This is the culture of having hundreds of millions of users. One user asking for something is just a data point and you have to rely on user research and surveys to know what users really want on average. But surveys have their blind spots as well.

The thing is, as a developer without having access to user research, all I know is what I want, and as a developer I assume I'm atypical. Whether it corresponds to what anyone else wants is questionable.

The opposite of this is people who assume that whatever they personally want is Obviously the Right Thing For All Users. You will find that attitude everywhere on the Internet. And that has its own flaws.

That’s unfortunately even true years after they left Google.

Wouldn't it make Google people to think when opened HN they found top 3 as it is for now - "1. Modifications to Google Chromium for removing Google integration", "2. Why I’m done with Chrome", "3. News Site to Investigate Big Tech, Helped by Craigslist Founder"?

No, a brick wall doesn't stare at you blankly. Nor does it argue back arrogantly and defy you that whatever Google wants is best.

I stopped using Chrome when I wanted to have downloads automatically save to the desktop (no dialog).

Turned out, there was a 2 year old open bug on the missing feature, in which Google UX engineers repeatedly argued allowing the save location to be changed was counter to the desired user experience.

I switched to Firefox the next day and haven't touched Chrome since.

Was that a long time ago? Chrome has supported the option of a fixed download location for many years. I don't remember it ever not having that option, in all the time I've used it.

Correction: I think it was the ability to turn off the in-window "downloaded file bar" pop-up, which could(?) only be dismissed by manually closing it.

There are a lot of different bug reports out there asking for a flag, and apparently the Chrome team added one, then disabled it a few patches latter.

I forget what I was doing at the time (downloading PDFs for a uni course?). But it was a pain in the ass, of dubious utility anyway, and the cavalier UX attitude of "father knows best" left a really bad taste.

https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=8966

They can't just put in every random feature that anyone shows up and suggests.

They do seem to put a lot of not so random features that no users have asked for.

Also, eventually brink walls break down. Google on the other hand doubles down the depth and breadth of its overreach.

This is the culture of monopoly. The same can be said of that other monopoly, government.

This may be true, but it's definitely not unique to Google. I know some well-meaning leftists who work for the leading Social Network and don't see any contradiction in that.

I could imagine a high-flying company having entitled employees, I just don't see the qualitative difference between this or that company. Please enlighten me if I'm missing the point.

And lest I sound arrogant myself: I once worked in Pharma and made my peace with the price vs R&D logic.

Well, every day there is more and more evidence ahoyt how R&D excuses in relation to the price later are that, excuses to win more money and they do not share the real investments numbers

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/apr/12/non-profits-...

"It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!" --- Upton Sinclair

Ummm, leftism has a long history of invasive mass surveillance and questionable social engineering practices, so I don’t really see the contradiction here...

Well, most of the fighting against "invasive mass surveillance and questionable social engineering practices" has also been done by leftists, so there's that...

Centrist average Joes usually don't care about such things, and right wingers applaud them to help the police and such.

As for libertarians they are against them when it's by the government, but fine with them when a private company (even one the size of a small nation) does it as part of a "voluntary" employment contract.

True. There’s the hippie leftist archetype, and the commissar leftist archetype. It’s a spectrum, so they say!

To me spectrum implies a single dimension, i.e. the spectrum of light is just based on wavelength. But this metaphor doesn't really fit with politics, which at best can be reduced to two dimensions (in my opinion), and realistically is a lot more.

Realistically the left/right spectrum is orthogonal to the authoritarian/libertarian spectrum. Classic liberalism is, I think, more aligned with the right but also profoundly anti-authoritarian. Similarly, the left has a proud tradition of supporting individual liberty but also a strong tradition of suppressing it in favour of collective power.

Corporations of all stripes tend towards authoritarianism though, in my view. It is a natural structure when you have agents using someone else's capital.

No. The claim is that all corporations tend toward authoritarianism. Left and middle and right. Not at all horseshoe theory.

You are conflating leftism with authorarisam

It's not a matter of arrogance but of money. You have to understand when it comes to google, you are the product, not the customer. Google's real customers are big ad buyers. They listen to large ad buyers. Look how quickly they "cleaned" up search results and youtube videos when ad buyers complained.

Us complaining to google about poor treatment is like sheep complaining to shepherds or vegetables complaining to the farmer about poor treatment. Nobody would care. But if the shepherd or farmer's customers complained, they would listen very closely because it affects their bottom line.

Especially now that google has a monopoly position on search and online videos, they have even less reason to care about what the products ( you and me ) say.