[nunez]

I think Google innovates plenty!

You might only use Maps, Gmail, and Search, but you've probably also:

- Used a ton of services hosted in Google Cloud (which Google built outright),

- interacted with data that was filtered through BigQuery or Cloud Spanner (which Google built)

- Edited something in Sheets, Docs, Slides, or Forms (all acquisitions, I think)

- Viewed a photo on Google Photos,

- Used Chrome,

- etc.

And that's before all of the stuff Google has produced that's open-source (Golang, Kubernetes, Flutter/Dart, V8, etc), or their AI stuff (DeepMind, AlphaGo, Brain), or their autonomous driving stuff (Waymo, which is probably a patent factory on its own accord)

Also, let's not discount that Maps has gotten a LOT of innovations over time. Is there another mapping service that can give you historical street view of almost any road in the US within seconds?

I worked there in 2015 and also disliked my experience, but Google definitely definitely moves the needle on stuff.

[juve1996]

I don't think anything in your list is all that impressive or innovative, other companies do most of those things, or do them better. In any case, none of them changed the way I interacted with the world like Search did. If any of them disappeared, I wouldn't really notice.

Google's "innovations" are minor evolutions now. They have some moonshots, sure, if Waymo is succesful, but nothing impacted the world like search did. Historical street view? Really?

[nunez]

Give me some easy to use and not self-hosted alternatives and I'll switch right now.

[seabrookmx]

Also, as the article points out, they're huge contributors to Web standards like Webassembly. HTTP/2, QUIC, and HTTP/3 are also huge.