"For applications on Google Play that integrate this tool, usage is tracked."
It's easy to remove, and they only track which apps use it to gauge how popular it is. Hardly evil.
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/getglimpse-dev/KA95n...
A big part of the decision is opt-out vs. opt-in, and how it would even be possible to make opt-in return meaningful results in a library. Also, one of the main problems was managing the expectations of the users of the library, many of whom would only install it through a packaging system which provides little means of documenting that tracking is included and enabled by default.
Here is the initial thread sharing a user's surprise:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/getglimpse-dev/7WgpX...
"each end user consents to the collection, storage, and use by QCE and its affiliates and service providers of Statistics from the Software and the transfer of Statistics between QCE and its affiliates and service providers (which may be in the United States or in other countries), in each case for the purposes of (a) facilitating the provision of new products, updates, enhancements and other services, (b) improving the Software, and other products, services and technologies, and (c) providing new products, services or technologies to You and customers of QCE and its affiliates;"
To be fair, they're giving away a great SDK for free that they've put a lot of effort into, so they can demand what they like from the license. Google can too - you don't have to use the free stuff they're giving away.
Now I really hope they don't acquire Github. No website I know of has improved in such a consistently good way. Pure UI improvements, awesome new features and no feeling of feature creep on the user side (I don't feel overwhelmed by Github's features at all, I just want to try them all!).
Google does a decent job on their apps but I honestly think Github is a much higher quality shop: do one thing and do it extremely well.
With all that said, how much Google uses Github has little to do with acquisitions. They also use Twitter and you won't see them acquiring that.
Awesome phrase that I shall steal for myself. Like, "the team wanted to use Git but management had their head stuck all the way up SVN's trunk."
You're saying this because you haven't heard about or used atom.io ;)
Google tries with Google Code now, but GitHub has probably much more traction. So, you may be right. I'm just not sure if they would do it, because the monetization is different. Or will we see AdSense inside GitHub pages for open repositories ;)
Probably does not make sense to them, most GitHub users are programmers who surf the web with ads disabled.
If someone decides to attempt something but there's already a similar project, why do so many think they should abandon their own to contribute to the other?
They can always contribute down the road.
If everyone collaborated on a few such projects, we'd have a few really great Eiffel towers scattered around.
If everyone started their own, we'd have a million piles of metal all over, and very few towers.
Edit: here's a video showing the technique: http://vimeo.com/4391370
For applications on Google Play that integrate this tool,
usage is tracked. This tracking is done automatically using
the embedded version string (b2_liquidFunVersionString),
and helps us continue to optimize it.
- OE-CAKE[1]
- Phun/Algodoo[2]
Which may give some examples of what could be done with this.
[1]http://www.teq.com/blog/2010/03/oe-cake-physics-simulator/