Google clearly made a mistake in offering an "unlimited plan" so it makes perfect sense that they're going to discontinue it, and offer 60 days before the data becomes read only. If it was just that, there wouldn't be any article.
The fact that they regret offering an unlimited plan doesn't, however, give them the right to tell him that they're going to give him 60 days before the data becomes read only but it won't be deleted and then suddenly tell him that actually his data is going to be deleted in 7 days, which isn't sufficient time to transfer it elsewhere.
I also very much agree that the monopolistic behavior you're mentioning is not a think we should just go accepting and even more, not be victim blaming. It feels really weird to me that people are blaming the reporter. You know, a 1.6 trillion dollar company vs well... nearly anyone else.
For reference, the standard scam before was to offer $40/month for e.g. 1GB of data. At that point, you'd pay a crazy amount for each additional MB of data. This was horrible with very fast data, where you could accidentally burn through the whole quota with a misclick e.g. grabbing a large download.
Unlimited with throttle is super-friendly in comparison. I need data in case of an emergency -- enough to send and get emails and have GPS. I don't need 4k video streaming in an emergency. I don't want a $1000 bill for that. It keeps me in a sensible position, without requiring unlimited liability for the carrier.
My cell network (not Fi) has crazy fast internet (I'd throttle it if I could, t avoid overusing it).
If I go over some amount, it goes to 3G speeds (probably 200kbps or similar).
If I were to run at 3G speeds -- continuously, peak speed -- for a month, I couldn't e.g. hit a terabit of data. Ergo, there is a cap, and it's short of 100GB. You cannot get to 100GB be because of the throttle.
I think this is very good behavior, but it is capped.
Is this not exactly what has happened? He was clearly threatened harshly, and... the data isn't yet deleted?
It sounds like he (I think reasonably) believed that would be the new reality after the grace period: that he couldn’t write new files, but that his existing data would be accessible indefinitely in read-only form.
Sure, it’s clear from the context that Google vaguely wants him to stop being a headache for them. But planning for a read-only future is very different from planning for your data to be vaporized. As GP points out, Google could get eviction done in the same timeframe but save considerable face if the initial correspondence had said “you’re using way too much, it’s against our TOS, and we’re deleting your data in 30 days,” then given him a 30-day “reprieve” when the deadline drew near.
How exactly is that not a harsh threat? Sounds like a harsh threat to me. They were nice before, he didn't comply, now they're jerks. But it remains just a threat unless they actually wipe the data. Which they won't, because he's surely downloading it right now while we yell about it on HN.
He didn’t comply with what? Show me where in Google’s communications where it said they were going to delete his data.
And there’s no practical way to download that amount of data within seven days, just based on the bandwidth this would require. The situation would be totally different if they gave him six months notice for the deletion.
The poster upthread was trying (vainly, I guess) to make a distinction between the two.
Google initially told him that there was no hard deadline for getting the data off—just that his drive would be read-only as long as it was over the limit.
Then, 6 months later, they told him he had 7 days to get it off or it would be wiped.
No. 100% wrong. If you advertise and sell "unlimited" then you should deliver unlimited. If you don't build in acceptable use limits into the contract, then that's your fault, not the customer's.
I think the answer is that Google did in fact target companies with exceptionally high storage needs. They were just assuming that everyone who had lots of data would also spend a lot on other services and that didn't pan out.
A better comparison is probably a restaurant promising unlimited coffee refills for life, forgetting to make it conditional on ordering food as well. Then some office worker who never eats breakfast turns up every morning for three double espresso refills.
In your analogy it would be Amazon setting up an S3 front on their corporate unlimited Google account. That didn't happen, it was just someone with more data than average. Google knows very well what the distribution looks like.
Contrast this "unlimited" with how gmail was rolled out – gmail didn't offer unlimited email storage, it just offered a number orders of magnitude greater than everyone thought was realistic at the time.
Content Delivery Network (Free, Pro, or Business)
Cloudflare’s content delivery network (the “CDN”) Service can be used to cache and serve web pages and websites. Unless you are an Enterprise customer, Cloudflare offers specific Paid Services (e.g., the Developer Platform, Images, and Stream) that you must use in order to serve video and other large files via the CDN. Cloudflare reserves the right to disable or limit your access to or use of the CDN, or to limit your End Users’ access to certain of your resources through the CDN, if you use or are suspected of using the CDN without such Paid Services to serve video or a disproportionate percentage of pictures, audio files, or other large files. We will use reasonable efforts to provide you with notice of such action.
I've experienced this first-hand and they're pretty fair about it. I believe they asked me to upgrade to Enterprise once I was serving something like >10-20TB per month of images / audio files (this was several years ago though!)
> if you use or are suspected of using the CDN without such Paid Services to serve video or a disproportionate percentage of pictures, audio files, or other large files
Lots of sites have images. When exactly can I start to expect paying? Will this unspoken limit change in the future? Will I be notified when it is? As-written, it doesn't seem that way since it's opaque.
I imagine it pretty much comes down to "did this one thing that an individual is free hosting suddenly become popular or are they constantly taking the piss/running a biz off free".
They have an internal metric - I just wish it was public. How can I make a business decision on cost without this?
Support is part of the cost that is rolled into that pay-per-usage fee IMO.
I have no problem with banging on Google for offering "unlimited" things without telling you what the limits actually are. But at some point, you have to expect some level of knowledge and sophistication from the users. I think accumulating 237Tb of data is well past the point where you should not just take "unlimited" at face value, ask hard questions about exactly what the limits of what they're offering are, and move to a better supported service, even if it costs some money.
It's probably also time to re-think - do you really need 237Tb? That's a huge amount of data. Is this like raw 4k HD video of every interview you've ever done, uncut? Maybe it's time to cut down on things a bit.
If Joe Blow's computer shop down the street offered "unlimited storage" then normies would understand that to be bullshit. But when Google gives that offer, it's taken literally because Google. And this is Google's own damn fault, their PR teams built Google's reputation to impossible heights deliberately.
Lesson being: do not rely on devices or services that rely on a third party. They absolutely will screw you; it’s only a matter of time.
If you do not believe this, then I would say that you have not been around this industry long enough. There may be rare exceptions, but this should be your rule if you care about the longevity of your software and data.
You can't expect customers to go into this as battle-hardened as their opponent.
If you don't own the hardware and software stack, you don't own the service.
Sure, we could boycott. How often is that ever effective in this modern age? Is it ever, because I don’t think I ever heard of such outside of history books?
Our lawmakers are corrupt and wholly in the pocket of those who would stand to benefit from perpetuating this shameful status quo. From my perspective, there ain’t damn thing we can do to fix it (or a thousand other problems), unless we are ready to start holding them accountable. I think that will take putting some of their heads on pikes.
Absolutely. The word "unlimited" has been misused by so many companies (especially ISP and mobile) that anyone who has their eyes open should expect it to mean limited.
Also if there is a deal that is exceeding better than other options, don't be surprised when the rules change later.
Remus says it better in a sibling comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38628966
"Burke said he paid Google “a lot of money for a long time” for an “unlimited” cloud storage account."
I don't see how can this be seen as "taking advantage of a system".
Thats highly subjective to the point of meaningless.
Every single person who had these 100+ TB plans knew it was unsustainable. When you have that much data you know how much it costs for hard drives to store that much data.
If the article had actually stated the amount the guy paid per month (what,$20-$60?) everyone would know that he should've known this was coming.
We had to move a bunch of data off gdrive too, which did little for our opinion of Google's business customer support and was a PITA I didn't need, but the first warnings were in 2002 some time and we were nowhere near as egregious in usage as some of the/r/datahoarder crowd that had multiple petabytes hiding in the lowest cost Gsuite legacy pricing.
That's not true though. They've been telling him that his account is in read-only state. Literally no mention anywhere is made about deletion of the account or data in it, until that very last email which gives him 7 days to move his data(which is unreasonable).
If they said 6 months ago "your account is entering a read only state, if you don't go below your quota it will get deleted in 180 days" I'd consider this entire post to be a waste of space - but that's not what happened, and I'm very sympathetic to his situation.
otherwise it says, verbatim:
Hello,
Your account was previously placed in a 14 day grace period because you exceeded your pooled storage limit.
The pooled storage grace period expired on May 25, 2023 and your account is now in a “read-only” state. In this state services are impacted, including users not being able to upload new files or create new Google Docs, Sheets, Slides or Forms. Learn more about the features that are currently impacted.
To prevent any further disruption to services, you can free up or get more storage.
Sincerely,
The Google Workspace Team
Why do you think this?
This was a paid service until Google changed the terms; afterwards, Google claimed that the files would merely be read only (indefinitely), not deleted. After THAT, they then gave the user 1 week to deal with 250 terabytes.
Read it again you understand that properly.
How much would a TB cost on S3?
It is able to provide services very cheaply and it is for that very reason that paying customers are attracted to it - and of course, even if a service is cheap, paying for a service creates a different relationship between the service provider and the customer than does a relationship where the customer freeloads. In my view, if this had been a free service the terms of which had changed, there wouldn't be the same scope for outrage. But this was a paying customer, even if he didn't pay as much as you think would have been reasonable - or would have been obtained - elsewhere in the market. Google voluntarily chose those prices for its unlimited plan for competitive reasons and in its own corporate interests. That's on Google, as was Google's subsequent unconscionable behaviour.
In Australia, I suspect this sort of behaviour would provoke very close scrutiny by our antitrust and consumer protection regular, the ACCC. We don't seem to have the same problem with regulatory capture that the US does currently. At the very least here the consumer would have arguable claims under the Australian Consumer Law relating to consumer guarantees and misleading and deceptive conduct in trade or commerce.
Does it say somewhere in terms and conditions?
If Google unilaterally changed its TOS and updated those terms by saying the account would go 'into a read only state' without any further details (both of which in fact happened), the user is entitled to assume that such a read only state will be the new status quo. Google should have specified a time limit or specified that the read only state would be revocable on with no or short notice, at the company's discretion. By staying silent on that matter, Google's communications were misleading or deceptive or likely to mislead or deceive the user of the product.
This really isn't rocket science.
Also, this was a paid subscription.
What are you talking about?
>Burke said he paid Google “a lot of money for a long time” for an “unlimited” cloud storage account.
Because people with that much data know how much it costs to buy hard drives to store that much data.
Ask any of them how Google was supposed to make money off of them as a customer and watch them go for a gold in mental gymnastics.
It's not at all unreasonable to think a company might offer a service where they make a profit on the average customer, but make a loss in some edge-cases. It's not such an uncommon model.
When you use the actual numbers instead of a theoretical argument it falls apart even quicker. These are message board arguments, not ones you'd make with a straight face in person.
Trust in Google might be near zero on HN these days but they still have a pretty good reputation with the general public. Expecting every non-technical user to see through the BS feels pretty wrong to me. I mean, what's the point of consumer protection laws if they don't push companies to be honest?
Otherwise its false advertising.
Edit: the real mistake here is trusting google, a company with a track record in messing up with their customers (from retired products to accounts frozen without any hope of appeal).
I can't even find that they're a tech reporter given that:
> The footage Burke obtained and shared with other journalists was obviously embarassing for the Fox brand. And that’s saying something, considering what Fox is willing to publish and air of its own free will and volition. A pair of videos featuring unreleased footage of a Kanye West interview allegedly illegally obtained by Tim Burke featured the rap star saying things even more abhorrent than his usual blend of sexism, bigotry, and conspiracy theories.
They certainly don't seem like someone with an expert's understanding of cloud storage costs, do you have evidence to the contrary?
Google response isn't correct but everyone here has there hands a bit dirty. Storing 237 Tb on an unlimited server - the individual clearly knew they were taking advantage of a system and probably should have been ready for some kind of remedy.