I think this is going to be really big. But it might require actual customer service; that must have made them think twice.

Edit: [[[ This story is getting heavily flagged as well.

http://i.imgur.com/LiUSpCy.png

Looks like the Google fans, employees and shareholders on HN with good karma can't let this story break on the day of Google I/O? And people accuse Microsoft of astroturfing! What is this then?

If PG does not want to stop this blatant and continuous moderator abuse, he might as well declare HN a Google and Linux fiefdom so that the rest of us using other platforms and who can think for ourselves and are not Microsoft haters can stay away. ]]]

Posted this story earlier and it got flagged off the front page.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5714520

Reposting my comment here:

This is the latest in a long saga. From a post from Microsoft in 2011:

First, in 2006 Google acquired YouTube—and since then it has put in place a growing number of technical measures to restrict competing search engines from properly accessing it for their search results. Without proper access to YouTube, Bing and other search engines cannot stand with Google on an equal footing in returning search results with links to YouTube videos and that, of course, drives more users away from competitors and to Google.

Second, in 2010 and again more recently, Google blocked Microsoft’s new Windows Phones from operating properly with YouTube. Google has enabled its own Android phones to access YouTube so that users can search for video categories, find favorites, see ratings, and so forth in the rich user interfaces offered by those phones. It’s done the same thing for the iPhones offered by Apple, which doesn’t offer a competing search service.

Unfortunately, Google has refused to allow Microsoft’s new Windows Phones to access this YouTube metadata in the same way that Android phones and iPhones do. As a result, Microsoft’s YouTube “app” on Windows Phones is basically just a browser displaying YouTube’s mobile Web site, without the rich functionality offered on competing phones. Microsoft is ready to release a high quality YouTube app for Windows Phone. We just need permission to access YouTube in the way that other phones already do, permission Google has refused to provide.

http://blogs.technet.com/b/microsoft_on_the_issues/archive/2...

Hi everyone. I've been working on this at Google for a while and would be happy to answer any questions you might have. If you don't want to ask here, feel free to email me at <my username> AT google.com. There might be a delay in responding if I get a lot of messages or if you have a particularly challenging question.