[bratsche]

I think what's almost shocking about this is that Google seemed so great in the beginning. "Don't Be Evil" was even like an internal code of conduct slogan or something.

I never worked there and have no inside knowledge of what happened. Did they get taken over by MBAs who gained control of the company? Was it always evil and we were just misled the whole time? Something else?

[20after4]

They merged with DoubleClick¹, an advertising company. The combined company was about twice the size of the old google so it severely diluted their ranks with a huge cohort of the worst kinds of MBAs: Advertising & Marketing executives.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DoubleClick

[terminalshort]

Nothing fundamentally changed. The only real difference is they hit that inevitable point for any business that they had to start making money. They weren't evil then and they aren't now. They're a business, and they are responding to market demand for free to consumer products paid for by advertisement. What nobody on HN wants to admit is that the vast majority of people would rather have that than pay for their software in dollars. People love to complain about the Google panopticon but aren't willing to grapple with the fact that it has tremendous benefits too.

[skinkestek]

They single-handedly dismantled a thriving browser ecosystem. They pushed Real Name policies, used Google+ to stifle innovation, and then finished the job by shutting Google+ down.

And so on.

[geocar]

> Google seemed so great in the beginning.

It's almost like they were good at marketing.