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One week with the Google Pixel

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Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#101

Post by josephg »

Karunamon wrote: post #56
fweespeech wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is not one of the few. People have pushed this "You are paranoid, no one is out to get you" narrative since the 90s. Everyone has something to hide, even if its just their sex life or beliefs that aren't politically favored that might affect your employment.

And yet not one single instance of Google misusing their collected advertising info exists. All of the dumping on Google Services has, to the day I write this, proven to be absolute FUD without a single concrete thing to point at.

The threat model isn't google. And I believe that google's engineers are more than up to the task of protecting their servers from everyday hackers.

The threat I'm worried about is the surveillance arm of the US government. The small glimpses we've seen are frightening - for example, they spliced a cable between two google data centers and recorded (some? all?) of the traffic travelling between them. This particular hole has since been plugged (google encrypts between-data-center traffic now), but we simply don't know what the US government's capabilities are. This isn't paranoia stuff - they really do this kind of thing.

And even if google manages to 'go dark' to the NSA, the US government can just legally demand access to all of our data. And block google from telling us that the data intrusion happened.

Its funny you mention FUD. Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt is exactly how I feel about trusting google (and by extension the US government) with every email, search, voice, in-app text in android, phone call and so on that I've ever made.

As a non-US citizen, I have even fewer protections and I can't fight this politically. But I can give my money to Apple instead. So thats what I do.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#102

Post by threeseed »

bad_user wrote: post #94
threeseed wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every app you listed is a 'power user' app. Naturally they will be better in Android since the platform is more open in this area. But in the sort of everyday apps most people use there isn't really a contest. Android lags far behind in overall polish.

I'm a heavy app user and imho that's a myth, because people end up being naturally biased towards the platform they've been using, once they learn about what's good or not. And even if I can feel my own bias, I really think Android is the more polished one, OS & apps. I could enumerate all sorts of reasons for why, but then you'd hand-wave it as not being relevant for moms using apps that could have been web pages :-…

I spent years as a mobile developer and have commercially worked on top tier apps for Android and iOS.

It's not a myth. Product Managers do look at the demographic split and invest more into iOS development. Also the fact that iOS is a more coherent platform i.e. Almost all users are on latest version means more resources on polish.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#103

Post by fweespeech »

Karunamon wrote: post #56
fweespeech wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He is not one of the few. People have pushed this "You are paranoid, no one is out to get you" narrative since the 90s. Everyone has something to hide, even if its just their sex life or beliefs that aren't politically favored that might affect your employment.

And yet not one single instance of Google misusing their collected advertising info exists. All of the dumping on Google Services has, to the day I write this, proven to be absolute FUD without a single concrete thing to point at.

> And yet not one single instance of Google misusing their collected advertising info exists. All of the dumping on Google Services has, to the day I write this, proven to be absolute FUD without a single concrete thing to point at.

---

http://www.theweek.co.uk/google/11581/google-worker-fired-fo...

> But further examples of Barksdale's abuse of his privileges were more serious. Earlier this spring, he viewed call logs from Google Voice in order to identify the girlfriend of a 15-year-old boy, who had refused to name her. Barksdale then taunted the boy and threatened to call his girlfriend.

---

Not a single instance of a Google employee misusing info? Not one you say?

A failure of internal controls qualifies as a problem just as serious as intentional abuse of it.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#104

Post by Karunamon »

fweespeech wrote: post #103
Karunamon wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet not one single instance of Google misusing their collected advertising info exists. All of the dumping on Google Services has, to the day I write this, proven to be absolute FUD without a single concrete thing to point at.

> And yet not one single instance of Google misusing their collected advertising info exists. All of the dumping on Google Services has, to the day I write this, proven to be absolute FUD without a single concrete thing to point at. --- http://www.theweek.co.uk/google/11581/google-worker-fired-fo... > But further examples of Barksdale's abuse of his privileges were more serious. Earlier this spring, he viewed call lo…

You conveniently left out the word "advertising". Employees misusing admin access is a threat with any company you may do business with.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#105

Post by at-fates-hands »

clumsysmurf wrote: post #6

"3. Deep Google integration - This shouldn’t be surprising in any way, but having Google built into pretty much everything you do on the phone is seriously useful." This is my main sticking point with Android lately. I would much rather have a stock Android OS + device from Google, and then add the few Google services I want. Instead Google is getting more and more baked into everything, and understanding how my data…

>> I would much rather have a stock Android OS + device from Google

There are tons of stock Android phones you can get from "off market" manufacturers

The Nexbit Robin: https://www.nextbit.com/

The OnePlus two or three: https://oneplus.net/2 , https://oneplus.net/3

Xiomi Mi Note: http://www.mi.com/en/minote/

ZTE Axon 7: https://www.zteusa.com/axon7/

Obi SJ1.5: http://www.obiworldphone.com/global/sj1.5

VeryKool (InfoSonic): https://www.verykool.net/Products/Smart_Phones/

As far as I know, these are all "stock" and only come with the smattering of Google apps, and absolutely none of the carrier bloatware you usually get. When I got my OnePlus Two, all it had on it were maybe 6 Google apps and that's it, nothing more, nothing less.

I've been ecstatic with the performance of the phone and only having the apps you really want on the phone makes it much easier to use. Plus, you can completely customize it, put a custom ROM on it and turn off all the Google tracking stuff. I have way more piece of mind since I got it.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#106

Post by fweespeech »

Karunamon wrote: post #104
fweespeech wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And yet not one single instance of Google misusing their collected advertising info exists. All of the dumping on Google Services has, to the day I write this, proven to be absolute FUD without a single concrete thing to point at. --- http://www.theweek.co.uk/google/11581/google-worker-fired-fo... > But further examples of Barksdale's abuse of his privileges were more serious. Earlier this spring, he viewed call lo…

You conveniently left out the word "advertising". Employees misusing admin access is a threat with any company you may do business with.

> You conveniently left out the word "advertising". Employees misusing admin access is a threat with any company you may do business with.

Then you shouldn't have replied to me and changed the context?

The context was information in Google's possession.

You tried to narrow it to advertising after I replied which is, at best, silly.

EDIT:

> ..did you read the original post?

You replied to me and tried to plays devil advocate. The context of my words is the one that is relevant, not your attempt to shift the goal posts into some narrow land of the absurd where you get to pretend the fact information Google collects ultimately gets abused isn't a privacy problem.

So just stop, honestly. Your position as absurd as storing plain text passwords because "Well, there has never been an official policy of abusing that information."

Rogue admins, hackers, etc. are all valid threats to privacy when the information is stored in an easily transportable form and the fact that isn't obvious to you terrifies me that you are somehow a professional sysadmin.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#107

Post by jug5 »

viraptor wrote: post #63
travv0 wrote: post #48

"The Pixel needs charging once a day, which is a little bit of a disappointment, but it charges really quickly." I'm not sure I understand this negative. I'd think any problems caused by this would be easily remedied by just charging your phone while you're sleeping, when you can't use it anyway. Or is he saying that it needs to be charged once a day, even if you charge it overnight?

With wifi, bt, and mobile data on, I easily get 24h out of my pixel. (not xl) And it does doze state pretty well: ~8% charge drop overnight (that's around 1% per hour of complete inactivity) If you pay 3d games or use it constantly, of course you'll need to charge it sometimes. But for casual usage with standard basic apps, I sometimes forget to plug it in at night and it's not problem. https://i.imgsafe.org/cfad953c…

I lose 1% overnight, what apps are you running in the background? 8% is huge.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#108

Post by Karunamon »

fweespeech wrote: post #106
Karunamon wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You conveniently left out the word "advertising". Employees misusing admin access is a threat with any company you may do business with.

> You conveniently left out the word "advertising". Employees misusing admin access is a threat with any company you may do business with. Then you shouldn't have replied to me and changed the context? The context was information in Google's possession. You tried to narrow it to advertising after I replied which is, at best, silly. EDIT: > ..did you read the original post? You replied to me and tried to plays devil a…

..did you read the original post?

My original words are: "And yet not one single instance of Google misusing their collected advertising info exists."

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#109

Post by pyre »

colemickens wrote: post #34
askafriend wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's never been about the features. We have this conversation every single time. Users care about the experience, and features are only a portion of the experience. That's what Apple really truly gets and other companies miss time and time again.

And the UI/UX is hardly at all different than what has been shipping for the last 3 major Android versions. Again, none of this is new for people who are actually using a recent version of Android in the last 2-3 years, but go figure I get downvoted for pointing it out. Just as your comment proves, it's a sad, tired and completely out-dated meme that Android doesn't have good UX. And then these blog posts come along…

> go figure I get downvoted for pointing it out.

I really hate this "I'm only stating the truth that people don't want to see! Wake up sheeple!" attitude that some people seem to cop.

Re: One week with the Google Pixel

#110

Post by oridecon »

uabstraction wrote: post #89
marricks wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With google stepping away from masking your ad profile it is even more troubling... Apple doesn't get enough praise for protecting user's privacy IMO, or perhaps it's just really something most people don't care about...

Beyond their occasional public stands such as the San Bernardino case, I don't think Apple does enough to market how this is useful to the average end user. In fact, as a free software enthusiast who has never even considered getting an iPhone, the privacy issue has me seriously considering getting one (though not the 7!) when my Nexus 5x succumbs to entropy. There are a few technical issues I need to work out before…

I'm in a similar position, I considered changing to an iPhone but in the end it's just half-measure.

There's Ubuntu Phone, KDE Plasma, Copperhead and others but they don't feel like a good solution. The problem is always the same: no apps. It doesn't matter if I can install 99/100 apps I need but the one I can't is a messenger one of my clients requires me to use. Or if I can't really rely on a compatibility layer like MicroG, since Android is not that open anymore.

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