Glitch Has Users Fuming, Google 'Frantic'

netbuzz writes "A problem with Google's Personalized Home Page feature has apparently cost a lot of users their carefully crafted doors to the Internet. And Google, which says it is frantically searching for a fix, also acknowledges that it is not sure if it will be able to recover the lost settings. 'The problem is the latest in what seems a regular stream of technical glitches and availability problems affecting Google's online services. In the past six months, Google services like Blogger, Gmail and Google Apps have all experienced significant technical issues that have left users fuming. The problems highlight one of the risks of relying on hosted applications providers, which offer to house software and its data for individuals and organizations. Google is one of the biggest cheerleaders for this software provisioning model, which many see as a viable option to the traditional approach of having users install applications on their own PCs and servers.'"

And In Other News...

Computers break down.

News at 11.

Re:And In Other News...

Well, as mentioned in the summary, "The problems highlight one of the risks of relying on hosted applications providers, which offer to house software and its data for individuals and organizations."

While computers do break down, but my broken Firefox browser doesn't affect yours.

I felt a great disturbance in the GoogleNet, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced. I fear something terrible has happened.

Re:And In Other News...

I think you're missing his point. Remotely hosting content opens people up to risks. He's going for the difference between outlook / thunderbird and gmail, and he makes a reasonable point. If my computer breaks down, I'm the fool who didn't back up. When a hosted solution goes down, everyone loses. It's not rocket science deduction he's doing, but it's still relevant to the overall point that Google goes down, service providers are inherently unreliable to some extent, and, as you said, life goes on. Unless it's me, and THEN I'm pissed.

Re:And In Other News...

Ok, maybe I'm missing what everyone is saying here. I keep seeing things like "remotely hosting content opens people up to risks" as if locally hosted content doesn't. There are risks regardless of whether information is hosted.

If my computer breaks down, I'm the fool who didn't back up. When a hosted solution goes down, everyone loses. ...and you're still the fool for not backing it up. If you keep your information in one place, you risk losing it if something happens to that place. I see now, mainly because you pointed it out not because I can understand what the hell that line meant, that his point was that many people can be affected by a crash when information is hosted remotely. However, the article wasn't about the affect it has on the masses but instead seemed to be about the affects it had on individuals. I think that is going down a different road, but either way the initial point is still valid in that it isn't news. I don't think anyone has trouble understanding that if a million people have their information hosted on a website and that website loses the information, then a million people's (peoples'?) information has just been lost.

Re:And In Other News...

.....that Google goes down......

Go back 30 years and substitute "the mainframe goes down". That's how it was before the "personal computer" was invented. Now we'll come full circle. The same system, one central computer and many users, and with it one central point of failure.

With a personal computer each user has more control over their information, but also more responsibility. There is a lot more "stuff" between my data stored by Google and my keyboard/monitor than the data store on the HD on my computer. A local HD or better still a good RAID storage system is still WAY more reliable than all the technology that needs to work correctly for the Google approach.

When there is a power outage here, we have UPS/Generator backup. However that is useless for the Internet, since the data multiplexer box about a quarter mile from here doesn't have any sort of backup. It just quits. The old POTS and dial up still work, but that will not sustain any serious work on any remote server. As far as the Internet goes, we're just held incommunicado until the power comes back.

Until the Internet becomes at LEAST as reliable as the good old fashioned phone, Internet applications will have no appeal to anyone who values reliability and accessibility to their data.

Re:And In Other News...

It's not like Google just lost everyone's email messages from the last 6 months.

While I agree with your overall perspective and find the Google Personalized Home's data to be of little critical value (btw - it's not the modules and gadgets developers have been building, it's just.. personalized homepages. the selection and order of widgets across a page...) - you contradict yourself in the above example.

"Shit happens", that's true. You should always be prepared. You should always backup.
But... if Google lost everyone's email messages from the last 6 months would it be fair of Google to say "well you should've backed it all up"? After all, what is Gmail if not a purely-online, searchable e-mail archive?
You can't expect users to be prepared for their archive to be destroyed, right? If Google wants me to manage my e-mail online, they can't expect me to download it all too, just in case.

The "stream of technical glitches" described in the article, albeit overstressed, is pointing at something that should worry us: If the software market is going towards online services, where data is centralized and 1 server down means 1,000 users down - what strategic steps do we take in order to protect our users and our data?

beta.Google?

I thought all of Google was still in Beta?

Re:beta.Google?

Yes, exactly. That is NOT funny but insightful. Almost all of these services are in beta. What the hell are you doing using Gmail for your corporate services?

Re:beta.Google?

Yes, exactly. That is NOT funny but insightful. Almost all of these services are in beta. What the hell are you doing using Gmail for your corporate services?

What is *google* doing pushing their beta services to corporate clients? Right now, the whole "beta forever" thing just has become a very lame disclaimer for every time something screws up.

Re:And In Other News...

Logically speaking, if your network services go down, your Google services go down, as you can no longer access them. This is one of the main reasons against ASPs, as they are only as reliable as the network structure you use to access them and any faults at the ASP end are just additional problems.

The funny thing is, just recently the googlites were hyping about how good you have to be to code for Google, number of applicants versus number of positions available. Perhaps it relates more to how like minded you have to be, to 'fit' the Google monoculture, willing to work more for less but your 'special'.

Gaagle - a flock of googlites baa-ing at the alter of Google where privacy is sacrificed daily for profits ;). Google definition of trolls, customers who complain about free beta services. It ain't free to the customer once the customers has invested their time and effort and read the endless adds, and end users don't treat their data entry as beta work so neither should google programmers.

Re:And In Other News...

What's important in this case is your frame of reference.

Mine is a Belgian waffle. With fresh strawberries and clotted cream. Mmmm.

So many jokes...

Searching? Have they tried Google?

It's still in beta!

Personal Home Page? I knew they should've have used PHP.

That's the trade-off...

... for not having to manage, install or roll-out this software. It saves time when setting up, but that time is possible then transferred to when the thing breaks. Not that in-house software breaks, but I guess at least then it's up to you to fix it, as opposed to some guys in a fancy building half-way around the world.

Re:That's the trade-off...

This exactly the reason I don't believe all these reports that Google's (Or other) online apps will take over from local software. Sure online word processing can be handy, but if the network breaks, or their servers do you've got no comeback. If Gmail broke tomorrow and everyone lost all their e-mails (and logins to websites etc) there would be mass problems and loads of people would be really annoyed. But there wouldn't be much we could do about it, I'm sure in the eula we're not allowed to sue for lost data etc because that would be crazy if everyone did. At least if its local you have someone to blame/punch....
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Contronyms: for people who sanction opposites
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Re:That's the trade-off...

This exactly the reason I don't believe all these reports that Google's (Or other) online apps will take over from local software. Sure online word processing can be handy, but if the network breaks, or their servers do you've got no comeback.

And this is just lost data, which is easily fixed in any useful system via a sensible back-up policy.

Wait until the first time a big web-based app doesn't mass-erase data, it mass-leaks it. As businesses stupid enough to trust their confidential documents to external systems watch their competitors get all their trade secrets for free, and consumers stupid enough to trust on-line systems to hold their credit card details securely for extended periods (I'm looking at you, Amazon) watch all their cards get defrauded, then people will realise that most web apps run by third party services simply don't offer any real advantage for anyone except lazy administrators.

Re:That's the trade-off...

Yeah, and bringing 4oz of shampoo on an airplane is a threat to aviation security. And not having my own power generator could result in a lot of spoiled food in the fridge. And using city water could be deadly if it's not filtered properly. And not fixing my own car could cause an accident. Shall I go on? Ok. And not growing my own food means that I have to trust McDonald's not to kill me. And taking Tylenol could kill me (it's happened before you know). And ....etc etc etc.

It's risk. When that happens (not if), somebody will get sued, the problems will get fixed, and we'll move on. The economics of the hosted model are too compelling to cause it to go away.

So explain again...

why storing all your data on some company's servers is a good idea?

Because...

Maybe because over the course of a few months or years, Google's uptime is a lot higher than my company's servers?

Re:Because...

Maybe your company should invest in some decent infrastructure. Trust me, it isn't as expensive as you'd expect.

I worked IT at a rather large firm several years back. During one of my interviews they bragged about their uptime. They had production mail servers that'd been up for 3 years. I thought they were full of shit. That was, until they hired me and I actually got to see these systems.

Their entire email infrastructure was run off of four PCs. Two were in one city, and two were in a branch office in another major city on the other side of the country. The two I worked with ran BSD/OS, and had in fact been up for 3 years when I started. Of the other two at the other office, one ran FreeBSD, and the other ran NetBSD. When I left there, the BSD/OS server had been up for about 4.5 years, the FreeBSD server for just over 3 years, and the NetBSD server for just under 3 years. They kept their systems powered during outages using the typical battery backups you find at a Circuit City.

They'd probably set up those systems for no more than $10,000, including hardware, BSD/OS, the battery backups, and the installation. When you consider the millions upon millions of dollars those systems helped bring in, it's really amazing that they could do so much with what was essentially so very little.

There is no reason why your company can't have servers with uptimes approaching five years, if it's that important to you. And it can probably be done for a very minimal initial cost, and even then with minimal upkeep.

Re:So explain again...

No, I'm guessing they don't do any backups in the sense you're talking about, like with tapes. Something tells me they just have too much data spread over a huge number of disparate fiefdoms (YouTube, Gmail, Groups, Blogger, PicasaWeb, to name a few) to make it feasible. Probably everything is mirrored across two or more geographically distinct locations and that's it. As with any mirroring solution (RAID1), this protects you against hardware failure but not accidental deletion.

Re:So explain again...

So explain again... why storing all your data on some company's servers is a good idea?

Because managing an email server is not my core concern.

Say that you business is selling fruitcakes. You make awesome fruitcakes. That's your core. Everything else that you do is not fruitcakes.

Do you grow the fruit yourself? Nope. You order them from some fruit company.

Do you make the box that the cake goes in? Nope. You order boxes from a box making company.

Do you make the machines that run in your plant? Nope. They come from an automation company.

Do you generate the electricity to run your plant? Nope. The electric company does that.

Do you sell the cakes directly to consumers? Nope. Retail grocery chains deal with the consumers.

Do you sell them directly to retailers? Nope. You have a distributor who deals with them.

Do you transport the cakes yourself? Nope. You contract to a logistics (trucking) company.

Do you even clean your own toilets? Nope. There's a cleaning service.

Why should you manage your own email servers? Contract that to a company who's core business is IT infrastructure. They are going to be better at it than you.

The problem is, Google isn't that good at it. Their core business is search. Everything else is just someone's cool project idea, and not a real product with real resources and real support. It's all just "hey, look at this cool thing with a cool UI" and that's then end of it.

Re:So explain again...

Do you sell the cakes directly to consumers? Nope. Retail grocery chains deal with the consumers.

What... would you say... ya do here?

Re:So explain again...

If I sell fruit cakes and my suppliers can't supply fruit, it quickly becomes my problem. Often with fruit suppliers, you can go to someone else to supply the fruit which is a commodity - ie you can replace it with the equivalent without missing a beat. Likewise with every other example you put up. There are other companies that will supply people to clean your toilets or transport your good. Your data on the other hand is not a commodity.

You often can't go to a different supplier because computer services tend towards monopolies. Find me a decent alternative to Google for searching. Find me another free/ad based web usenet provider that only requires port 80. For that reason keeping your email store with a 3rd party that's more than a little stupid. An alternative company can't sell you a new copy. Trusting a company in that way is crazy. It's not quite as high a level of trust as you're forced to place in your doctor or taxi driver, because there your life is at stake. However that's why these industries are heavily regulated. The internet...well good luck settling that issue in court and if your data just happens to be destroyed in the meantime, whooopsie it slipped.

Re:So explain again...

So explain again why storing all your data on some company's servers is a good idea?

Because using a company like Google who has an unlimited data retention policy there is no chance your data will be lost.

Oh wait...

Hmm

So 3 different apps have 1 hiccup each over the course of 6 months. If only my desktop applications were so reliable. I can't even count how many paragraphs in Word I've lost due to crashes, or how many settings I've lost in Gnome from random bugs. I don't see what the fuss is, it's still a matter of "shit happens" only Google seems to be rather responsive about it all.

Re:Hmm

At least my desktop applications have backups.
I don't have to rely on 'frantic google engineers scrambling to find a fix'. I know absolutely that my data can be recovered.

I backup my data based on how valuable it is to me.

How valuable is your data to google? I know they try, and they even do a pretty dammed good job, but at the end of the day, you aren't even really their customer -- you are their product.

Like a farmer raising chickens; they want them strong, well fed, happy, healthy, content, disease free, and they take steps to ensure they stay that way. But at the end of the day, they aren't really in it for the chicken's welfare.

Re:Hmm

Every google app has the option of downloading a local backup, whether its pop mail via gmail or downloading your docs and spread sheets from google docs. You are responsible for your own data, period. If it's that critical for you, don't put it online. It's a free service, period. If you paid for it I'd see that argument as relevent, however, you don't.

Re:Hmm

"Every google app has the option of downloading a local backup". Not the personalized pages.

Re:Hmm

Wait right click save html is broken?

Seems to me that should be enough to recreate it, obviously you don't have the backend but it sounds like they were mostly produced by the service and can be recreated by the service.

This may be a generalization but people doing cool stuff with css2 and mySql probably aren't using Google's free service for hosting.

Re:Hmm

When something goes wrong on your desktop you have control. You can work around it. You decide when to upgrade the hardware and software. I haven't lost much in Office for a long time because I know it's quirks and work around it.

By contrast when Google groups suddenly started eating all my usenet posts the other day while falsely showing they were being posted, then stopped showing new Usenet messages, I was borked. There was nothing I could do. It's still borked by the way and I'm totally at their mercy.

Now when you say Google are responsive about it all, what do you mean? I can't get a reply for one from one of their staff for a problem I experience. If the problem isn't being had by a large number of people I can guarantee I'll be ignored.

I don't understand how someone can say with a straight face that it's no different with remote apps. Even more puzzling is how it gets modded insightful.

Step away from the web

Many who use Google's Personalized Home Page feature - yours truly included - are trembling in fear today over the prospect of losing all of their carefully crafted settings to a bug that has Google engineers "frantic" to find a fix.

You might want to think about getting out a bit more if loosing a few settings has you 'trembling in fear'.

Re:Step away from the web

the risks of relying on hosted applications providers

And of course, a desktop application would NEVER have a bug that caused you to lose information or settings.

Re:Step away from the web

losing. How frigging hard is it to type LOSING instead of LOOSING?

I don't know, you managed to misspell "fucking." How hard was that for you?

hmmmmm

"Google, which says it is frantically searching for a fix, also acknowledges that it is not sure if it will be able to recover the lost settings."

That's what they said when gmail mail was disappearing. All of the mail (IIRC) was recovered.

This is just basic CYA. If they promise that the data will come back, then they're legally obligated to restore it.

Most companies just would have not issued any kind of statement until they already knew what the problem was.

This announcement is a GOOD THING(tm).

Re:hmmmmm

This is just basic CYA. If they promise that the data will come back, then they're legally obligated to restore it.

Under what law? IANAL, but I believe making a hopeful statement in a press release is rather different than signing a legal contract. I think it would be poor public relations to overpromise and underdeliver, but illegal? That sounds crazy.

Re:hmmmmm

If you promise that something will happen, without knowing for sure that it will happen, that's fraud

That is not the definition of fraud AT ALL. If it were, churches all across the nation would get nailed on fraud charges every Sunday.

Terminator...

wasn't the first sign of skynet a loss of performance and outages in large distributed computing networks?

Eggs and baskets...

as in, don't put all of your eggs in the same basket.

And don't count your chickens before they hatch.

Google has never made any binding promises about the availability of many of its services or the data that users entrust to them. If Google loses all your email, tough noogies. They are not accountable. Stop pretending that they are.

huge problem for me

Forget losing my data, I'm using the "Seasonal" theme on my Google homepage and it's still showing snow-covered hills and a snowman. It knows from my zip code that I do not live in Siberia or even Buffalo. How is this seasonal!? I think Google should drop everything else and get on this one pronto.

Re:huge problem for me

Forget losing my data, I'm using the "Seasonal" theme on my Google homepage and it's still showing snow-covered hills and a snowman. It knows from my zip code that I do not live in Siberia or even Buffalo. How is this seasonal!? I think Google should drop everything else and get on this one pronto.

The above comment is proof positive that MBA's post at Slashdot.

If only losing your google frontpage

not even your email it getting your blood pressure up, you need to get some professional help.

Refund

Jeez, what a screwup! You'd think that Google would offer to refund affected users their license and subscription fees for the service! I mean if I paid good money for something like that and they messed it up, I'd be hopping mad. I'd take my business to all those other sites that offer all those cool Ajax apps along with the biggest search engine in the world. Not like I was getting something for free or anything!

Oh wait a minute...

Re:Refund

I gotta admit, this is a tricky call.

Suppose you have a couch on your lawn. You figure you'll hire somebody to come move it to the dump, but your neighbor says, "Heck, I got a couple of strong boys. I'll move it for free tonight." Next morning, the couch is still there. A few days later, you mention it to the neighbor. "Sure, I'll get the boys to do it tonight. No problem!" Next day, it's still there. It rained that night and the couch is now soaked through. You can't mow the lawn because there's this couch in the way. The in-laws are coming over tomorrow and you'd rather not have this big ol' couch sitting right smack dab in the middle of the lawn. But the neighbor says, "Hey, don't worry. My boys'll be over to take it away."

Sure, it's not costing you anything. But how annoying is it? And considering this problem, would you really trust your neighbor to, say, feed your dog while you were away on vacation?

So some of this is perception. Google says, "trust us with your data." And when something goes wrong, they'll try to get it back? They have to show me that they can get it back before I'll trust them with my important data.

Fuming?

Just how much do people have invested here? I haven't experienced the glitch yet, but if I did it would take me all of five minutes to set up my settings the way I want them again. It really doesn't strike me as being as big a deal as everyone says it is. I mean, all of the services Google offers are absolutely free. Does anyone really have any right to complain about something they're getting for free? Well, of course they have the right, let me rephrase that: people shouldn't complain about stuff that they get for free. :P

"Big Cheerleaders"

I had enough of that in high school, thanks. Egh.

server based approach is inherently flawed

What many of us don't realize is the fact that depending on a large service provider such as Google for applictions provision may actually leave us quite vulnerable. What we are doing is putting all our eggs in one basket. If Google goes down, your business processes crash with it. eBay lost a lot in revenues when its servers crashed a few years ago. If there were a peer-to-peer e-commerce model, people would feel more secure and less dependent on others for commerce. Imagine storing all your information on your own hard-drive, and selling products to others WITHOUT paying ebay fees! Ultimate empowerment implies physical independence. Until that happens, we are all vulnerable.

Re:server based approach is inherently flawed

If there were a peer-to-peer e-commerce model, people would feel more secure and less dependent on others for commerce.

That's just about the scariest thing I've heard in a long time! When I'm shopping on eBay, at least I have some protections against fraud. Dealing with any random give-me-your-card-number joe on the internet is not my idea of "secure".

Individual vs. Group Perspective

From my perspective as an individual Google services are more reliable than any of my desktop apps. I think I've had about 2 times where I couldn't log in and check my email. I waited five minutes and was able to check it without any issues. From all I've read I haven't heard of outages much more than a few minutes so far. Lost data sometimes happens when working online, but that happens with desktop apps as well. I don't really see a drawback on an individual perspective. It's on a group perspective that internet apps like Google's services are really noticed. If the service goes down it isn't just affecting you, it's affecting everyone that uses it. Besides that though there really isn't a downside to using this free service beyone that. It's a wierd dualistic view that wouldn't always work from a business perspective, but for personal home use Google offers unsurpassed features per dollar.

Oh dear me no.

So people are "fuming" that their personalized news page and other crap, which is free, and mostly in beta, had a minor glitch and now they'll have to spend two minutes setting up their precious, precious settings again. My, what a catastrophe.

Re:Oh dear me no.

Catastrophe doesn't begin to describe it. I had only just set up my personalised home page and Gmail account and this disaster happens with no explanation.

Please would someone contact me at ';delete * from personalisedsettings;'@gmail.com if they have any news.

So ask for your money back.

Oh, right.

Isn't this what PCs were supposed to save us from?

Back in the day, when users were confined to terminals with access to the mainframe at the whim of the sysop, PCs with their own software were supposed to set us free from those shackles. Free to develop their own creativity. Free from timesharing computer resources. Free from someone else having access to every file, every preference, every .conf. They threw a big hammer through Big Brother's face during the Super Bowl and everything.

So what's the attraction to going backwards to putting Big Brother in charge again? Having your data on someone else's server, with its security only as good as the least honest person with access to the server? Having no choice over the software you use every day and being dependent on the choices, preference s and whims of the person running the server ("What? You preferred Emacs? Sorry, now you're using vi.")? Having to look at ads all day long so that you don't have to pay for software?

All these things that are supposed to be so much hipper like IMAP and googlapps just give your control over your data to someone else blindly on faith that they are trustworthy. What a crock!

Re:Apologists, start your engines

"but it's beta...."

And it's a free service too, isn't it?