Talks to Watch

Google Chrome Dear Sophie

311K views · Jun 28, 2014 · 1:32 · 0 HN recommenders · 4 mentions · discussed 2020–2024

Google's "Dear Sophie" Chrome ad, in which a father emails his daughter's life moments to her future self over the years. It portrays an email account as a lifelong keepsake.

Why Hacker News points people here: Brought up ironically in threads about Google deleting inactive accounts and tightening storage policies, as a reminder that Google once encouraged this kind of long-term use.

What Hacker News said 4

Cites itpaulryanrogersJun 2024

“Kind of ironic since I recall an early Gmail ad showed a father opening an account for his infant”

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Kind of ironic since I recall an early Gmail ad showed a father opening an account for his infant, then giving to the child as it got older. Correction: technically a Chrome ad, yet very heavy use of Gmail. Maybe the trick is to not open it in their exact name? (In the ad they use "dear{name}@gmail.com) this video

in “Sending emails to my three-year-old” · view on HN
Criticalrunlevel1Dec 2020

“A policy change that sabotages an idea that Google itself gave many people just a few years ago.”

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A policy change that sabotages an idea that Google itself gave many people just a few years ago. Google's "Dear Sophie" ad: this video

in “An update to storage policies across your Google Account” · view on HN
CriticalcseleborgSep 2021

“Ironically, this was exactly the theme of Google's”

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Ironically, this was exactly the theme of Google's "Dear Sophie" ad [1] a few years ago. [1] this video

in “Britain's Age Appropriate Design Code has made inroads into big tech's dominance” · view on HN
CriticalSebastianKraMay 2023

“8 years of work for nothing.”

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I feel like this ad from Google is relevant: this video 8 years of work for nothing. --- ("Dear Sophie" - about a Father using Gmail as a Diary to share with his Daughter someday)

in “Google to delete inactive accounts starting December” · view on HN