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Whoa! I paid $4.99 for Pic Scanner Gold (https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/pic-scanner-gold-scan-photos/id1124131441?mt=8) just 2 days ago, so when I saw this story on the Google app, I said what a bummer and let me get a refund. Then I downloaded Photoscan and played a bit. And my verdict: I'll stick to Pic Scanner. Sure, it's early days for Photoscan and I'm sure Google will make it better, and it's free, BUT:

- Pic Scanner Gold can scan 2-4 photos in one shot, and separates and crops them by itself. That makes it 2-4x faster

- Its editor toolkit is FAR FAR superior to Photoscan's. I even use it for imports from Photos app.

- I can add notes to photos (either embossed on photo itself or saved to meta data)

- Can make photos into greeting cards. App has many card templates, and that alone is worth the app's price

- It has a really cool slideshow mode that I love

I am not too spooked about Google getting my personal photos, but with Pic this issue also goes away. One nice feature of PhotoScan is flash correction, but I also find scanning in daytime gives more realistic colors.

Bottom line, I will keep both apps. Pic because I prefer it, Google because it's free.

Thanks for the tip, but the exciting thing about the Google app is that it uses multiple photos of the subject to build up a high quality image. In theory (because I haven't used it) it should be able to produce a sharper, cleaner image than the iPhone camera is otherwise capable of. That's pretty neat.

On the other hand, I don't see any such boasts from the Pic Scanner product page, and in fact they seem to be taking the exact opposite route, capturing 4 photos in one go, thereby producing 'scans' or far lower quality than the camera is capability of.

How does it perform in actual use? Good quality?

Regarding privacy concerns from other posters. I don't see what the problem is having all your photos examined by possibly the world's most advanced photo recognition AI, and every detail, every person, every place name, every block of text, stored in a massive searchable database for all time. Unless of course the government had a habit of hacking into such things and taking copies for their own use. Oh wait...

But even then, that's hardly a genuine problem for anyone but terrorists, unless of course America turns into a fascist state overnight. Which almost never happens.
 
You know the most amazing thing about your comment? It led off with "What if someone from Google came knocking at your door and asked..." and, and, and not 1 but 2 (as of this posting)... 2 real live humans who breathe the same air that I do. Who I assume are fully functioning adults... that hold down jobs. They gave this post a thumbs up.o_O:confused::eek: I'm going to assume that @tennisproha and @mejsric thought you were doing satire and found humor in what you wrote. There are no other acceptable explanations for giving that post a thumbs up. Paint chips, alien abduction... maybe. Nope, not even that.
You realise it was just a hypothetical scenario, right? Just a bit of abstract thinking, to highlight the contradictions in some people's attitude to online privacy vs real-world privacy? A little intellectual excercise?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_experiment

The idea is to get people thinking a bit, instead of just blindly going along with something. Critical thought is a good thing, not something to be ashamed of.

I'm gonna go like that post too. ;p
 
I don't mind the slow speed and the noise of flatbed scanners when scanning old pictures. However, when I see this app, I am quite frustrated that this perfect edge detection does not seem to be available in any easy to use scanning software on macOS... I did hundreds of scans using macOS' Image Capture, and that involves a lot of manual rotating and cropping. (Lately, Image Capture sometimes gives me blank scans, and so I have switched to a Canon scanning app. Again: manual rotating and cropping.)
 
I love the constant google paranoia this group seems to hold on to.

What could they really do with pictures of peoples faces that would be so harmful? Unless they are stealing my identity and all my money, which I can't see happening with a photo, do I care that much? Besides most people have there current photos all over the net already anyway so....
And all from people who then happily surf the internet, register on internet forums etc.., happily sharing away so much of their sensitive and precious data just so they can moan about other firms using their data...
 
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This looks cool, I'll have to look into it. Yeah, I do echo the concern about privacy and google being google.
 
I believe fair use allows you to scan/print photos for your own personal use.

Also, I HIGHLY doubt Walmart would destroy a customer's property like this. Do you have any links? Imagine the lawsuit that would result if they shredded someone's only copy of a priceless photo.

They actually do shred them when they see the watermark on the photo, I was working there in 2015 and this was their policy.
This forces you to return to the photographer and request another print.
I did see one girl cry and plead for them not to do this and they gave them back. I think because that photographer studio was out of business for many years.
 
Can you elaborate here?
Can you post one, just one substantiated link about how someones data was mined and sold and who to? One?
Also, can you tell me what Apple do with your data?
Can you tell me how they talked their way around the old iPhone tracking issue that made it Ok.

Well for starters they have a direct financial connection with the CIA. But umm why are you mentioning Apple? I'm confused, I thought I posted don't trust Google?

Not sure why you brought Apple into this?
[doublepost=1479297180][/doublepost]
Care to expand on that?

Google was just a seed, a project (there were a few) that was funded by the CIA back in the 90s.

Do some homework on the history of Google Earth it will blow your mind. Not to mention google was created way back when for one main purpose, to spy and track people's data.
 
Great concept, going to test it out.

I'm a little shocked that Apple isn't bringing apps like this to the plate and intertwining them with their other digital services.
 
Well for starters they have a direct financial connection with the CIA. But umm why are you mentioning Apple? I'm confused, I thought I posted don't trust Google?

Not sure why you brought Apple into this?
[doublepost=1479297180][/doublepost]

Google was just a seed, a project (there were a few) that was funded by the CIA back in the 90s.

Do some homework on the history of Google Earth it will blow your mind. Not to mention google was created way back when for one main purpose, to spy and track people's data.
So that’s no. you don’t have any substantiated evidence what so ever?
 
You realize it was just a hypothetical scenario, right? Just a bit of abstract thinking, to highlight the contradictions in some people's attitude to online privacy vs real-world privacy? A little intellectual excercise?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thought_experiment

The idea is to get people thinking a bit, instead of just blindly going along with something. Critical thought is a good thing, not something to be ashamed of.

I'm gonna go like that post too. ;p
I do realize it was hypothetical. Completely unrealistic, but yes hypothetical. I also realize it was an exaggerated scenario that made no sense whatsoever. First of all, there was no debate regarding online vs real world privacy. Second, there was nothing in that quote that would make critical thinking necessary. It was silly and did more to detract from the topic of online privacy than it did to add to it.

Thought experiment. Hmmm, yeah no. That wasn't a thought experiment. Thought experiments are designed to illuminate ideas and possible consequences of a principle in question. Our principle was online privacy. Nothing in that quote contributes to anything related to online privacy. Thought experiments are supposed to be designed to help you understand and draw conclusions related to your problem. Even ignoring the Google coming to your house nonsene, the conclusion regarding ads doesn't make any sense.

"...connecting that to the information collected from the photo albums of those people, connecting that data to other data they collected while you visited friends, family and public places, what you did there etc,..." - That's not critical thinking, or even remotely experimentally thought provoking. That's just a really bad hyperbole.
 
Trust me, with Google the paranoia is warranted.

I could have quoted several posts in this thread. Listen - I get the privacy thing. I do. But Google is fairly transparent. Those so concerned about ad targeting can turn that off. And their model is really no different than Apple's iAds - the difference being, Apple pretty much sucks with their ad server/revenue stream. So I guess fault Google for being so good at what they do. They certainly take a hit here when it comes to their hardware, while Apple gets praised for being so good at their hardware.
 
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Q
Great so Google can now datamine photos of people from times before the internet exsisted.
[doublepost=1479247308][/doublepost]
They could do a lot of things perhaps build a giant database of individuals and use it to track people even more than they already do. The possibilities are endless.

With that who cares mentality why have locks on our doors and shades on our windows. Who cares what could happen :rolleyes:. Who needs privacy!

Your life is incredible boring to google. They don't care what u do man
 
Very useful tool.. bummer it is from Google. Will have to suck it up and download it though as this is pretty cool.

you have another option it called Photomyne, I have been usinging it for a while and it is great, you can scan more than I photo at a time. its in the apple app store.
 
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A very close friend who is also a MR member visited a major hackers conference in NYC over the summer. It discussed security mainly. Boy I wish you and I could grab a coffee and talk for about an hour.

I would blow your mind.

I doubt it. I have friends who attend those conferences. Friends who work for Google in various capacities. Friends that work for Microsoft and Apple too.

It takes a lot these days to blow my mind ;)
 
I doubt it. I have friends who attend those conferences. Friends who work for Google in various capacities. Friends that work for Microsoft and Apple too.

It takes a lot these days to blow my mind ;)

Haha maybe it does, but the fact that you also have friends that work for google doesn't mean what I'm saying is false.

In fact anyone can go online and see the history between Google and the CIA. The start up seed,heck even the connection with Pokémon Go. It's all public info.
 
Haha maybe it does, but the fact that you also have friends that work for google doesn't mean what I'm saying is false.

In fact anyone can go online and see the history between Google and the CIA. The start up seed,heck even the connection with Pokémon Go. It's all public info.

Well aware. I just don't think the average consumer has to worry any more or less about them than Apple, etc.

Axciom, and other larger big data companies are far more scary to me.
 
They actually do shred them when they see the watermark on the photo, I was working there in 2015 and this was their policy.
This forces you to return to the photographer and request another print.
I did see one girl cry and plead for them not to do this and they gave them back. I think because that photographer studio was out of business for many years.

Sounds like a policy that would make me never trust Walmart for anything, ever.

The original photo is the customer's property. Walmart has no right to destroy it. Not only is it not Walmart's job to enforce copyright law, but it is in no way illegal to return the original photo to the customer. What reason does Walmart have to shred it? They gain nothing but an angry, possibly vengeful customer.
 
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