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Google announces support for Ukraine by giving $2M in Adwords credit

89 points by forcer ↗ HN
Ask your friends at Google to explain this joke donation of Adwords credit: https://www.androidcentral.com/google-response-ukraine-invasion

Ukraine needs real support not using this crisis to push your product!

If you want to make a statement switch off Google services in Russia. That is how revolutions are started!

Google makes less than %0.3 of their total revenue in Russia. Surely that is worth a sacrifice to end this unfair war and tell Russia they cannot invade their neighbors!

25 comments

[ 4.1 ms ] story [ 61.4 ms ] thread
CPLX
It’s the least they could do.
techdragon
The least they could do was nothing… this is just a little better than that. This isn’t 2 million of useful cash money, it’s -2 million of revenue. It sort of feels “cheap” to me.

And I’m wondering how senior the management chain has to be to approve something this large? Are we talking C suite? Or like Vice President of AdWords European business marketing division ?

burntoutfire
Any decision with political ramifications surely needs to go through the highest echelons.
morelisp
"Good" news, this is unlikely to have any political ramifications.
klyrs
More cynically, it's a $2M thumb on the scale of an auction, and if somebody wants to outbid the relevant keywords, that's pure profit.
PenguinCoder
Is this a legitimate, poorly executed joke? Or a legitimate offer from Google. Fucking disgusting.
thiscatis
What a sad excuse of a company Google has become.
yrgulation
Pull out of russia google otherwise its just virtue signalling.
morelisp
So let's be clear about what "donated adwords" means: It means if someone searches for "ukraine refugee help" they're going to get useful results about how to find help as a Ukrainian refugee or give aid to them; rather than a scam, Russian propaganda, or just whoever bid highest.

That should be table stakes of a search engine, not a laudable charitable donation.

stonekyx
Ten years ago I was trying to get a job in Google as hard as I could, but these years there are just less and less reasons to even consider applying. I mean, OK, their business model is built around advertisement, but seriously?
inospeak1
I don't see any reference to this on the internet other than this post. The link posted -> https://www.androidcentral.com/google-response-ukraine-invas...

says nothing about Adwords credit.

And I am surprised none of the commenters so far have noticed this...?

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Pigalowda
A pittance from a gigantic American corporation. I’m sure Ukraine appreciates this advertisement for Google. I guess it’s hard to advertise over all the “noise” of geopolitical events unless you attach your product to it.
aeternum
Remember when Google's motto was "Do no evil". Did they get rid of that?
IYasha
It was "Don't be evil" - and, yes, they've removed it :D
SkyLinx
$2M total? That's literally pennies for them. LOL
IYasha
Where were they when <I'd probably be redflagged for naming> certain mid-east countries were attacked?? :-| Such a show-off.