Back in April, when I habitually opened my Google Reader on my phone, I found a network error. I thought it was due to the instability of the newly downloaded Opera Mini browser until today when I saw the Google Statistics page and realized that Google mobile applications had been completely blocked. Up to this point, apart from email, I almost want to give up on Google. Actually, as a non-heavy internet user, the services I need are not many. However, I have still witnessed the departure of a large number of excellent websites, of course, passively.
I once said that I cherish my own words very much because they are records of life and witnesses of thought. My earliest articles were written using MSN Space, which was slow and inconvenient to access. Later, I learned about Blogger and without hesitation turned to Google's embrace. I imported all the articles from MSN into Google Blogger and cleared the MSN articles, wholeheartedly maintaining my blog. One day, I suddenly found that the secondary domain name of the blog could not be accessed. At first, I didn't know and blamed Google, thinking how such an excellent product could be unstable. Later, I found out that our country had blocked Blogger. Of course, life can continue without Google, so I started using an independent blog, from Zblog to today's WordPress, continuing my blogging.
I also have another need, which is the backup and sharing of photos. I have a lot of photos, and due to privacy issues, I don't want to publish them on the internet. However, I need a cloud-based backup to prevent losing those precious memories if the machine breaks down. Out of love and trust for Google, I used Picasa to sync my photos to the online album, where only I can see them after logging in. Moreover, I can send a complex URL to my friends so they can view specific albums or photos. Suddenly one day, I found that my album was full of red crosses. I began to suspect whether there was a problem with Google's server, but the fact proved again that Google was fine, it was just that the photo album had been blocked.
Of course, there is more. My Twitter cannot log in, YouTube videos cannot open, and even the virtual host I bought domestically was shut down for no reason...
As Google and others have left, I really don't know who to trust anymore. Maybe some people would say I am obsequious to foreigners, but honestly, I really don't have much confidence in domestic Internet service providers. Flickr's photo album service is very good, and $24 per year is not expensive, but I dare not use it, I'm afraid that after paying, one day I will have to go abroad to browse. As for domestic ones like Yupoo, I'm afraid that one day I won't be able to find them, or they might lose my photos, or they might get stolen. As for Twitter-like microblogging sites, I wouldn't dare to use them either. The information I posted on Twitter two years ago can still be found now, but Fanfou? I'm heartbroken to see my precious words forgotten. Even Tencent, such a big company, has shut down Taotao. Thinking about it, is anything certain?
In fact, there is a view that a domestic Internet company is learning from Google, which is Tencent, from email to readers, Tencent has indeed done very effective work. However, I am still not entirely at ease because I think what Tencent needs to learn is not just the product, but more importantly the attitude and responsibility. Of course, responsibility and attitude require strength as backing. Compared with other companies, if Gmail is blocked one day, I should choose Tencent email. There is one thing to understand: even if we trust Tencent and others, there are still many things beyond their control, like the departure of Fanfou. Therefore, up to now, I haven't uploaded my photos to QQ Album. I am still waiting, still looking...
Author Information: Yuan Hong, personal blog (www.yhsem.com), moderator of Tui18 (bbs.tui18.com), one of the founding team members. Recently established a new group for online marketing promotion 5 with number 32514308, welcome to join.
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