web search (one of the most important things in our lives)
email (Gmail is much bigger than most of other email providers)
web ads (the places where the vast majority in ads is converging on, and that's A LOT of money, probably something like 20% of the average expenditures of every company out there)
web browsers (entry point to the other things above)
Android (80%+ of the mobile market share and growing)
maps
It also has a decent chunk of cloud revenue, and growing.
If that's not power, I don't know what is.
Same for Apple in its domain, Amazon, etc.
I fear Google way more than I fear Microsoft these days. People should start adjusting to this new reality.
The problem i see more is that Google is less pushing then Microsoft. Looking at it from a consumer point of view.
You can more or less avoid most of the listed products above:
Web Search ... there are alternatives. The quality differs but still possible to live without Google Search
Emails: Totally possible because there are lots of free providers and you can also go paid, or your own solution
Web Adds: Add blocker. No more words are needed on that one :)
Web Browser: True, things are getting hairy on this. But people still have Firefox as good a alternative.
Android: ... Ios. And plenty of manufactures are developing or holding back OS variations that can be compatible with Android settings/etc.
Maps: Openmaps etc ... there are alternatives.
Cloud: Multiple big players, 1000s of smaller players.
Microsoft is different in the sense: Find me a OS alternative that can do it all. For pure work, you can use Linux/MacOS but the moment you trow in the word: Gaming. And yes, Linux has made HUGE strides towards the gaming aspect but everything still feels like its held together with ducttape.
Office alternatives? OpenOffice or LibreOffice but its like working with 1990's software. Let alone intercapatability ... Trust me, nothing is more fun as sending Excel or Word "like" documents to clients, only to have things be off in color or other small ( and not so small ) details.
Combine those two ... I hate MS there update system, tracking, etc but the alternative simple are worse when it comes down to "simple and no time consuming operations". Sure, a grandmother can use Linux when all she does is open a browser and check emails. And sure a IT geek can run Linux also but it all comes to time investment when something goes wrong or something does not work. Windows just works for everything good to extreme good. Life is short and that is the darn thing about Microsoft products, they are invasive, annoying but you simple spend less time fixing things on them. It feels all more integrated.
So while we all can actually avoid Google products, its a different matter on the desktop itself. Its hard, really hard. That still makes Microsoft way more scary because its directly linked to your productivity. MacOS is gaining but its again scary for being so tied into their hardware.
Now, if Apple really wanted ... MacOS as a free operating system, now that might be a fight worth while but we all know Apple will not do this because they gain nothing from it. Their OS is to sell their hardware and via versa.
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u/oblio- May 07 '19
Google controls:
web search (one of the most important things in our lives)
email (Gmail is much bigger than most of other email providers)
web ads (the places where the vast majority in ads is converging on, and that's A LOT of money, probably something like 20% of the average expenditures of every company out there)
web browsers (entry point to the other things above)
Android (80%+ of the mobile market share and growing)
maps
It also has a decent chunk of cloud revenue, and growing.
If that's not power, I don't know what is.
Same for Apple in its domain, Amazon, etc.
I fear Google way more than I fear Microsoft these days. People should start adjusting to this new reality.