My divorce from Google - One year later

My divorce from Google - One year later(itworld.com)

17 points by jotaass 13 years ago | 20 comments

risratorn 13 years ago |

Well it's all just a mater of personal taste but tbh ... when someone says "GPS. I don't use it, even in a car. I'm old-school as I like printed maps." I don't find it that surprising he has no trouble letting stuff like gmail, google maps and google search go.

It can be done, but for some it's easier as for others.

Aardwolf 13 years ago |

The strange thing is that despite this, the author uses Facebook and Amazon and stuff. Weird selective exclusion based on whatever. Each to their own I guess.

simonh 13 years ago | |

When you have high expectations and they are not met (or sometimes even just have the appearance of not being met) that feels a lot worse than when you have low expectations which are met.

Hence if Google does something even close to being interpreted as being evil if you squint hard enough, they are ditched in favour of Facebook. If workers on iPhone production lines have tough working conditions, even if they're better than the working conditions on the Samsung lines and are better paid, you still get people swearing to buy a Galaxy next instead.

It's just human nature.

harel 13 years ago |

To me this smell like paranoia for paranoia's sake. No real valid reason for it. So Google track you. Everybody tracks you. Its the nature of the web. If you don't get tracked you will still see ads. They'll just be random. At least you have a chance of seeing something you might actually be interested in. And really the bottom line is that all of this internet-scale costs money. And since we are a bit touchy about paying for stuff we take for granted these days, like 'search' and 'social' or 'maps', we might as well accept the ads and get on with it. Why would I want to use an OK service for maps or translation when I can use a Great one from another provider even if they track me. (by the way, should we tell him that Facebook, Yahoo and in future most likely DuckDuckGo too, tracks him in the same way or let him figure it out by himself over time?)

electrichead 13 years ago | |

I am ok with targeted ads. I actually think that most people would be ok with targeted ads too, since a lot of my searches would have been averted by a good well-placed ad. For instance, I see something on TV that I want to buy; I have to Google "what was so-and-so character wearing in this episode" or search for the soundtrack to a particular ad. These are things that could have been targeted to me. A pure audio ad that plays 10 seconds of a song from an artist's new album is an effective ad, if that is an artist I actually like.

Targetting is not a bad thing when done right.

john61 13 years ago | |

It is not about ads. It's about personal private data. For ads, anonymous targeting would suffice. No one can garantee that this personal private data is used for ads only. It is usefull for a lot of ugly things. And therefore it will (is?) used for them.

harel 13 years ago | | |

Yes but no one can really guarantee anything on the internet. What I don't want Big G' to know, won't go on line and if it has to, it will be done right. The only thing is, there's not much I can think of that I'd really give a #u!@ if G' Man is in on it or not. I don't have a deep rooted principles regarding this leading my life and ultimately restring my movement. I use what I use, until its no longer useful, and I'm well aware that what I use is also using me. Fair exchange I think. H

writtles 13 years ago |

>Some friends followed my example onto other social media sites. Not many. Perhaps they weren't really friends.

Wow, OP really feels his friends chose Google over the friendship?

yanw 13 years ago |

This was dusscissed here a few hours ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5476812

HN ought to weed duplicates better.

jotaass 13 years ago | |

Submitter here. I did search for it first, but I clearly did a poor job. Apologies for that.