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Look Away to Pause YouTube (Experimental Chrome Extension)(github.com)
almost 3 years ago from Mattias H, mattias.lol
Pierre Fortier, over 2 years ago
I'm in a similar boat. I've ditched Chrome for Firefox (even if it means a significant performance hit on macOS). I've also been using DuckDuckGo on desktop and mobile without noticing much difference (I'm on android for mobile which is its own issue, and I've been contemplating switching to LineageOS... or buy an iPhone)
It can be a lot of work, though! I'm still not sure what to do about my Gmail, Gmaps on Android (open source alternatives are... sub-optimal), Google Docs+Drive... I'm pretty entrenched.
Google has sort of become the "default internet" for a lot of people, and off-boarding from it can be quite a project.
Andrew Hersh, over 2 years ago Why would I care if they figure out I am looking to buy a grill, and start showing me ads for grills?
Why would I care WHAT information they gather about me?
Stuart McCoy, over 2 years ago
Because the grill you're looking at is only a fraction of the data they weened from your perusal of the web. Much like herd immunity from viruses, internet privacy requires "vaccinations" and awareness. The more anti-privacy people like you there are, the more difficult it is to demand privacy concessions from these companies in the future.
John Leschinski, almost 3 years ago
Why do people continue to use Google's products?
Because not everyone has a tinfoil hat.
A tinfoil hat need not be required to see the damage caused by Facebook and Cambridge Analytica. Privacy isn't dead but it is on life support. Hopefully the GDPR will force stronger privacy protections outside of Europe as well but unless people start caring about what corporations can do with personal information, they will continue to harvest it to the detriment of the internet as a whole.
And look at this, directly to my point, the NYTimes has an article about amazon.com and facial recognition databases being used by law enforcement.
Andrew C, almost 3 years ago You get what you pay for, I guess?
Why do people continue to use Google's products? They are, and always have been, and advertising company looking to sell information about you to the highest bidder. Tools like Gmail, Chrome, and Maps are all designed to collect information from you. It doesn't take a PhD to connect the two and after the release of the Selfish Ledger video last week, I'm really surprised there wasn't more of a call (a la Facebook) to quit using Google products. I started an experiment a few weeks ago to stop using Google's search engine in all my devices (I already use Safari, Apple Maps, and Mail on my iPad, Macs, and iPhone). So far I haven't really missed finding information I've been looking for using Bing. I'm thinking of giving Duck Duck Go a try again but it's not readily available on iOS through Safari and I like having access to the same experiences across all my devices.