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Comment by anonymous908213 | Hacker News Reader

Has anyone in the last 10 years praised Google for anything, ever? They've been engaged in enshittification the entire time. Search is getting worse, Youtube is getting worse, Android is getting worse, Chrome is getting worse. They are indeed a hollow shell of the company that originally established themselves, but now that they have such a wide-ranging monopoly they can freely debase the value of their products to extract as much from customers as they can.

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Google is still the best search engine. YouTube is still the best video site. Android is still the best operating system. Chrome is still the best browser.

And on the side they built the best AI and the best autonomous ride service.

Not bad for a "hollow shell" of a company.

Youtube and Android particularly are completely garbage and are not the "best" on any technical merits. To the extent they are used, it's solely because people are locked into using them by network effects. If you as a viewer use a technically superior video website, you will have no content to watch. If you as a content creator use a technically superior video website, you will have no viewers to watch your content. Similarly, if you as an OS developer want to make a new phone OS -- tough luck, nobody will produce hardware that is open and accepts anything other than an existing OS, and you can't sell a phone people will buy without modern hardware. This is why monopolies are terrible for humanity, and why Google's ongoing success has absolutely nothing to do with its technical capabilities or complete lack thereof.

>Google is still the best search engine. YouTube is still the best video site.

And both products are arguably worse than they were ten years ago.

Best in the Western hemisphere. There’s already equivalent alternatives available but it’s ok.

Yandex?

When you say "worse" shareholders will say: "globally dominant in multiple platforms".

Sure Android might be worse from a pure Linux perspective, but what shareholder has ever cared about that.

Gemini maybe? (and before that the alpha fold and alpha go), they do have things they are good at

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