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Are you wondering “why Google is bad”?
So did I! Now please choose one of the following:
- This post deals with the reasons why using Google’s Chrome browser is a bad idea. Scroll to read the rest.
- To find out why Google search sucks read the post covering the search engine.
- For general criticism of Google consider reading why I banned Google on my blog.
- You can also look up my list of Google alternatives when you’re convinced that Google is bad for you.
OK. Let’s get started!
Why is Google Chrome potentially hazardous to use? See below!
When Chrome got introduced
Please note that this post went live back when Chrome entered the market. It went viral back then.
I update the article ever since.
In 2008 Firefox dominated. The Google Chrome monopoly (case) was a far cry.
I got a lot of critical comments at once and ever since.
You can’t see those anymore as I disabled comments finally on this blog.
Anyway. All of the things I wrote back then were mere predictions!
During the latest review I changed “will” to present tense though.
Why? The predictions are reality by now – sometimes for years!
Let’s take a step back even further to the early days of the Web to understand the context!
The short history of browser wars
Do you remember the browser wars?
No, I don’t talk about Star Wars, the browser wars.
In the prehistoric era of the Web we had Netscape Navigators which guided us through the World Wide Wait.
Netscape 2, 3 and 4 were the dominant browsers back then.
Then Microsoft made the situation more difficult by gaining market share.
Believe it or not but at a certain point the Internet Explorer was the best browser to use.
Netscape failed to fulfill both Internet users’ and web developers’ needs.
Thus Netscape 6 (there never was a 5) was built from scratch.
Firefox is what came out of it in the end – it was a happy ending – but it was no ending at all!
Now Google goes to war again with a proprietary browser!
Google Chrome is a bad idea for various reasons
OK, long story short let’s talk about the actual drawbacks of using Google Chrome.
Some of them have a direct influence on your
- user experience
- privacy
- or even freedom.
Others refer to more specific use cases or are about ethics and their impact on the Web, market and society in general.
1. Proprietary: Do you think the Microsoft monopoly sucked?
Don’t you think that a Google monopoly does suck as well?
Chrome might be open source. Yet it’s not truly free software.
Google Chrome is not another Firefox, you can bet.
Google is the Microsoft of the Web. It won’t be friendly forever. Just ask the Chinese.
2. Privacy: Google knows almost everything about you:
what you search (Google search)
what messages you read (Gmail)
what people visit a site (Google Analytics)
what sites you visit
- Google Chrome
- lifetime Google cookies
- DoubleClick tracking cookies etc.
but there still are some unknowns, from time to time. With a Google browser you can’t hide anything anymore.
3. Ads: Stripped down versions of Chrome like Brave, Vivaldi, Opera and other browsers come with built in ad blockers.
Third party tools are often even more powerful. I use uBlock Origin on Firefox e.g.
Yet a Google browser is basically a Google Ads feeding machine.
You can’t always block Google ads on Google Chrome as they try limit ad blocking extensions.
4. Web Development: Web developers had a difficult enough job to fix websites for the existing browsers like Firefox, Safari etc.
Do you think a Google browser makes it easier?
Building websites often takes up less time than tweaking them for different browsers.
5. Web Standards: Do you really expect Google and Microsoft to implement the same Web Standards as the open Web?
No way, they attempt to push their own ways of interpreting them.
For example Google search did not support the best image format called AVIF until 2024 because of their competing product WebP.
Chrome did support it since 2020 so why did it take another 4 years for search?
IMHO Google protects its products where possible. On Chrome they couldn’t not support Netflix etc. though.
We end up with web apps or even websites working just on one of them.
6. Firefox: The guy who built Firefox started to work for Google or for both Mozilla (of Firefox) and Google.
Why do you think Firefox market share declined ever since?
Do you really think Google wants to support its own free and non-profit open source competition?
7. Search: No other search engine will be able to succeed in future.
Google is – just like Microsoft before it – bundling the browser with the search engine.
Any new search engine that comes up faces an insurmountable disadvantage.
It can’t gain significant market share without owning a browser.
It took years of court fight to even get different search options on Google devices!
What do you think?
Are you eager to fight in the browser wars?
Do you need more sequels?
Are you joining the dark side?
Do you really think Microsoft is the dark side and Google is not?
No matter how the empire is called.
The emperor wields all the power.
In case you’re with the rebel forces use Firefox instead.
This new initiative raises a lot of questions. We won’t like some of the answers.
Personally I do not trust Google – like any other corporation – to own me and control my browsing habits.
Most of my Google Chrome predictions came true!
When I originally published this I hoped for the best and prepared for the worst! How?
Using Google-free open source software! Firefox is still my choice.
This post went live and viral in 2008 when Google introduced Chrome.
I’ve edited and updated it ever since for better readability and to stay true to current events.
The gist is still the same despite these changes, an added preface and newer examples.
Most of my predictions that started with “will” are written in present tense now.
* Creative Commons image by Pascal.