PDA

View Full Version : Why does Google contribute to the Document Foundation?



ninjaaron
September 2nd, 2011, 10:02 AM
Ok, so I get why Canonical, Novell, and RedHat contribute to the Document Foundation (aka:the LibreOffice community). Without an office-suite competitive with MS office, Linux as a desktop platform becomes trivial. It would destroy the product.

But what's Google's angel? They are they developing their own office suite, which has horrible compatibility with open document formats, I might add. As far as I can see, they don't have any commercial products using LibreOffice.

Am I missing something here, or is it just philanthropy?

user1397
September 2nd, 2011, 10:21 AM
maybe the mere fact that any competition to MS office is good for google, as one of its main competitors is MS? just a guess

t0p
September 2nd, 2011, 11:56 AM
As the OP says, Google "are they developing their own office suite, which has horrible compatibility with open document formats". Maybe that is Google's interest in the scheme - they want to improve their compatibility with open document formats.

aura7
September 2nd, 2011, 12:12 PM
The exact answer from Google representative is as under :

Chris DiBona, Open Source Programs Manager at Google, Inc., has commented: "The creation of The Document Foundation is a great step forward in encouraging further development of open source office suites. Having a level playing field for all contributors is fundamental in creating a broad and active community around an open source software project. Google is proud to be a supporter of The Document Foundation and participate in the project".

Bachstelze
September 2nd, 2011, 01:17 PM
The exact answer from Google representative is as under :

Chris DiBona, Open Source Programs Manager at Google, Inc., has commented: "The creation of The Document Foundation is a great step forward in encouraging further development of open source office suites. Having a level playing field for all contributors is fundamental in creating a broad and active community around an open source software project. Google is proud to be a supporter of The Document Foundation and participate in the project".

Basically, just a PR stunt.

sanderd17
September 2nd, 2011, 01:22 PM
Well, they have google docs.

And google wants to have everything in open formats anyway. The ultimate goal of Google is to gather knowledge over the complete world. This is easier if all information is stored with (real) open formats.

They also supported WebM.

handy
September 2nd, 2011, 09:37 PM
Google is by far the strongest supporter of open-source software on the planet.

Copper Bezel
September 2nd, 2011, 10:00 PM
Basically, just a PR stunt.
Implicit (or very nearly explicit) in that statement is the assertion that it's not a level playing field because of Microsoft's position with office software, and that Google dislikes Microsoft's being in said position. For that reason, it doesn't seem like a disingenuously altruistic statement.

user1397
September 2nd, 2011, 10:04 PM
whats weird is that even though google may be the most prominent supporter of open source software in the world, it is strictly driven by profit as are all companies, so one day that agenda may change :P

Bandit
September 2nd, 2011, 10:30 PM
whats weird is that even though google may be the most prominent supporter of open source software in the world, it is strictly driven by profit as are all companies, so one day that agenda may change :P

Its not weird. Its business. Enemy of your enemy is your friend.

juancarlospaco
September 2nd, 2011, 10:34 PM
Google is by far the strongest supporter of open-source software on the planet.

^ This

sanderd17
September 3rd, 2011, 08:12 AM
Google is by far the strongest supporter of open-source software on the planet.

Because they don't sell software, they sell information. They sell information to google users in exchange for advertising.

Therefore it's not that important if their software is open or closed. Some software they made is open, like Android (although doubtable) but they also have a lot of closed source software, e.g. there is no way that I can set up a server which runs Google Docs.

They use both, open and closed source software, and they choose the model that will bring the most customers to their platform and not to competitors.

The thing I like most about Google is that they are openly against vendor lock-in. They have a liberation program, where you can export data from their services in standard formats. According to their philosophy, this model is responsible for better quality services and creates services that will attract more people in the long-term.

So I support Google. They have a healthy business model while being very open in all sorts of ways.

handy
September 3rd, 2011, 10:28 AM
Because they don't sell software, they sell information. They sell information to google users in exchange for advertising.

:confused:

I've been using the internet since before Google existed, & one way or another I use Google's search engine multiple times a day to acquire information. I've never had to pay Google for anything.

sanderd17
September 3rd, 2011, 10:31 AM
:confused:

I've been using the internet since before Google existed, & one way or another I use Google's search engine multiple times a day to acquire information. I've never had to pay Google for anything.

you pay by looking at advertisements and by clicking on them.

Oxwivi
September 3rd, 2011, 12:43 PM
They use both, open and closed source software, and they choose the model that will bring the most customers to their platform and not to competitors.

Best Google description.

handy
September 3rd, 2011, 02:18 PM
you pay by looking at advertisements and by clicking on them.

I don't pay Google anything.

Apart from the fact that I have the advertisements turned off.

cgroza
September 3rd, 2011, 02:21 PM
you pay by looking at advertisements and by clicking on them.
When you do that, no single cent leaves your pocket.
And advertisements are useful sometimes.

forrestcupp
September 3rd, 2011, 03:05 PM
Basically, just a PR stunt.

Every company that contributes anything to anyone other than themselves is at least partially doing it for a PR stunt.

Oxwivi
September 3rd, 2011, 03:29 PM
Every company that contributes anything to anyone other than themselves is at least partially doing it for a PR stunt.
Unless they're OSS developers like Red Hat and Canonical.

Copper Bezel
September 3rd, 2011, 05:13 PM
In which case PR is not a stunt, but the bread and butter currency of the entire enterprise, because if they don't contribute, no one will. Hell, Canonical is targeted by many for not contributing enough, which hurts their PR in the open source world.

sffvba[e0rt
September 3rd, 2011, 05:18 PM
I don't pay Google anything.

Apart from the fact that I have the advertisements turned off.

Oh, there are enough companies happily paying Google for all the information Google can supply them on your browsing habits etc... Yes, they are watching and learning...


404

Copper Bezel
September 3rd, 2011, 07:10 PM
That's their business, and it always has been. It's why the search engine itself works at all - tracking behaviors to establish what sites are relevant.

forrestcupp
September 4th, 2011, 02:27 AM
Unless they're OSS developers like Red Hat and Canonical.

That's definitely not true. Red Hat and Canonical absolutely invest in PR. Just because they're into FOSS doesn't mean they're not into it for the money, too.

If Canonical didn't care at all about money, they wouldn't sell support and try to make deals with vendors like Dell. Then you have to have PR to get people to use your product.

JDShu
September 4th, 2011, 03:54 AM
That's definitely not true. Red Hat and Canonical absolutely invest in PR. Just because they're into FOSS doesn't mean they're not into it for the money, too.

If Canonical didn't care at all about money, they wouldn't sell support and try to make deals with vendors like Dell. Then you have to have PR to get people to use your product.

I think the main reason why Red Hat contributes is upstream presence. This allows them to know the software inside out for bug fixing,and to influence the direction that the software goes, i.e. harness the power of the community. This is probably true for Google as well.

ScionicSpectre
September 4th, 2011, 08:07 AM
Google has done a ton of good things just because they were the right thing to do, which is one of the company's explicit missions. It may sound hokey and disingenuous for a company to have 'not being evil' as a motto, but it seems to work most of the time.

Sure, they may be a bit behind freedom in the most liberal sense (like AGPL GMail and Google Apps, and releasing source code in a logical timeframe), but for the most part the worst thing Google has done is show you advertisements. They have done far more good than bad, especially if you compare them to their rivals.

Google is kind of like Samsung and HTC- they know that if they support open standards and interoperate with everybody, they'll gain the widest user base. They realize that doing what's right happens to increase their chances, which is nice- having a socially responsible company that tries to act as a single entity with a distinctly good personality.

I'm not saying to throw money at them, just to use common sense.

Oxwivi
September 4th, 2011, 08:34 AM
In which case PR is not a stunt, but the bread and butter currency of the entire enterprise, because if they don't contribute, no one will. Hell, Canonical is targeted by many for not contributing enough, which hurts their PR in the open source world.
Sure, Canonical may slack in contributing in the technical side of things, i.e. codes, but as a user-facing distro, it achieves a lot.

I'm sure you all will find this article quite an interesting read: http://larrythefreesoftwareguy.wordpress.com/2011/08/31/dont-be-an-idiot/



That's definitely not true. Red Hat and Canonical absolutely invest in PR. Just because they're into FOSS doesn't mean they're not into it for the money, too.

If Canonical didn't care at all about money, they wouldn't sell support and try to make deals with vendors like Dell. Then you have to have PR to get people to use your product.
I'm saying they're not contributing for PR, but for the software which they use to make money.

Copper Bezel
September 4th, 2011, 08:41 AM
Sure, Canonical may slack in contributing in the technical side of things, i.e. codes, but as a user-facing distro, it achieves a lot.
No, I'm aware of that. I didn't say that it was a valid criticism, but it is one that's been leveled at Canonical, as that article points out. I.e., upstream contributions do help PR for a distro, so Google isn't alone in making an attempt at it, even if they're paying for the contributions they're bringing to the table rather than directly hiring developers to do the same.

NCLI
September 4th, 2011, 11:37 AM
Basically, just a PR stunt.

Yes, obviously, because soooo many people know that Google is a member of the Open Document Foundation.....

Oxwivi
September 4th, 2011, 12:14 PM
Whatever it is, PR stunt or otherwise, if it benefits us, the users of FLOSS, then it's all cool. Since we're benefiting from their contribution, we're really not in a position to decide if it's for good or evil - probably.

forrestcupp
September 4th, 2011, 12:35 PM
I think the main reason why Red Hat contributes is upstream presence. This allows them to know the software inside out for bug fixing,and to influence the direction that the software goes, i.e. harness the power of the community. This is probably true for Google as well.



I'm saying they're not contributing for PR, but for the software which they use to make money.

I'm not saying that PR is the only reason, or even that it's the main reason for companies to contribute. But every company wants PR any way they can get it, even if it's just a side effect of their main reason for contributing.

I'm also not saying that public relations is a bad thing. In fact, the Linux world could do with a little more of it. PR is only a bad thing when it is done distastefully.


Yes, obviously, because soooo many people know that Google is a member of the Open Document Foundation.....Even if not many people know that Google contributes to ODF, some people do, and every little bit helps. The fact that not a lot of people know that just shows that PR is not their main goal in those contributions.

NCLI
September 4th, 2011, 12:42 PM
even if not many people know that Google contributes to ODF, some people do, and every little bit helps. The fact that not a lot of people know that just shows that PR is not their main goal in those contributions.
Yes, that was my point.

Oxwivi
September 4th, 2011, 12:46 PM
Yes, that was my point.
Sarcasm FTW!

dmoconnell
September 4th, 2011, 04:08 PM
I think its good that a powerhouse of a company like Google is apart of the Doc Foundation. I feel that with Google on board that any legal issues that come up would have a more favorable outcome for D.F. I mean sure D.F may have their own official lawyer, but still, the foundation is "small" company and lets say that if another company (cough *Oracle or Microsoft* cough) had an issue with them, they may get their legal rear ends kicked, but with the support of Google, and by extension their legal team, the D.F would at have an equal chance at getting a favorable outcome in court.

and on a side ,but still related, note. Google makes money from everyone in 2 main ways. Directly and Indirectly. Directly by selling you products (ie Chromebooks, SketchUp pro, GEarth pro, etc) . It also makes money Indirectly, by selling user date (no personal data) which (as stated previously) when you use either their search engine, google online services (gmail, apps, etc) or chrome the browser (and i think its safe to assume when you also use your chromebook) is collected

and thats my conspiracy theory of the day ;)

Dm

sanderd17
September 4th, 2011, 05:31 PM
and thats my conspiracy theory of the day ;)

Dm

It's not a conspiracy theory. Google has a page where you can see your history (but it's not that easy to find). They also offer to delete your history and to unsubscribe from remembering your history.

That's again to be more friendly and get more friendly reviews. And, as I stated before, this way Google encourages itself to make it's services better.

IWantFroyo
September 4th, 2011, 05:42 PM
As the OP says, Google "are they developing their own office suite, which has horrible compatibility with open document formats". Maybe that is Google's interest in the scheme - they want to improve their compatibility with open document formats.
This is likely it.

They could also be thinking of expanding Chrome OS into a full desktop platform, in which case there would probably be some GDocs/LOffice hybrid.
Or maybe they are planning to make an online version of LibreOffice, and use that to replace Google Documents.

Either way, they probably want ideas and code from LibreOffice for their Google Docs project.

forrestcupp
September 4th, 2011, 06:14 PM
Yes, that was my point.

And my point was that even though they may be mainly contributing for other reasons, I'm sure they don't mind if they get some PR out of it.

aysiu
September 4th, 2011, 06:26 PM
Oh, there are enough companies happily paying Google for all the information Google can supply them on your browsing habits etc... Yes, they are watching and learning...


404 Sign up for AdWords and then post back here what Google tells you about my browsing habits:
https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=adwords&hl=en_US&ltmpl=regionalc&passive=false&ifr=false&alwf=true&continue=https://adwords.google.com/um/gaiaauth?apt%3DNone&error=newacct

Oxwivi
September 4th, 2011, 06:57 PM
Sign up for AdWords and then post back here what Google tells you about my browsing habits:
https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=adwords&hl=en_US&ltmpl=regionalc&passive=false&ifr=false&alwf=true&continue=https://adwords.google.com/um/gaiaauth?apt%3DNone&error=newacct
They do sell browsing habits, but not individually. Huge stats of all the internet users as I understand.

aysiu
September 4th, 2011, 07:11 PM
They do sell browsing habits, but not individually. Huge stats of all the internet users as I understand.
I don't care about that. That's aggregate stuff. Hey, I collect "browsing habits" of people who visit my Psychocats website. I don't know any individuals or any personal information about them, but it matters to me how many people are visiting, what pages they look at, how they got there, and how long they stay.

Oxwivi
September 4th, 2011, 07:13 PM
Yeah, so nothing to worry about. They'll attach your tag to your searching history if you tell them to (for more 'personalized searching experience', but they don't sell personal habits, going by what they say they do.

aysiu
September 4th, 2011, 07:45 PM
Yeah, so nothing to worry about. They'll attach your tag to your searching history if you tell them to (for more 'personalized searching experience', but they don't sell personal habits, going by what they say they do.
Or going by that wouldn't do them any good from either a financial or PR standpoint.

They make billions of dollars using aggregate data to target advertisements intelligently. Their business model doesn't involve selling individual personal data. And personal data would involve too much work, anyway.

alexan
September 4th, 2011, 07:55 PM
to start index contenent included in pdf and flash/shockwave Google had to knock at Adobe door. Other proprietary format could give similar problem to google. think about media where proprietary h.264 become standard by fact: make thumbnail or animated preview will come for free or they should pay.
Google is confident in it's way to deliver innovation but no in other's will to prevent innovation with troll patenting.

ninjaaron
September 5th, 2011, 12:06 PM
I totally forgot about this thread.

Nice discussion. I enjoyed reading it... except the post right above mine. It's like sentences made out of random words or something.

alexan
September 5th, 2011, 12:10 PM
Sorry, posted from an Android smart phone.


In short: with all the specs of a document format google search engines (which aren't just about html text now) can easily extract all the data from documents.

ninjaaron
September 5th, 2011, 12:26 PM
ah... that makes sense.

thanks for the clarification.

el_koraco
September 5th, 2011, 12:56 PM
ah... that makes sense.

thanks for the clarification.

Just remembered, I've posted a possible solution on how you can use network manager with scrotwm. It's on the screenshot thread.

forrestcupp
September 5th, 2011, 01:19 PM
I totally forgot about this thread.

Nice discussion. I enjoyed reading it... except the post right above mine. It's like sentences made out of random words or something.

Lol. I got a good belly laugh out of that one.

Someone needs to come up with an Android text translator. :)

Johnb0y
September 5th, 2011, 01:33 PM
Basically, just a PR stunt.

isnt it always with companies like that? :P