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Google Acquiring Tony Fadell-Founded Nest for $3.2 Billion

rictus007 said:
To be honest no matter what they said, I'm still worried about privacy.....
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Look at it this way, if they collect anything more than telemetry data for inane stuff like "average household temperatures during the November-February cold periods", you could probably sue the hell out of them.

It's a thermostat. Any data collected with be thermostat related. I doubt very seriously they'll be recording when you're home or not, or putting little spy cameras into them to see what you do when you think you're alone.

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Rogifan said:
When has Apple ever acquired hardware companies that already had an end product being sold to consumers? What exactly does Nest have that Apple needs? Is their IP (or engineers) worth $3B?
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Off the top of my head? Fingerworks. I'm sure there's a couple more.
 
Makes sense.....

if Google dont want to enter soon in the wearable hardware field. I think Apple can get too a presence in the Nest environment/market sector.

Automation and control, in highly industrialized societies becomes more and more ubiquitous. And more and more significant.....In my conspirancy-theoricist mind glooms a question: Had Google outbidded Apple in this particular transaction...?......:eek:....:confused:


:):apple:
 
Renzatic said:
Look at it this way, if they collect anything more than telemetry data for inane stuff like "average household temperatures during the November-February cold periods", you could probably sue the hell out of them.

It's a thermostat. Any data collected with be thermostat related. I doubt very seriously they'll be recording when you're home or not, or putting little spy cameras into them to see what you do when you think you're alone.
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Wait till they see what I do in front of the camera.
 
SwiftLives said:
I disagree. One of Apple's greatest strengths is their ability to focus. And thermostats - or any home appliance - doesn't really fit with Apple's business strategy. (Admittedly, it would have been nice...)

But with Google buying Nest - does this mean Google will know when we're at home? Or will they / could they use that data for marketing purposes? I hope we get some clear answers to those questions.
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Apple is about an ever-expanding ecosystem that will involve automobiles (alliances, contacts and interfaces already known) and will certainly involve our homes.

This may feel like a poke in the eye for Apple, but Google wants an ecosystem as they may get ad revenue from free services, but they have seen limits on revenues from Android. They need to expand their ecosystem.

Nest is also suspected with good reason, to have a lot more valuable technology in the works for a home ecosystem. It could be huge.

I own AAPL and am rooting for Apple and yes, Google kinda annoys me with it's "me-too" flattery by imitation. But that's the course of the industrial age and knowledge revolution. Even if patents were encroached, eventually workarounds are developed and eventually patents run out.

It just seems like Apple should have enjoyed the fruits of their labor and innovation a little longer for we who took a risk on Apple products and AAPL.
But that's self-interest wishful thinking. (and yes, court decisions have and will continue to draw some line$)
 
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SirLance99 said:
Could not and will not ever happen. Apple doesn't have enough money to buy Google.
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Not that I believe it actually could or should happen, but I have been told by people that know better than I do that, absent SEC and other regulatory roadblocks, a leveraged hostile takeover was possible until about a year ago. Currently, Apple along with associated/interested investors could still probably manage to take a substantial share. And that would take us right back to Microsoft of the 80s and 90s.
 
Knighthammer said:
Glad to see rampent fanboyism is just as bad in the Mac community as it is in Google land. :rolleyes:
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Why is being skeeved out by a company whose product is the end-user and customers are advertisers and creeps me out every time I see an adsense banner for something on a site I just visited that I know they harvested data on through either other adsense banners or Analytics buying a company that sells sensors for your home "rampant fanboyism"?

Not saying some people here might not bash Google out of blind allegiance, but even if I weren't an Apple device user I would have given up on Google some time between when they started shoving Google+ down people's throats, when they re-wrote their TOS to basically let them datamine the entire internet via Adsense/Analytics, and when they decided to start flaunting their own rather pretentious "don't be evil" motto when it suited their bottom line. Basically, they already creeped me the heck out, and this does not in any way help.

Want to try something fun? Load up a fresh browser in which you are not logged into any Google services. Go to a site with an AdSense unit on it. Reload a couple of times and see what ads you're getting. Now type in the URL of a site selling, say, luggage into another window. Or click a link in DuckDuckGo, which uses Bing and is anonymized. I did this with Luggage Pros (not posting the URL so I'm not advertising, but you can guess what their URL is). Don't do a Google search for it, don't do ANY search for it, just type in the URL. Click a couple links on the site. Now go reload the other site with the AdSense unit on it a couple of times. Ooh, look at that, suddenly ads for Luggage Pros (and at least one for an executive briefcase maker) are in the rotation.

This is why Do Not Track is off in Chrome by default. Come to think of it, I wouldn't be surprised if that was why Google was first to push the unibar design, so they could get people to just type things into the URL bar instead of using URLs so they'd be sure to get the search as it autocompleted even if they didn't have any tracking on the direct URL landing page.
 
Stella said:
There's probably a lot more reasons for Google buying this than meets the eye.
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No reasons meet the eye, so all of them must be unstated. There is nothing about Nest's vision that aligns with Google's. Nest is a home appliance company, and Google is an advertising company. The overlap is clearly in the sensor-- Google wants eyes inside the home, and Nest has the advantage of being a fixed installation.
 
Danthetechman said:
"welcome into the Google family" *shudder*
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villageofthedamned1.jpg
 
Renzatic said:
Off the top of my head? Fingerworks. I'm sure there's a couple more.
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The point is it's incredibly rare. Even rarer would be Apple buying a company and keeping it autonomous. But maybe Apple is already working on products in this space and we'll see a Nest competitor this fall.
 
musser said:
Well, that's ends MY interest in ever buying any of these. If Google's involved, I'm gone. They're trying their best to own us all. Well, not me!
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This is why gen 1 and 2 will probably hold their value and probably sell more used than the android version, as long as it's not updated.
 
Nest has a LOT of ex-Apple employees (a few of my mates work there).

IMO Goolge wanted it in order to score a bunch of high performing ex-Apple employees (not a smoke alarm).
 
I'm sure Google already knows when you're home or not, just basing it on inactivity from your computer at home. If you're using a smartphone, well Google knows exactly where you are at all times.

That said, I was pondering to buy the Nest since my thermostat started acting up. Since I don't like to volunteer any more of my data than I already do to Google, I guess I'll just buy another Honeywell now and save me $200 in the process.

Oh man I can't stand Google. I browsed for a camera on B&H now every site I visit I'm getting spammed with camera ads :mad:
 
Rogifan said:
The point is it's incredibly rare. Even rarer would be Apple buying a company and keeping it autonomous. But maybe Apple is already working on products in this space and we'll see a Nest competitor this fall.
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Yeah, it's rare for Apple to pick up a company once they've gone public with a product, but it does happens. There's nothing particularly weird about it.

Though I doubt Apple would be releasing a competing product. Even now, in these post Steve Jobs days, they still tend to stick to their core competency.
 
Go figure

"Will Nest customer data be shared with Google?

Our privacy policy clearly limits the use of customer information to providing and improving Nest’s products and services. We’ve always taken privacy seriously and this will not change."

The answer is YES.
 
Renzatic said:
Yeah, it's rare for Apple to pick up a company once they've gone public with a product, but it does happens. There's nothing particularly weird about it.

Though I doubt Apple would be releasing a competing product. Even now, in these post Steve Jobs days, they still tend to stick to their core competency.
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Is wearables their core competency? I think its clear they're working on new stuff. How do we know home automation isn't included in that? I'm not saying it is, just that it could be.
 
Rogifan said:
Is wearables their core competency? I think its clear they're working on new stuff. How do we know home automation isn't included in that? I'm not saying it is, just that it could be.
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I think of it like this: Apple works on platforms, things that can be a launching point for more specific tasks. A wearable could be considered an extension of their platform, but home automation would be more of a specific. Hundreds of bits of hardware tied together through a common API, and delivered to you via an app on your iDevice. To me, that doesn't seem like something Apple would do. It's probably something better handled by a 3rd party.
 
I swear any post on this site that mentions Google makes me want to bash my head in. There are so, so many idiots on here that have a blind hatred towards Google. Google buying Nest will not change the company for the worst; it will only make it better, much like Google buying Motorola and Waze. Having a heavy weight backer behind them means they can step out and try things that they wouldn't have been able to do otherwise.

My big hope is somehow this drops the prices a bit. I love my Nest to death and would love to add a couple Protects, but at $120+/each that isn't an option.
 
kuwxman said:
I swear any post on this site that mentions Google makes me want to bash my head in. There are so, so many idiots on here that have a blind hatred towards Google. Google buying Nest will not change the company for the worst; it will only make it better, much like their Motorola and Waze acquisitions. Having a heavy weight backer behind them means they can step out and try things that they wouldn't have been able to do otherwise.

My big hope is somehow this drops the prices a bit. I love my Nest to death and would love to add a couple Protects, but at $120+/each that isn't an option.
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You should know by now that logic and reason don't go over too well here at times. :D:D
 
Renzatic said:
I think of it like this: Apple works on platforms, things that can be a launching point for more specific tasks. A wearable could be considered an extension of their platform, but home automation would be more of a specific. Hundreds of bits of hardware tied together through a common API, and delivered to you via an app on your iDevice. To me, that doesn't seem like something Apple would do. It's probably something better handled by a 3rd party.
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Could be. I guess time will tell. But if re/code is correct and Apple had no interest in Nest then they must not see any IP or engineers worth acquiring. Or as that cnet article said, Nest is more about design than groundbreaking technology so not something Apple needs.
 
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