Gamone has been Google-mapped

I’ve just discovered, by chance, that Google Maps apparently carried out a street-view operation at Gamone in May 2013. Here’s the road leading up to my house:

Click to enlarge

Here’s a panoramic view of my house:

The Google vehicle carried on up the road to my neighbors’ house. There’s a nice view of the Cournouze seen from a point just below Jackie’s house:

Politicians: Google Streetview is where you put your foot down? Really?

Google Streetview is causing quite an activity in Germany: Many politicians ask Google to blur their houses and suggest that citizens do the same. So it does not bother them that Google reads all your emails or takes away your data, nilly-willy, but storing pictures that anyone can freely take, anyway, is a problem? I suspect that many people do not understand what is going on, are scared, and have a knee-jerk reaction. I would be scared to, if I thought that Google was constantly filming my house and publishing the result on the internet, for everyone to see. Note that there is a downside to the opt-outs, because the blurs have made Google Streetview less useful, at least in Munich. Other Google threats are much more serious. Or am I missing something?

Google Wave is dead

It was bound to happen: Google Wave is dead. Google Wave has always been a problematic product: What does it really do?

(*) What is wrong with email, instant messaging, forums, and collaborative editors? Why do they need to be merged into a single product? It was a typical Google product: Technologically very impressive, only for technical people (I have yet to meet a non-technical person that has used it), abandoned after a short while.

By the way: If anyone has an answer to (*), I would love to hear about it.



Update 2010-12-25: Google Wave has now become an Apache project.

I’ve thought about it some more and there is something intriguing about continually updating information and tracking the changes that are made. But a wiki that allows one to follow changes should be enough for that. Instead, Wave conflated this kind of documentation with instant-messaging-style brainstorming. I suspect that keeping brainstorming fully documented does not make sense and goes against the human tendency to maintain order by throwing stuff away and/or transforming it into something new.

Beware of Google Groups

I love the Google Groups user interface: It is easy to understand and you can get started right away (quicker than with all alternatives that I’ve seen so far). It is a great tool whenever teams need to collaborate, because it gives members a choice between RSS, email, and online reading. I’ve used it often when working with groups of students.



Alas, it also shows Google’s modus operandi of running things on auto-pilot. Almost a year ago, out of the blue, Google Groups banned me from their site. Some kind of automatic trigger went off; I was never given a reason. Now, on one hand, I cannot manage my own groups. On the other hand I cannot access any information stored anywhere in Google Groups. If I’m logged in, that is. Thus, I now use Firefox for browsing the web (where I’m logged into Blogger, Google Calendar, etc.) and Safari (where I’m not logged into any Google web apps) whenever I need to look up information that is stored in Google Groups.



I did try many things to fix this: I sent an email to the Google accounts help desk, posted in the Google Groups help groups (well, I sent it to my brother who posted it for me) where this is a frequent topic of discussion, even sent a fax to Google headquarters. All to no avail.



So Google does share a trait that is common in big companies: it does not listen to its customers. Or only when it suits them. Granted, they are popular, have a lot of customers, and are free, but this is still very frustrating. Losing control over one’s own data makes “free” services very expensive.



Alternatives to Google Groups that I know of:

• Nabble (version 2 is powerful, but a bit complicated to use)


• Yahoo groups (not tested, yet)


• Groupsite


• Posterous groups [added 2010-12-25]


• Onhub [added 2011-01-10]


• Tangler [added 2011-01-10]

Update 2010-12-23: John Resig (creator of jQuery, among other things) writes about why he abandoned Google Groups in “Google Groups is Dead”.

Synching Google Calendar with iCal and Thunderbird

Via the CalDAV protocol, Google now supports bi-directional(!) synchronization between Google Calendar and iCal or Thunderbird. Details [source: fscklog]:

• Get Started with CalDAV


• Calaboration, the tool linked to above

This is great, previously one needed the purchaseware BusySync to do so (note though, that BusySync also allows you to sync iCals in a WLAN).



Related post: Cloud-sync your iOS calendars (bonus: PC/Mac)

Google has banned me

From all Google groups, that is (that’s a lot of content!). The weird thing is that I can do less when I'm logged in than when I'm logged out, because then, they don't know that they have banned me. This seems to be a common problem. To add insult to injury, many resources for fixing it are only available in Google groups itself (if you are logged in and not banned).

“Sorry... The owner of this group has banned you from this group.” This initially mislead me to believe it was a one-group thing.

“Forbidden. Your client does not have permission to get URL / from this server.” Slight problem: Most of the resources for figuring out what went wrong are on exactly this server.

The root of the problem

The problem is a tricky one: Google offers most of its services for free and is faced with a lot of spam. Hence, to save costs, they have to automate and don’t employ many people in support. That is, you get what you paid for. On the other hand, many people use those services for critical data which they can’t afford to lose. Thus, Google has a lot of responsibility which it doesn’t always live up to (and probably can’t, cost-wise).
It comes down to the rule:

Be sure that you are in control of content that is important to you.

For example, by constantly backing up or by storing your content offline and only pushing it to Google [1].

Trying to fix the problem

There is no direct solution, so I've tried indirect ones:

• Disable autoresponder: this leads to Google checking if the account has been blocked due to too many posts made via email. Some people have successfully (ab)used this to get unbanned.
  


• Feedback about Google Accounts: One step higher up the Google chain, this is one of the few generic options for getting in contact with Google. I left a note.
  


• I sent a fax to Google Inc.: Yes, there was real paper involved.


• I gave feedback on the GG help site (which obviously was negative).
  

So far, none of this has worked.

Updates

• [2009-03-26] At least I haven't lost money: “Google is Evil, Worse than PayPal: Don't use Google Checkout for your business”.
  


• [2011-10-18] I finally got my access back. After three years! And only via a contact at Google.
  


• [2011-04-14] “How I lost access to my Google account today” by Ehsan Akhgari.
  

Related reading

1. Google Blogger: staying in control of your content and other tips