spam down. Lots of people liked it, and still do. Not everyone, obviously. The 18+ requirement was just to minimize legal and privacy risks early on until Google was sure about how to manage them.
censoring photos
The no porn rule undoubtedly bothers some users, but I suspect a lot more like it. I do. Even more so now that my kids are on Google+.
How, exactly, does that work? It rings on several phones and they get deconflicted how?
Whichever one you pick up first gets the call. That's the multi-ring feature, though, not the call screening feature. Vonage and, I imagine, some other VOIP providers also provide multi-ring.
Slashdot Mirror
Root is no longer required: http://gizmodo.com/5883913/google-wallet-has-been-hacked-again-now-you-should-panic
Oh, and I should also have said: Still more secure than plastic. Especially if you use the lock screen.
Root is no longer required: http://gizmodo.com/5883913/google-wallet-has-been-hacked-again-now-you-should-panic
Ah... I didn't realize that had been published. I really wasn't trying to hide it, but as a Google employee I have to be circumspect about things that aren't yet public.
As the Gizmodo article mentions, Google is working on a fix for this which address this issue. In case it's not clear from the article this only affect Google Prepaid card balances. If you've put your Citibank MasterCard in Google Wallet an attacker can't gain access to it. Adding a "real" card requires typing in the card number. It's just for the Prepaid card there's this kind of behind-the-scenes credit card number which is tied to the phone.
However, I did just get off the phone with Money Network (the company that manages the Google Prepaid card on Google Wallet. After speaking with them and doing a little reading, I discovered that the phone owner is not liable for fraudulent charges. You must notify them as soon as possible though (855-492-5538, toll free).
Right. Just like any other credit card, except that Money Network explicitly agrees to lower your liability to $0 from the legally-allowed $50.
In practice, what this means is that if someone gets your phone, clears the Wallet app data, then uses Wallet to spend your pre-paid balance, Money Network will give you back the money they spent, transferring it to your new phone.
Will you stop posting on every Google story?
Why? Because my posts make it harder for people to spread misinformation?
You've mentioned the opt-out thing on several posts already.
It's something that not many people seem to know about, and it's important, so I like to tell people about it whenever I get a chance.
Why does it have to be opt out?
Actually it's all opt in. You opt in by using Google's services. Unlike some of the competition, Google provides you a way to use their services and opt out of the part of the services that involve collecting information to personalize your experience.
being a Google employee you don't seem to be able to think by yourself anymore.
You have no basis for this assertion. If you think anything I've said is wrong, or illogical, by all means feel free to call me on it.
The key thing to keep in mind about the various Google Wallet deficiencies is that they all require the attacker to get your phone and root it... and he still has less information about and/or ability to use your card than if he'd gotten your credit card. That's not to say that the Wallet issues don't need to be addressed, but it does mean that carrying your credit card in your phone is more secure than carrying your credit card in your wallet.
Bottom line: Google Wallet security isn't as good as it could be, but it's still better than plastic.
Oh, I guess there is one way plastic might be more secure... the phone conducts transactions via RF, so there's still the possibility of someone doing a payment transaction with your phone while it's in your pocket, without your knowledge. Google Wallet addresses that risk in three ways. First, NFC is very short range. 1-2 centimeters with off-the-shelf equipment, perhaps 10 cm in the lab. Second, if your screen is turned off, the NFC payment is disabled. Third, if you haven't entered you PIN in the last few minutes (15?), NFC payment is disabled. In addition, all of the normal credit card risk management infrastructure is still in place, as well as the legal limitations on your liability.
Honestly, the biggest problem with Google Wallet isn't security, it's acceptance. Unless you want to eat at McDonald's a lot, it's fairly difficult to find merchants who can accept it.
The basic assumption of Google now is that it's for dumb fucks.
The basic assumption of Google is that it's for everyone. The fact is that most users don't know how to tweak their query arguments to get the answer they want -- not because they're dumb but because they're not geeks. Users misspell things, use the wrong terms, etc. Google's goal is to help them find what they're looking for, even when they screw up.
There's no doubt that as the web has changed from a geek playground to something that absolutely everyone uses, and as Google has changed to accommodate that, that the geek experience has in many ways degraded. For example, I don't like it when Google Search "corrects" my spelling -- because it's nearly always wrong, and I nearly always meant what I wrote. But the fact is that most queries contain misspelled words. That's not a guess, Google has mountains of data to prove it.
In theory, at least, your complaint can be addressed by more personalization. I expect that at some point in the future Google will realize I know how to spell and stop trying to correct my spelling, for example.
And to date google didn't even manage to show me a single ad that actually interested me. In like a decade!
Yep, Google fully understands that ad personalization isn't where it should be. The goal is that not only should Google show you ads that interest you, it should show you only ads that interest you. Any ad you see that you don't click on is a failure on Google's part -- which means that Google fails nearly all of the time. It succeeds more than anyone else does, which is why it makes so much money, but that doesn't mean anyone at Google thinks the current situation is good enough.
Consider a library, and the librarian: "Hello good sir, here's some books that might interest you!!!!
When I was a kid, the local librarian did that. I spent enough time in the library that she knew what authors I liked to read and always let me know when a new book came in that I'd want -- and she was almost always right. The library also posted a list of new books that arrived, broken down by category. That list was also very successful, IMO, because although most of what it contained was uninteresting to me, it was unobtrusive, not in my face.
That library did on a very tiny scale, the same job that Google is trying to do. The librarian's recommendations were in my face and would have been annoying if they were wrong... but they were right. The list's recommendations were usually wrong, but still useful at highlighting a variety of things I might like when I chose to look. And, of course, the library as a whole was searchable and browseable.
Anyway, my main point is that this is Google's theory, that given enough data and sufficiently powerful analytics, Google can make it easier for you to find and use the information you need, including information about products you might want to buy. Google's official mission is to "organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful". That's a crazy-ambitious goal, but Google is serious about it, and has recognized that the sheer volume of information means that making it accessible and useful requires figuring out what people are interested in.
But, if you don't like personalization, you're free to opt out and Google won't try to help you in that way.
I have to wonder... by accepting the Google cookie on a website that runs analytics have you now accepted the new all-services privacy policy?
My understanding is that the new policy goes into effect on March 1, and that any usage of Google's services after that date constitutes acceptance of the policy. However, I don't think visiting a site using Google analytics would constitute you using Google services.
Per the Google Analytics privacy policy (http://www.google.com/intl/en/analytics/privacyoverview.html), the uses that Google can make of the data collected by Google Analytics are controlled by the owners of the sites you visit. So, essentially, if the sites you visit choose to share their data with Google, then Google can use it. If they don't, Google can't, even if Google Analytics is collecting data on behalf of the site.
BUT, if you don't want that, you can also opt out of Google Analytics. In that case, your visits will not be tracked by Google at all, and won't be part of the Analytics information given to the site you visited. Of course, the site may still track you with other tracking services or through its own logs.
Another option is to opt out of all Google tracking and ads personalization. Check out the tools at http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacy/tools.html
All you have to do to "opt out" of Google tracking is ... keep a Google tracking cookie on you everywhere you go.
Well, yes. There has to be some way for Google's systems to know that they should not log or aggregate information about your requests.
When it comes to security of Google's own, internal information they go to great lengths to limit who can access it because they know they cannot rely on contractually-enforced trust of their own employees but when it comes to security of your information they insist that you rely on no-contract-whatsoever trust of Google.
The privacy policy is an enforceable contract, I believe (IANAL).
Google really doesn't want to track you against your will. Google's theory is that with personalization Google can help you find what you want -- including what you want to buy -- so much better than without it, that you'll want Google to know as much as possible about you so it can be as helpful as possible to you. But if you don't like that deal, Google doesn't want to force it on you.
As I pointed out to the AC, you don't actually have to be logged in. Opt-outs are specified by a persistent browser cookie. For cases where it's not persistent enough you can install a Chrome extension which makes sure it never gets removed.
Which requires you to be logged in. Nice try, arrogant Google asshole.
No, it doesn't.
Opt-outs are stored in a cookie, so Google gets them even when you're not logged in. Now, that cookie can get lost in lots of different ways, so Google also provides a Chrome plugin called "keep my opt-outs" which ensures that your opt-out cookie is always replaced whenever it is deleted.
Does it prevent them from getting data from employers and say "match/no match" ? Because this would not be giving the data, just using what was given to them to provides a service.
I think that's still clearly providing personally identifiable information (PII), even sensitive PII.
That's not against their privacy policy, and nothing private leave google servers.
The match/no match bit is a highly compressed form of the original private information. The fact that it has been dramatically compressed by an employer-specified transformation doesn't change that.
That's my view, anyway, and I think most Googlers would see it the same way.
Another option is to use the tools Google provides to opt out of tracking and personalization and to view and delete data stored about you. http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacy/tools.html
I am fully addicted to google. I use all the products of google and integrate them to get most out of it. However, now i feel like my privacy is lost in some way.
Google provides tools that allow you to see and control what Google stores about you, and to opt out of tracking and ad personalization.
http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacy/tools.html
I am extremely uncomfortable even considering what they are up to. If this is Google's future, it is time to cut my losses and go anywhere else.
Another option is to opt out of all Google tracking and ads personalization. Check out the tools at http://www.google.com/intl/en/privacy/tools.html
Does not matter what Google would do, just wait until all those data "leak" in some breach and the blackhats get their hands on it.
Or, Google's Prospective Employee Recruitment Program service starts selling your data to employers.
Google's privacy policy prohibits selling or otherwise transferring user data to outside parties.
Does not matter what Google would do, just wait until all those data "leak" in some breach and the blackhats get their hands on it.
That's always possible, of course. As someone who works on securing data at Google, though, I have to say that I think your data is safer in Google's servers than just about anywhere. Almost certainly safer than on your own computer. Prior to joining Google I spent 15 years working as a security and privacy consultant for companies all over the world, big and small, so I have a pretty good feel for the state of information security around the world. In my expert opinion, Google does an excellent job. Far better than, for example, your bank.
I'm not sure how much I'm free to say here, so I'm not going to give any details. I'll just say that Google has excellent security infrastructure, and uses it well. Google's security operations teams review everything that remotely touches on security or privacy, and they're world class. Much of my work touches on the cryptographic security infrastructure, and I love the fact that I get my designs and implementations reviewed by serious cryptographers. I also love the fact that in the year I've been with Google I've never yet had any potential security issue I raised be ignored. It's no accident that Google is one of the few major sites on the web that uses SSL for basically all of its user-facing pages -- it's clearly indicative of the "secure by default" mentality of Google engineers.
Even better, most of the security focus at Google isn't directed at keeping the data secure from outside hackers -- most of the threat analyses that I write are focused on preventing abuses by insiders. Not because Google doesn't trust its employees, but because insiders have the most access. If you can make it impossible for employees to access data, you can be pretty sure that it's secure from outside hackers.
Of course, sometimes employees have to be able to get to information. To address that Google has extensive logging infrastructure and systems to identify potential abuses -- and accessing information without a good reason is a firing offense, regardless of whether or not you actually misuse it.
Nothing is perfect, of course, and no real system is invulnerable, so I won't say breaches are impossible. I will say that they're unlikely.
You don't get it... this isn't about your privacy or making results better, it's about getting people to use Chrome.
Google doesn't care if people use Chrome or not, except to the degree that it motivates other browser makers to push their implementations in directions Google wants. Chrome is all about influencing IE, Firefox, Safari and Opera, pushing them to compete in the ways that Google wants them to compete -- ways that make it possible for Google to build a complete suite of software tools that are browser and operating-system agnostic and work just as well as any local application.
In short: Chrome is part of Google's strategy to kill Microsoft Windows and Apple OS X. Not in the sense that Windows and OS X cease to exist, or to be popular, but in the sense that they cease to be a competitive advantage for Microsoft and Apple, because everything is on the web and your OS is irrelevant.
whoosh
Is that the sound of the GP's post going over your head? Because he's absolutely right. There are many excellent technical solutions to the question of waste disposal, but all of them are rendered infeasible by political considerations.
No one has really found a good way to evaluate a programmers efficiency, mostly because if they do their job right they are not doing the same thing every day so their output will vary.
I think lots of metrics have been devised that provide useful information -- but only if the programmers don't know what they are, and only if the people interpreting the metrics have a clue. As soon as people know they're being measured they adjust their behavior to optimize the measurements, so unless you can measure exactly what you want to optimize (and software development is far too complex for this to be easy, and may be too hard for it to be possible), then any metric will ultimately be counterproductive if used slavishly. Also, any metric is at best a partial picture, so the users of the numbers have to understand what the numbers do and do not tell them.
You're a douche. In an economy where many people have been unemployed for so long that they're just dropping out of the workforce altogether, you're fretting over "FUD" because your company did a normal thing and switched products? Get over it. Do you realize how insane you have to be to take platform wars so seriously that you actually quit your job and avoid any other jobs that have anything to do with Microsoft products? For god's sake, get some perspective.
Bah.
If you don't like your job -- for absolutely any reason at all -- and can find one you like better, do it! Heck, even if you like your job it's a good idea to always keep your eyes open for what else might be available.
I can completely understand not enjoying working on MS platforms, because I don't. Not that I won't or can't, and not that it makes me hate my life or anything, but I don't enjoy it as much as *nix, and since I'm capable of finding, getting and keeping a job that I do enjoy more, why the hell wouldn't I? If the OP can find something more to his liking, more power to him.
And if you're an unemployed MS expert, his moving to a job he likes better creates an opening for you. Regardless, it makes no sense whatsoever for him to keep a job he doesn't like just because you're out of work.
What I read in the article indicated they would update this list separately from the whole browser.
Yeah, call screening has never been useful to me either.
1. Gift Cards. Often have expiration dates or monthly service fees that eat away the value of the card even though the card has been paid for with real cash and the company keeps, and usually reinvests, this cash. And the card is no longer redeemable if the company goes bankrupt.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_CARD_Act_of_2009 The rules were changed for gift and credit cards because of the abusive industry practices you describe.
Somewhat. Dormancy fees can't kick in unless the card is unused for 12 months and expiration dates have to be at least five years out. All of the money still evaporates in a bankruptcy.
The "accidental" deletion of email when closing a G+ account at the beginning
Never happened. Shutdowns of G+ accounts got conflated with the case of a guy who got all his Google services shut off due to using them to trade kiddie porn. Mix that with a bunch of Google hatred and the meme got started, but it never actually happened.
requiring real names and 18+ years old
I suppose. The real name requirement was to make it easier to connect with people you know and to keep spam down. Lots of people liked it, and still do. Not everyone, obviously. The 18+ requirement was just to minimize legal and privacy risks early on until Google was sure about how to manage them.
censoring photos
The no porn rule undoubtedly bothers some users, but I suspect a lot more like it. I do. Even more so now that my kids are on Google+.
How, exactly, does that work? It rings on several phones and they get deconflicted how?
Whichever one you pick up first gets the call. That's the multi-ring feature, though, not the call screening feature. Vonage and, I imagine, some other VOIP providers also provide multi-ring.