Google Will Stop Scanning Your Emails to Show Personalized Ads in Gmail

[sudo1996]

Back to your concern about the difficultly, I encourage you to try as it is very easy to take some steps like installing an ad blocker and tracker blocker. You will be amazed at how many trackers Google and others are trying to install on everyone, regardless if you don't use their services. You will be amazed also at how much better browsing the web is without the ads and trackers. Once you use them, you won't ever want to go back.

I agree that VPN's can be confusing, and I hope Apple builds it in to the next version of Safari, and TOR is simple to download and use, but can be slow; however, if you use a search engine like DuckDuckGO that doesn't track your searches and take a couple of minutes to install something like Ghostery which then works beautifully well and any of the several good ad blockers, e.g., Disconnect, etc., you will deny Google a lot of what it is trying to collect and collate about you. Of course, don't use any of Google's services like Photos, Assistant, Maps, Gmail, etc., or you will be attaching yourself to a giant vacuum that will suck every possible detail about you into their files. Fortunately, we have Apple and other companies to provide services that aren't built upon a model of giving them away in return for your privacy and information security.

I do have an ad blocker 'cause I don't want ads. IDK what is tracking me exactly other than cookies and IP lookups, and neither of those make my browsing experience worse. I know how to use VPNs and proxies, but you really have to pay if you want a good one, so nah. When I want to be really private, I use Tor, and otherwise I'm just using an ad blocker.

In the USA (would be different in, say, the UAE), the only time I've ever heard of any non-criminal being concretely negatively impacted by non-anonymity here was when some students had their Harvard acceptances rescinded because they said offensive things within a private 10-person group chat but used their real names, and one of the 10 snitched on them. There are probably lots of cases like that. Easy to avoid in many ways.

Whereas if you leave Facebook, you don't get invited to things, and if you use DuckDuckGo, you get crappy search results, and those are concretely bad things. And IDK why you are this careful but still use Apple's closed-source software. Sounds like you ought to use Linux on your PC, which would probably be yet another disadvantage.

 

[slimothy]

Well apples iCloud goes down way too much so I can't trust apples mailing service I'll stick with gmail

Haha I don't really use Apple's mail service often so I don't notice.

 

[truthertech]

I do have an ad blocker 'cause I don't want ads. IDK what is tracking me exactly other than cookies and IP lookups, and neither of those make my browsing experience worse. I know how to use VPNs and proxies, but you really have to pay if you want a good one, so nah. When I want to be really private, I use Tor, and otherwise I'm just using an ad blocker.

In the USA (would be different in, say, the UAE), the only time I've ever heard of any non-criminal being concretely negatively impacted by non-anonymity here was when some students had their Harvard acceptances rescinded because they said offensive things within a private 10-person group chat but used their real names, and one of the 10 snitched on them. There are probably lots of cases like that. Easy to avoid in many ways.

Whereas if you leave Facebook, you don't get invited to things, and if you use DuckDuckGo, you get crappy search results, and those are concretely bad things. And IDK why you are this careful but still use Apple's closed-source software. Sounds like you ought to use Linux on your PC, which would probably be yet another disadvantage.

Those trackers do slow down your browsing. And they send back all the information about you that they can, e.g., what pages you visit, what items you click on, purchases, etc. etc. You also have a very narrow view of the risks if you think it is only criminals who have been or who will be negatively impacted by having a database with all of your private information in it. Google has been tremendously successful in getting people to believe it's for their own good. "Look at what we give you for free! And, yes we collect a little bit of info here and there, but it's for your own good so you get better ads!"

Facebook also "coerces" people into using it by the fear of being left out as you cited. That's kind of sad, but if you feel you must use it, at least set up a dummy account with a temp email, etc., and then make sure you are blocking all trackers, using VPN/TOR whenever you use it, or they will link it back to you anyways.

The reason to use Apple eco system with common sense protections such as blockers, etc., aside from the great things they offer, is that you are starting with a company that isn't incentivized to violate your privacy.

 

[sudo1996]

Those trackers do slow down your browsing. And they send back all the information about you that they can, e.g., what pages you visit, what items you click on, purchases, etc. etc. You also have a very narrow view of the risks if you think it is only criminals who have been or who will be negatively impacted by having a database with all of your private information in it. Google has been tremendously successful in getting people to believe it's for their own good. "Look at what we give you for free! And, yes we collect a little bit of info here and there, but it's for your own good so you get better ads!"

Facebook also "coerces" people into using it by the fear of being left out as you cited. That's kind of sad, but if you feel you must use it, at least set up a dummy account with a temp email, etc., and then make sure you are blocking all trackers, using VPN/TOR whenever you use it, or they will link it back to you anyways.

The reason to use Apple eco system with common sense protections such as blockers, etc., aside from the great things they offer, is that you are starting with a company that isn't incentivized to violate your privacy.

If Google gets hacked, attackers get to see what sites I visited. I don't pay for anything Google-related or give them any information besides what they grab from their ad tracking. There's nothing sensitive. I definitely trust Apple a lot more than Google for the reason you said, but I'd still consider them a much greater risk because we're both fully in their ecosystem, using their closed OSs that are black boxes to the outside world, plus (IDK about you) I have my CC number in my iTunes account. iOS used to save your location history indefinitely in a local file, and nobody knows what Apple was doing with that.

As for Facebook, again there's nothing interesting about me on there. I have my name and face so people can find me, as they would if I met them IRL, and send me messages or invitations to stuff that I want to go to. And I know for a fact that if I didn't use it (I didn't before), I would have done fewer things in general. I don't wanna live in a shell.

 

[dilbert99]

What a completely opposite experience that I've had. I've got over 90,000 emails in my Google email and handle many hundreds per week. Actually having access to the US Army's Exchange email system gives me a good idea of what email used to be like and is like for older companies - and that's the definition of "utterly worthless" to the T.

I much prefer the search in Google Mail to exchange.

 

[FelixDerKater]

They don’t need to when they have you using Chrome anyway.

 

[Naaaaak]

…will stop scanning the emails of its free Gmail users for the purpose of delivering personalized ads

So it will still scan them for other reasons.

 

[Howl's Castle]

First off, it's the Google Pixel. Nexus is the brand of their previous phones before the Pixel.

Second, you spelled October wrong.

If you're going to criticize, do it properly.

He didn't spell October wrong if he speaks German. That's how it is spelled in Germany.

 

[jblagden]

Still won't use. Such a creepy company.

Which company do you use for email?
[doublepost=1498486971][/doublepost]

Many years ago I had my Gmail hacked because I stupidly used the same password on a few websites (not all) and this Ubuntu forum I used to frequent before becoming a Mac user was hacked and they used that to access my Gmail. This was before two-step and stuff like that. And apparently my backup email, which was Yahoo back then, had shut down my email because I hadn't used it for so long. I couldn't find anyone at Google or anywhere on their site that could help me.

It was around that time that I was getting into Macs and iPhones and I had the realization that if you're not paying for it in some way, you're the product being sold. I think this was also around the time Google started doing creepy stuff like this and becoming more invasive with tracking, throwing their "don't be evil" motto to the wind, as well as blatantly copying the iPhone functionality in their new Android OS. I started removing myself from everything Google, such as Docs and Calendar that I used all the time, and moved everything over to Mobile Me when that came out. It was a bit of a cluster, but I liked paying for it instead of selling my soul to the devil, and it has gotten a lot better over the years. I just can't trust Google to not betray my trust or to have my back if something goes wrong.

That realization led to me eventually shutting down things like FaceBook, as I realized that I was just giving them all of this information for free so they could make money off of me while massively wasting my time. I wish there were a paid social network that doesn't have all that crap, but the nature of people and getting them to part with their cash means that you'd never get the network big enough to be worthwhile. They tried that with app.net a few years ago and it failed.

When did you switch over to MacOS? I'm just curious because I'm actually considering switching from MacOS to Linux due to the recent Mac hardware.

There's an Android variant called LineageOS which is Android without the spyware and bloatware.

I don't know of any paid social networks, but I do know of Mastodon, which is an open-source social network.
[doublepost=1498487064][/doublepost]

The only service I’m using from Google is YouTube. Lost trust in everything else.

Which company do you use for email?

 

[TMRJIJ]

Which company do you use for email?

Apple

 

[macduke]

Which company do you use for email?
[doublepost=1498486971][/doublepost]
When did you switch over to MacOS? I'm just curious because I'm actually considering switching from MacOS to Linux due to the recent Mac hardware.

2008. It was also around that time that I was considering switching to a design major, so it really came in handy for that during the start of the spring 2009 semester. As for recent Mac hardware, it has been getting better as of late and after WWDC I legit believe Apple when they say they're not going to leave it behind. I think they realized that's a mistake, as myself and many others on here have said, it's the pro users and app programmers that use Mac hardware for design and development which I believe helps keep iOS at the forefront.

As for me, I'm not sure if I'll pony up for the iMac Pro or wait to see what this modular Mac Pro turns out to be. I use Macs to make money, my iPad Pro for personal projects such as photo editing and drawing, and use my Xbox/Switch for play. I've been mulling the idea of building a gaming PC like I used to do back in the day before I switched so I can get more games on Steam. Although the Xbox One X has a lot of power for a lot less money, but I might wait to see if some good games come out for it. It's also interesting how much Apple talked about gaming, specifically as it relates to VR during the keynote, the external GPU support, and the improvements in Metal 2. So hopefully they put a renewed focus on that.

I played around on Ubuntu for a couple years alongside OSX86 on my old Dell Inspiron. I liked OSX the best out of the three. I got an iPhone the day it first came out after never owning an Apple product before, and it won me over for wanting to get a Mac. While in college I started my freelance company and used that to buy a 15" MacBook Pro and it paid for itself several times over, so I don't mind paying more for Apple stuff because it clicks with my brain and makes me more efficient.

 

[sudo1996]

When did you switch over to MacOS? I'm just curious because I'm actually considering switching from MacOS to Linux due to the recent Mac hardware.

Same boat. I'm thinking about buying a netbook myself and installing some Linux-based OS. There are Asus netbooks for around $200 that have ethernet, HDMI, VGA, and USB-A (3.0), and I can upgrade the hard drive. Since I have servers to do any necessary heavy-lifting, it's tempting.

Since you're asking about email, I know AOL sounds terrible, but their mail works fine with any mail client. I switched my "anonymous" email (not the personal/work one managed by my school) from Google to AOL when they started tampering with their IMAP auth and breaking compatibility.

 

[jblagden]

Same boat. I'm thinking about buying a netbook myself and installing some Linux-based OS. There are Asus netbooks for around $200 that have ethernet, HDMI, VGA, and USB-A (3.0), and I can upgrade the hard drive. Since I have servers to do any necessary heavy-lifting, it's tempting.

Since you're asking about email, I know AOL sounds terrible, but their mail works fine with any mail client. I switched my "anonymous" email (not the personal/work one managed by my school) from Google to AOL when they started tampering with their IMAP auth and breaking compatibility.

Is this the sort of thing you're looking to buy? https://www.amazon.com/Lightweight-...8&qid=1498573281&sr=8-3&keywords=asus+netbook

 

[sudo1996]

Is this the sort of thing you're looking to buy? https://www.amazon.com/Lightweight-...8&qid=1498573281&sr=8-3&keywords=asus+netbook

Pretty much, but I was aiming for one with more ports than that specific model. Though it probably won't be for a while unless I want two laptops. If my experience is like the last few times, my current rMBP will completely break down within warranty then keep breaking down until it's no longer covered, but I still have about 2.5 years left.

 

[jblagden]

Pretty much, but I was aiming for one with more ports than that specific model. Though it probably won't be for a while unless I want two laptops. If my experience is like the last few times, my current rMBP will completely break down within warranty then keep breaking down until it's no longer covered, but I still have about 2.5 years left.

I'm in the same boat - with the exception of warranty (I didn't get an extended warranty). I've heard that Lenovo's laptops and also those from HP have very good Linux driver support.

I couldn't find any $200 Lenovo laptops (they start at $300), but they're worth a look: http://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/c/LAPTOPS?q=rice-asc:facetSys-Price:$100~$499.99&uq=&text=#

I also checked HP, and here's what they've got in the $179 to $519 range: http://store.hp.com/us/en/vwa/laptops/segm=Home;Price=179-519?jumpid=ma_lt_featured_na_6_170510

Unfortunately, it seems like all of the low-cost laptops have Celeron CPUs, 4 GB RAM, and 32 gigabytes of storage. Pretty much Chromebook specs. It seems like you have to go above $600 or $700 to get anything decent.

 

[sudo1996]

I'm in the same boat - with the exception of warranty (I didn't get an extended warranty). I've heard that Lenovo's laptops and also those from HP have very good Linux driver support.

I couldn't find any $200 Lenovo laptops (they start at $300), but they're worth a look: http://www3.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/c/LAPTOPS?q=rice-asc:facetSys-Price:$100~$499.99&uq=&text=#

I also checked HP, and here's what they've got in the $179 to $519 range: http://store.hp.com/us/en/vwa/laptops/segm=Home;Price=179-519?jumpid=ma_lt_featured_na_6_170510

Unfortunately, it seems like all of the low-cost laptops have Celeron CPUs, 4 GB RAM, and 32 gigabytes of storage. Pretty much Chromebook specs. It seems like you have to go above $600 or $700 to get anything decent.

Problem with the Lenovo you linked is it doesn't have an Intel CPU. And I've banned HP from myself because I've always had the worst experiences with everything they sell, from printers to PCs to servers. The reason I like Asus is they seem to have nicer displays and keyboards for similar prices, which is all I'm really looking for in these other than ports.

 

[jblagden]

Problem with the Lenovo you linked is it doesn't have an Intel CPU. And I've banned HP from myself because I've always had the worst experiences with everything they sell, from printers to PCs to servers. The reason I like Asus is they seem to have nicer displays and keyboards for similar prices, which is all I'm really looking for in these other than ports.

Here's something: https://www.amazon.com/Asus-E402SA-...ie=UTF8&qid=1498612308&sr=1-1&keywords=E402SA

Specs aren't great, but that's what I've found from Asus.

 

[sudo1996]

Here's something: https://www.amazon.com/Asus-E402SA-...ie=UTF8&qid=1498612308&sr=1-1&keywords=E402SA

Specs aren't great, but that's what I've found from Asus.

That was actually one of the ones I was eyeing. Only thing is it's a bit old. So it would probably be between that and the gold one for me.

 

[jblagden]

That was actually one of the ones I was eyeing. Only thing is it's a bit old. So it would probably be between that and the gold one for me.

I just looked at the gold one. It kind of reminds me of the MacBook Air - the difference being that the Asus laptop is priced correctly.

 

[sudo1996]

I just looked at the gold one. It kind of reminds me of the MacBook Air - the difference being that the Asus laptop is priced correctly.

It is without a doubt a complete knockoff of the MacBook Air, and I wouldn't feel bad buying it.