This is a b2b product. Its not meant to make the world better.
But maybe a business that’s actually making the world better by making better, healthier stuff uses it, gets more customers, and makes the world better
> From Google's perspective - someone bought a gift card in the US, and redeemed it somewhere else in the US
hmm really? is this coming from a google PR firm or what? if that's the google's "perspective", unfortunately that means google is really technically inept or morally corrupt enough to watch a lot of people, including Americans, go thru the torture and being incinerated.
if Google receives a lot of "I was scammed into this" from whoever bought the giftcard, doesn't google have the responsibility to ask the giftcard user where they got that redeem code from?
At least warn them several times, and then cut those buyers too?
that's the worst justification of a big corp imaginable -- I mean, that alone justifies a congressional hearing, and could mount to a deluge of negative media press:
> if Google receives a lot of "I was scammed into this" from whoever bought the giftcard
Google doesn't sell the cards directly - at least not the ones purchased at the supermarket and used for scamming. There's a scummy industry of middlemen that handles this - that's why every store can sell basically every gift card; they don't have their PoS interact with every single vendor's API, they delegate to a middleman. So Google gets very limited data at purchase time, and is not technically the merchant selling the goods in this case.
> doesn't google have the responsibility to ask the giftcard user where they got that redeem code from
What will that change in practice? They have 2 options: either accept any answer, and nothing changes, or decline some answers, meaning either legitimate usage gets disrupted or the sites laundering the cards will just tell you the "right" answers to say.
> At least warn them several times, and then cut those buyers too?
Most buyers are one-time users; it's a relatively niche market. Mostly teens/etc who don't have their own payment card or are willing to go through the whole hassle for a small discount. As per the above, cutting people off would likely hinder legitimate usage.
Ideally the whole "gift card" industry just goes away as there's no good reason to have it when we already have the ultimate form of "gift card" in the form of money... but until then, even if Google were to step out of the game someone else will step in (the company issuing the cards isn't directly involved, their gift card is just used as a negotiable instrument in lieu of cash during the scam transaction, so any company's will do).
> has skin in the Cambodian scams
Cambodia/etc is pig butchering/fake investment scams. Gift cards and redeeming is exclusively Indians targeting the US market (in the UK they have money mules to launder actual bank transfers, so no need for gift cards).
well, even if they are, if google got scam-report, then isn't google obliged to start some investigation? are you ok with "well that's too bad you're scammed"?
> Gift cards and redeeming is exclusively Indians targeting the US market (in the UK they have money mules to launder actual bank transfers, so no need for gift cards).
well nope it's a thing everywhere -- even in some east-asian country, there's a public advertisement targeting convenient-store workers: "don't give google redeem code even if the person claims to work for the cvs chain"
AND...
> Google doesn't sell the cards directly - at least not the ones purchased at the supermarket and used for scamming.
wow... ok so where does that "redeem card" come from? are you saying stores can generate those redeem codes?
...something doesn't seem right here...?
> Ideally the whole "gift card" industry just goes away as there's no good reason to have it when we already have the ultimate form of "gift card" in the form of money... but until then, even if Google were to step out of the game someone else will step in (the company issuing the cards isn't directly involved, their gift card is just used as a negotiable instrument in lieu of cash during the scam transaction, so any company's will do).
wtf is this... are we talking about some random mom&pop store-issued giftcards?
is Google a mom&pop store? is the "google doing a giftcard biz" so valuable enough to license them turning blind-eye?
> Cambodia/etc is pig butchering/fake investment scams
cambodian operation is massive enough that it INCLUDES google-giftcard scheme.
idk, all this adds up to one thing: google needs to replace whatever PR firm it's using
Yes, they do. Advertising works. "Free with ads" isn't really free because on average you'll end up spending more money than you would otherwise. You're also paying more than if it was a subscription because the producer has to create both the product and also advertise it.
Generally, yes. You have a right to discovery of anything that they plan to introduce at trial against you, or anything that would cast doubt on your guilt (exculpatory evidence).
Most facts, yes. Non-disclosure is the exception, not the rule, thanks to the Sixth Amendment's right to a fair trial. However, when national security is involved, the Classified Information Protection Act (CIPA) may apply, and some evidence may be reserved for in camera hearings.
Also, if the information would not exculpate the defendant, and the prosecution won't introduce it at trial as evidence of guilt, then the information can be withheld.
I'm on the verge of not trusting the US govt when they prosecute things. Epstein details being proclaimed and then hiding them is just the start. If the large and formerly mostly independent and trustworthy federal law enforcement groups can't disclose info there, what should make you feel like they are honest?
Good point, criminal trial process is not obviously corrupted like the pre-trial. Every day recently there's a story about trump trying to get his political enemies prosecuted, and then he fired people who investigated him from his last term.
An indictment is pre-trial. To get a criminal indictment, all you need to show to a grand jury is "probable cause," which is a very low standard--the same standard needed to justify an arrest. That's the reason for the old joke about being able to indict a ham sandwich.
Now that Comey's been indicted, the trial process will begin, assuming he doesn't plea out (and I don't think he will). The uphill battle for the prosecution now begins.
Not to take away from your meta comment but there's something to be said about the mind originating content from a place of wandering versus having content blasted at you from an external source.
There's a place for both. Sometimes I listen to music and dance around while I crank out tasks that require some thought, but not a ton.
And other times for really menial tasks like cleaning I'll zone out cause my mind can truly wander during those moments (cause putting the dishes away is full autopilot, where things like... writing some tests might be a bit more... autopilot, a bit of thought, autopilot, etc). There is an absolute ton of value in letting your brain wander.
And finally, for certain tasks, it's either very quiet classical or none at all cause it's just fully focused thought about larger problem spaces that need to be fleshed out.
And I think, if you listen to the same library or playlists a lot, your brain may start to associate it with working. But I really have no idea what I'm talking about, so who knows!
The same library or playlist is good - I used that trick for time tracking when I was training for the marathon.
Had a eclectic playlist where I would start with some quite chill Mozart because I would always start too fast and needed to pace myself for example then after the 2/2.5 hr mark is when I'd usually start to fade and some prog rock would come on to boost my spirits.
Funnily I have banned listening to classical for most coding but that's a me problem because I end up listening too closely and analysing the music and performance too much. But that's just because I'm a classical nerd
As if disabling the issue tracker and stonewalling pull requests wasn't bad enough, seeing how it is built out of multiple layers that communicate via gRPC was what made me instantly lose all trust in Proton. I don't know who's been doing their hiring but just from one look at that kludge it's evident they've lost the plot altogether.
(There's a third-party alternative called Hydroxide, but it's experimental. Haven't been able to send emails through it from Thunderbird yet, though I've only looked into this for a few hours recently.)
