Slashdot Asks: Which Tech Giant You Can't Live Without? 269
In this week's column of NYTimes, Farhad Manjoo writes about the five largest technology companies in the world: Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft and Alphabet, the parent company of Google. As he notes, these companies have become the most powerful firms of any kind, essentially inescapable for any consumer or business that wants to participate in the modern world. This brings us to two questions:
1. Of the five aforementioned companies, tell us one whose services you don't need for work and for personal use. (In short, the company that doesn't matter to you.) Here's a poll where you can cast your vote.
2. On the same note, which company's services and products you can't ditch (for work / personal use)?
1. Of the five aforementioned companies, tell us one whose services you don't need for work and for personal use. (In short, the company that doesn't matter to you.) Here's a poll where you can cast your vote.
2. On the same note, which company's services and products you can't ditch (for work / personal use)?
None of them. (Score:4, Insightful)
I can get my PC from intel, my monitor from Samsung, my OS via Linux and internet through some sort of fascist company.
I don't need those 5 at all.
Re:None of them. (Score:5, Insightful)
You should add google.* to your banned host list, and see how far you get on the "internet" :D
Re:None of them. (Score:5, Informative)
Ok, I guess I heard of Apple in my teens, but they weren't the behemoth they are now and didn't have that much influence on society.
But seriously, I grew up in a city, with a family, friends, and normal life....without any of these companies and I can tell you, I never felt back then my life was lacking in any form.
Today?
Well, I do appreciate and use the resources of many of these companies...but I do find that some of them also creep me out with the data mining and surveillance they have on my and everyones' lives.
I find that FB and other social media, while being helpful in so many ways, is also seeming to increase the divisiveness in society, especially in the US. I know there are underlying problems, but I think FB and other social media are compounding these problems.
Google has some great stuff, but I very much dislike their data gathering on me, my life and preferences.
So, I could (and have) lived without any of these companies.....and did just fine.
I don't use FB, never have...so, no loss there. I could probably get by without Google, but the one thing I'd miss is YouTube.
I do use Amazon a lot, it's my primary purchase destination, but ever since they started collecting tax a couple months ago on their direct sales to my state, I've been using them less. If they clamp down on the 3rd party sellers on Amazon and make THEM also start collecting tax, I'll likely drop using them as often. Might as well buy local at that point.
So, I guess my answer to the question is "Meh"....I've lived without them before and life was just fine.
Re:None of them. (Score:5, Insightful)
But you're looking at it through historical context - we've lived without internet, without cellphones, even without cable TV, and managed to actually survive! But if you're looking at it in the context of today, you've likely started relying heavily on one or more of these companies and it would likely be extremely inconvenient, if not impossible to do your job, without one or several of them.
I'll agree that facebook is the most useless one there, and if facebook disappeared from the face of the planet, the lives of hundreds of millions of users worldwide would actually likely improve.
I've come to rely on google for a lot of things. Certainly searching the internet is one of them, but gmail, google voice, sharing calendars and documents with my family has been extremely useful. So, on a personal level, losing Google would hurt the most - although I'd manage.
As far as work goes, we work with proprietary software (and I'm not complaining, as it includes great API access for us programmers); it only runs on Windows. I would love to see a port somewhere else, but that's not likely. We also rely a lot on Microsoft's cloud services and office products to share things (the way I do in my personal life with Google). If MS were suddenly to cease to exist, we'd switch to products on Linux (we've evaluated them, and they just weren't ready for prime-time yet, but we'd learn to live with them if they were the only option).
I also use Amazon a lot - I have prime, and I've never looked back. I'll take free two day shipping over wasting gas, causing extra pollution, adding to the traffic problem, and spending a couple of hours going to the local big box store and choosing something from a much more limited selection. I don't care about sales tax. I'd be paying that locally anyway. Prime videos and music are a nice added bonus.
So there's none of these companies I couldn't live without, but I don't think that's really the question. We use the word "need" very loosely these days, and it depends on context. I don't "need" internet service at home... but I do "need" internet service at home if I want to work remotely. But I don't "need" to work remotely, it's just a perk. I don't "need" any of these companies. I "need" them to do some specific things that I don't really "need" to do.
And slashdot actually has polls, so WTF would someone go offsite to take this survey? Unless, of course, you like being the product. Wondering how many ads are on the linked page.
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There's several ways to interpret the poll question. Does "giving up" one of the tech giants means that you personally simply refuse to use their products, but everyone else still does? Or does it mean that the tech giant magically disappears from the face of the planet, and everyone relying on them is left in a lurch?
So, for instance, I'd be happy to give up MS products forever. However I can't easily do it any time soon because my job, and almost any other job I might apply to and be qualified for, use
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Apple? I like macOS for bread and butter computing, but I won't be destroyed if I wind up using a Dell or Lenovo.
Microsoft? There isn't much out that will scale as well as AD, so perhaps someone (Novell?) would put out a good LDAP offering that can handle things. Other than that, a good Puppet infrastructure could replace SCCM.
Amazon? Azure and OpenStack items could replace AWS, and someone could make an API interface to map all AWS calls to the other cloud providers.
Facebook? Easiest to replace. If t
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You know...I lived a good portion of my life before any of these companies existed.
People used to live before the invention of a telephone. Now try getting a job without uploading some PDF document to some website along with your email address, LinkedIn details, and right for people to pry into your life.
Times change. We did a lot of things in the past we wouldn't be able to do anymore. You may not use google, you may not like google, but if you block google you may find your life needlessly difficult e.g. just today I asked the address of a restaurant and I get as a response a google lin
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I agree, I really do use YT as one of my primary sources of how to learn something new.
It was a fun thing before Google bought them....and with Google's attempts at making everyone on YT a Google+ or whatever they are doing now member...they have actually
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Google routes to null here, along with lots of other Alphabet domains and any I find.
You think you need googleapis, but you don't.
Nor do you need any of the rest of them. It's all in your mind.
But then, you can get away without using sugar, tobacco, booze, petroleum-based fuels, and quite a bit more. Just depends on how industrious you are.
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But then, you can get away without using sugar...
I hope you're only referring to refined sugar...
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Read The Case Against Sugar by Taubes if you have question. Sugar is addictive as opoids, perhaps more so, and dietary overconsumption leads to horrific results. Read the book.
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Also, overconsumption is the key word. I don't think having a diet completely free of sugar, in any form, is good either.
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There are several genotypes that are more susceptible to sugar and carbohydrates. Until you know which one you're a member of, you're in a grey area. By the time you find out, you're pre-diabetic, have high A1Cs, or may have already stressed your pancreatic beta cells.
Most individuals living today consume 10x-3000x+ the level of carbohydrates that their GGgrandparents did. '
Without a doubt, you can live very very well on a diet of protein and fat-- remember that excess protein is converted to carbs, and die
Re: None of them. (Score:5, Interesting)
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Tell me about duckduckgo's email service, and calendaring system, and cloud document services. I'm interested in switching. I could easily live without Google's search service.... I could live without Google at all, but we're really talking about current levels of reliance on any of these companies, and I don't think you get as much "for free" from anyone else (I know it's not free, I know I'm the product, but I'm OK with that trade off to the extent that I use the service).
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Like I said, it's a trade off, and I've not given them any information that I'm not comfortable giving them. Why do I care if they scan my email for keywords? I don't care if they know what restaurant I'm going to... in fact, I happily set my home and work locations to make things even easier. If someone wanted this information, it'd be fairly easy to figure out anyway. Like I said, I wouldn't put financial or personal medical information in a gmail.
I have comcast for internet service, and when their D
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Life Before the Internet (Score:2)
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There was life before indoor plumbing too.
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I already do, it's called No Script with the addition of Disconnect with Google added to blacklist. If the site does not render, I do not go there. Problem solved
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I would do fine, there are other companies that provide the same thing, and if there wasn't a company would soon come in and fill the gap. The question was not do these companies provide valuable services, they clearly do. The question is could you live without them, and the answer for me for all of them is I could live without them. In fact at worst it would be mildly inconvenient.
I think for most people if you removed Apple, Google, and Microsoft you would l loose smart phones (or the operating system the
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I've actually started migrating-away from Amazon. They have a local presence and I get charged local sales tax if I buy from them. It makes more sense to buy from other vendors that don't have such a presence if I'm doing catalog purchases, especially if those other vendors also offer free shipping.
Re:None of them. (Score:4, Insightful)
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And how is this different than any other thread?
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In other threads you are more likely to learn something useful.
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I used Altavista.digital.com back in the day, I used mapquest, I used Yahoo maps.
I switched to using Google for a search engine when Altavista's results got bad or when it closed, can't remember which at this point. I switched to Google's maps because they were easier to read than Mapquest's or Yahoo's.
Should a truly better competitor for these kinds of functions come along then I would consider them. I'm not exactly thrilled with Google/Alphabet's direction, they seem to be getting a little big for their
Re: None of them. (Score:2)
That's an easy one... (Score:3)
Apple (Score:3)
A world where the only viable phone was an android and the only viable system running the defacto standard desktop app (MS Office) would suck. Apple provides a unique and viable competition. I don't think it would be possible today to start a new "apple". Though one has to give MS credit for finally innovating a bit with it's surface series.
One can't quite say the same about microsoft. If microsoft went away the hegemony of the Office app series would fade, probably for the better of everyone. Though t
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Least disruptive to me: Microsoft. As a Mac user, I haven't used any Microsoft products for any nontrivial amount of time since I took an assembly language programming course before the turn of the century. They could disappear tomorrow, and I wouldn't even notice apart from the uptick in friends asking me to recommend alternative office suites.
Most disruptive to me in the short term: Google. If Google Analytics suddenly went away, it would literally bring the Internet to its knees with stalled connecti
Re:That's an easy one... (Score:4, Insightful)
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DEC had some inroads into banking as well, but yeah, IBM AS/400 jobs are still out there because banks are reluctant to move off of their expensive servers they bought in the 1980s. I know a guy making over a million dollars a year maintaining an AS/400 installation and he previously worked on a DEC banking system (both ran COBOL). He lives in Silicon Valley and his cost of living is absurd, too. When he took that job they offered him $800000 a year and 20% down payment on a house to move there and that was
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Valve.
Not Valve. Where would I buy $60 video games for $5 each during Black Friday weekend?
"Caste your vote" (Score:2, Funny)
Anonymous Coward's votes are clearly Dalit.
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> Here's a poll where you can caste your vote.
Should have been:
Here's a pole where you can caste your vote.
Alphabet (Score:5, Informative)
I've never owned any Apple products, avoid buying from Amazon, think Facebook is a huge waste of time, and got rid of my last Windows (W2K) computer a few years back.
But my Android phone is indispensable and I find that duckduckgo's search results aren't as good as google's results.
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Same here. I haven't used MS products except for some basic compatibility with MS users in over 10 years. I don't have a Facebook account and I am very happy not to have one. I have never used apple products nor anyone in my family.
Amazon and Google are the remaining ones. I probably could do without Amazon, as I mostly use their retail business and not really their cloud business. And retail has dozens of competitors, maybe not quite as good, but up there.
Google is a harder one to live without. Their searc
The Only Answer (Score:5, Insightful)
None. Zero. They could all go bankrupt and it would be business as usual for me after some slight adjustment.
As soon as the tech giants learn that people couldn't live without them (despite whether it's true or not), that's when they always start creeping into nefarious territory with their policies to push their profits higher.
I'd also like to add that Facebook was caught performing psychological experiments on their users that included attempting to make users extremely sad [bbc.co.uk].
Fuck Facebook. I left them YEARS ago and haven't looked back. Now when I talk to friends I meet up with, we have something to talk about because they have no idea what I've been up to AND I have no idea what they've been doing lately.
Other than Facebook I'm indifferent to every other large business. I'll buy products that have high quality longevity and are a value to me. The second they tamper with the quality, I lose trust in them and move on to some other product.
I've exited entire markets of products just because none of the offerings were valuable to me. My wallet thanked me for that.
Re:The Only Answer (Score:5, Funny)
*blinks*
A TWO DIGIT USER?!?
It's like meeting a celestial! :)
Re:The Only Answer (Score:5, Funny)
Makes *me* feel like a youngster.
Re:The Only Answer (Score:5, Funny)
It definitely puts things in perspective. If only you'd signed up a few hours earlier...
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He died like, four years ago. You are replying to his /. post-generating app, which is prepaid to run for another six years.
If that response was auto-generated, then I'd say we have proof that AI is quite advanced.
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I was going to say that they left an option out of All of the above., but I think your post pretty much covers that.
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How about Food? (Score:2)
If we look strictly into tech - CISCO and the likes, they make networking gear keeping Internet running. Followed by chip designers - that will be AMD, Intel, Qualcomm, ARM. Followed by crypto and PKI companies, like OpenSSL Foundation, RSA, and Entrsut. Crypto is really difficult to get right, starting fresh there would be a huge setback. OS is not that important in grand scheme of
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For example, without Facebook would mean that it disappeared and somehow people forgot how to create social networks and entice people into narcissistic navel gazing online.
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FTFY.
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Does masturbation count as sex? Otherwise most slashdot readers are left out.
In the poll I asked others to explain votes (Score:2)
I put in Alphabet/Google because my company provides a Chrome Extension as a development tool for our product. If Google went away, I'd be fucked.
The initial voting was interesting with Amazon getting exactly ZERO votes. I'm an Amazon customer but life would go on if they went away and I guess everybody else feels that way.
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The initial voting was interesting with Amazon getting exactly ZERO votes. I'm an Amazon customer but life would go on if they went away and I guess everybody else feels that way.
I wasn't very surprised, except for Kindle, Echo and a few other unremarkable products they're 99% just an e-tailer and some other company would fill the void. I also like my local grocery store, but it's quite obvious I'd find another even if I wouldn't be that happy with location, selection and prices.
You've got to move (Score:2)
American Standard
https://www.americanstandard-u... [americanstandard-us.com]
Middle Age Minority Immigrant Professional I think (Score:5, Interesting)
Apple - Don't Need
not a fan boy, and though I work with CS I'm happy with the MS compatible product
Amazon - Don't Need, but Really Like
What can I say as a guy, and a parent (see bulk diapers, toilet paper, detergent), and clueless shopper, they have become an asset. e.g. I bought my son a nice watch for his 16th birthday. I first attempted to go to the down town Los Angeles jewelry district. I had my negotiating cash in hand but realized immediately I had no idea what qualified as a good watch. Amazon to the rescue every offer was counter offered by the Amazon cost on my phone. Ultimately I purchased the watch on Amazon for less $10.
Facebook - Hate It
Humanity would be better off without it. I've watched all my associates become attention whoring narcissistic children. between that and eye catching adds funneled through friend likes it's kinda sad.
Microsoft - Use It
Being in an engineering/architecture field it's required, the only alternate to Office has been Google Apps (see docs) I actually used this in a professional office until people could no longer deal with the accountants whining about there precious icons. (we went back to office). Yes I've tried the linux office apps think they work great but in my professional life this is a pipe dream
Alphabet - Need It (this could be google subliminal suggestions)
What can I say they whore my information but it works and it's cheap (see $100 android phone). I also just discovered the cool features in google photos. lossless uploads and automatic sorting. After 10+ years of Film, DSLR this is sooo convenient.
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Well this was a jewelry exchange designed to allow single source competition (see tons of sales booths within an open area). Normally I would agree being a proponent of the local small business. However this gentleman was reselling store brand (sears) as new unique with an unreasonable markup. Amazon gave me the advantage of knowledge:
a. value
b. quality
c. product origin.
This took away his advantage which he used maliciously.
None (Score:2)
While I do not necessarily use every tech giant out there personally, I feel like if you took one away it could adversely affect how the markets have grown, and we could be living in a very different time.
One thing I am certain of, if Oracle did not buy Sun Microsystems, we would be better off today. I feel as though anyone else buying Sun would have yielded better for everyone.
Visa/MasterCard/AmEx (Score:2)
"BUT WHUT ABOUT THE BITCOINZ!?!?!"
Not until I can pay my water bill with bitcoins will it be ready for mass consumption. Once Bitcoin reaches the low level of utilities then it'll be ready for primetime.
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This is just not true. Without credit card companies we would still have bank exchanges, wire transactions, debit cards and so on. Actually, without CC companies retail economy would grow 3% overnight, or about how much these companies suck up in transaction charges.
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There's no way in hell to manage any form payment system without having one of the big 4 as a vendor and support. Paypal is getting closer.
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Or we just switch back to writing checks.
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I need a debit card only because the banks in my country are trying to kill cash.
I was doing fine without it for many years.
Bank transfers for paying bills: Internet banking works great. Most of them are automated, under my control.
Bank transfers for buying stuff from people on the Internet: works great as well.
No MS, Google, Facebook, Twitter etc (Score:2)
I can live very well without any of them especially the (anti-)social media companies.
Microsoft was the last one I gave up. Boy did I feel good and still do tbh.
Smartphones & Apple vs Alphabet/Google + Faceb (Score:3)
Oh my. (Score:2)
I confess to using Gmail (for convenience) and purchase the occasional item from Amazon but that's it but I don't even interact with the rest. If they all vanished, I would be just fine. Does this mean I'm not participating in the modern world?
Only Microsoft (Score:2)
At home I depend on Windows to be able to run my videogames. I could certainly buy a Playstation but I have lots of games that only work on Wi
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Not to mention that first-person shooters just plain suck with a controller. Keyboard+mouse FTW!
AOL (Score:2)
CARRIER LOST
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Why isn't AOL on the list? I'm still rocking my dialup account on AOL, and I think it's all I'll ever ne(SAD&~~~~
CARRIER LOST
Dear Sir,
I hereby notifying you in writing that your post is defacing and infringing on my "no carrier joke on computer" patent. You will be shortly hearing from my la`+#$%NO CARRIER
Mostly just Inconvenient (Score:2)
None, not even one not on this list. (Score:2)
I need air, water and food, in that order.
Next stupid question.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Facebook (Score:2)
I don't like Microsoft, but as long as I'm employed, I doubt I could escape them.
I could use Android, but I prefer Apple.
I'd really be hard-pressed to get rid of gmail, and I have a lot on Google Docs.
I can't think of any good alternative to Kindle and Amazon rules online shopping.
Facebook can FOAD. I have little use for it.
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Also my answer. Work supports Android (Alphabet/Google) and iOS (Apple) mobile apps and we have both Azure and AWS cloud backends (Microsoft and Amazon, respectively). That means Facebook is the odd man out. We use Facebook, but losing it wouldn't kill any products or services we offer. The same information is on Twitter and other sources.
Microsoft (Score:2)
Tech giants (Score:2)
Can't live without:
Apple: main computer for daily use (personal and work). Safari, Mail, Pages, etc.
Alphabet: GMail (email used for various websites, great spam filters). YouTube. Chrome for websites that choke on Safari.
Netflix: my only entertainment source (limited selection compared to the USA but still worth the price).
Microsoft: only used for gaming. I don't use Office or anything else from Microsoft. It's just the OS that happens to be required for most games.
None at all:
Facebook: No account, I don't
reality most make my life better (Score:2)
That is how I make 100% of my income. I mean, before Google and Amazon and java, I still made 100% of my income in software, so presumably I would continue to do so even if these megacorporations c
All of them? (Score:2)
Alphabet/Google - Yeah, it's hard to not use Google
Facebook - so far I haven't had a need to set up an account and don't feel like I have been negatively impacted
Microsoft - I haven't used Windows in more than a decade, but I'm sure I interact with MS products via ATMs and things like that.
Apple - as a consumer this one is pretty easy to avoid (see Android under Alphabet/Google)
Amazon - I know a few people who still distrust shopping online and don't use Amazon. So it is possible, but it's so convenient!
So,
The poll doesn't match the article post. (Score:2)
The article says which one "can't you live without" and the poll says "which one CAN you live without" (paraphrasing).
So, I predict other people will fuck up their answers like I did and pick the one they wanted to keep and not discard first.
Google (Score:2)
None of them (Score:2)
I'd miss Google Search and maybe Gmail but I could live without Alphabet AKA "Google's EU antitrust shield". Amazon is convenient but there are plenty of other places to buy things online. My life would be markedly improved if Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft went away.
Cue Richard Pryor: NONE OF THE ABOVE! (Score:3)
I could do very well without any or all of the above companies.
None of them offer any services I'd particularly miss.
Depends on your definition? (Score:2)
I lived perfectly fine before using their products, I could live perfectly fine without them again.
But which ones would I be severely annoyed at losing? Spotify is probably the most important one, Youtube comes second.
Decisions, decisions.... (Score:2)
I can live without all of them (Score:2)
I do a lot of Windows programming, so if Microsoft went away I'd take a short-term hit. But only short term -- I'd just switch to whatever took its place.
The rest of them are entirely optional.
Google, Microsoft (Score:2)
The problem with avoiding Google is that their search engine really is the best. I mostly try to use other ones that respect privacy, but if they aren't giving me the information I want I'll switch over to Google, because it really does work best.
I don't own a Windows computer, but I sometimes have to use Windows at work. That's true for a lot of people.
Amazon is easy to avoid. Anything they sell, you can also get from lots of other online stores.
Apple is easy to avoid, as long as you aren't also avoidin
Amazon and Apple are optional for businesses (Score:2)
Anything Amazon sells in its web services is now also available from Google. Anything Amazon sells is available elsewhere for similar cost.
Apple is only needed if you absolutely want to publish your own i-app. If you just do business through a website, though, they're a luxury.
You still need Google for marketing your offerings, and you still need Facebook if you market to consumers (although other social med
Nobody can duplicate what Google does (Score:3)
- Apple - don't use it at all
- Amazon - I use it, but don't depend on it
- Facebook - only check once in a while when I get a notification that one of my family members posted something. If Facebook disappeared, there are other services that work just as well.
- Microsoft - I use Windows a lot, but these days, there are alternatives that work about as well. Who really cares about the OS, when all you do is browse the Web and check your email!
- Google - Nobody can duplicate what Google does with Search. Not even close. I remember life before Google.com. It was a lot harder to find out things I wanted to know. Google is almost magic. Bing and Yahoo don't even come close. MapQuest and Garmin don't come close to Google Maps and Navigation. Without Google, I'd be lost, figuratively and sometimes literally! There is no adequate replacement for what Google does.
I don't use Facebook or any MS product (Score:2)
I don't use Facebook or any MS product *now*, so that much is very easy.
Apple... I do have a Macbook, which I like, but I could replace it with a high-quality laptop with a good Linux distro without any qualms. I don't use any software which doesn't run on Linux.
Amazon would be tough. I buy tons of stuff from Amazon, including monthly subscribe & save items, etc. But i could do without it.
Google, heh. I use Android devices (phone, tablet, watch), and Chromebooks, and Chromecasts, and Nexus Players
That was easier than expected... (Score:2)
Facebook: Facebook not existing would actually make my life better because then I wouldn't have to hear condescending "Oh, you're not on Facebook" comments from... everyone ever.
Apple: I don't use any of their products. (Though I like that they provide a check on the Microsoft and Google platforms.)
Amazon: I'll answer this as soon as I'm done buying something on Amazon.
Microsoft: Professionally, no getting around this. At home, the number of things keeping me on the Windows platform is vanishingly small. (B
I don't want big IT companies. (Score:2)
I don't believe that Big IT serves my needs or interests. It cripples my abilities. It limits my choices. It creates powerful political pressures that wish to enslave me.
I don't need or want Big IT or any other powerful corporation. I would
Back in the 1900s, I got along without any of them (Score:2)
I'll rank these companies by descending utility to me personally:
Google
Apple
Amazon
Microsoft
Facebook
Certainly, for most of my life I didn't have any of these services available to me. But those were the days when the news sites I used the most had to be printed out on big sheets of cheap paper and delivered house to house by small boys. When I shopped for anything, I had to drive around to different stores looking for the item and comparing prices. To look something up, I had to drive to a public building ca
Just two (Score:2)
hungry.... (Score:2)
Monsanto :(
Personally or Professionally? (Score:2)
Professionally, part of my job involves using Android, iOS, AWS and Windows. So, professionally I would be okay with FaceBook going away. Actually, I'd be fine having to support fewer platforms. As long as they give me time to migrate away, I don't really care which of them remain.
Re: (Score:2)
I have NO idea what this means.
Anyone with a translation?
Re:Microsoft (Score:4, Insightful)
the world runs on Windows and Office
That may have been true in the 90s but it hasn't been the case for a looong time. The web runs the world these days and it's easy to get by without Windows and Office. There are plenty of alternatives. People just stick to Windows out of laziness and because it's what most other people have.
If Office and Windows were to disappear tomorrow, people would just standardize on something else and they would get by just as well.
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