A good reminder to go through your settings and review how many random apps are regularly collecting your location data.
Costs of using Google Maps
11–20 of 23 posts
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#12Not using Google Maps is difficult, but it can be done. I'm currently using OsmAnd from F-Droid and it works awesome. I would recommend it to anyone trying to live without Google services.
Not only do I use OsmAnd, but I prefer it to Google maps (and not just for privacy reasons). For whatever reason, I always find it a bit fiddly to set up initially, but once I've got it working, it's really nice.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#13Not using Google Maps is difficult, but it can be done. I'm currently using OsmAnd from F-Droid and it works awesome. I would recommend it to anyone trying to live without Google services.
The biggest selling point of Google Maps is not the content itself, it is the usability. And the usability is unmatched by OsmAnd at this moment.
It is such a chore to look something up in OsmAnd that makes me throw all the privacy awareness away and go immediately to Google Maps.
So while replacing Google Maps can be done indeed, it is not a pleasant experience to replace it with open source solutions.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#14What restaurants did Google Maps show you? Unless you searched for a specific restaurant, you likely saw only those restaurants that paid for contextual advertising on that search. (At the very least, you saw the paid listing first, and on a small mobile screen, you may not have scrolled past them.)
The author makes a pretty sweeping claim here and then walks it back in the next sentence. Does anyone else have the experience described? The vast majority of my mobile Maps queries do not seem to show ads at the top, and very few ads show up at all, but maybe I'm an outlier.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#15The main thrust of this rambling article seems to be that Google Maps and location services more generally might not be misused by Google itself but instead shown wholesale to a third-party concert app which then leaks it to my "creepy stalker ex-boyfriend." Is there anything new in this article or rehashing familiar hypothetical scaremongering? Not saying that handing over data, especially very personal data, is to…
I personally wasn't aware they directly sold the data. I always assumed they acted as intermediaries to advertisers,
I'm not aware of that either. What API scope would share your location data with a third-party developer? https://developers.google.com/identity/protocols/googlescope... doesn't turn up anything obvious.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#16The main thrust of this rambling article seems to be that Google Maps and location services more generally might not be misused by Google itself but instead shown wholesale to a third-party concert app which then leaks it to my "creepy stalker ex-boyfriend." Is there anything new in this article or rehashing familiar hypothetical scaremongering? Not saying that handing over data, especially very personal data, is to…
>6. Is using location services worth your children being followed to school? It is a little over the top
That’s funny. One of my former colleagues said she was finally convinced to buy smartphones for her junior high age children when they were followed/stalked by a stranger when walking home from school.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#17The main thrust of this rambling article seems to be that Google Maps and location services more generally might not be misused by Google itself but instead shown wholesale to a third-party concert app which then leaks it to my "creepy stalker ex-boyfriend." Is there anything new in this article or rehashing familiar hypothetical scaremongering? Not saying that handing over data, especially very personal data, is to…
I personally wasn't aware they directly sold the data. I always assumed they acted as intermediaries to advertisers,
They don't (sell your data directly), explained by Google itself https://safety.google/privacy/ads-and-data/
Of course it's up to you how much you trust what they write there.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#18> If you haven’t given the Google Maps app on your phone the permission to use your location information, it will ask you for that. It’s obvious, isn’t it? But think about that for a moment. Google Maps doesn’t need to know where you are to show you restaurants in Omaha. There are no “terms and conditions” to read. There is only an “accept” button. You click it.
You don't _need_ to share your location with Google Maps in order to utilize it, unless you want turn-by-turn directions from your current location.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#19Not using Google Maps is difficult, but it can be done. I'm currently using OsmAnd from F-Droid and it works awesome. I would recommend it to anyone trying to live without Google services.
Mapquest is surprisingly still going, and it seems better than Google Maps in my limited experience with it. When visiting Orlando, FL a couple of years ago, the Mapquest app generated optimal and correct directions while Google Maps was generating erroneous ones.
There's also OpenStreetMap.org.
Re: Costs of using Google Maps
#20Not using Google Maps is difficult, but it can be done. I'm currently using OsmAnd from F-Droid and it works awesome. I would recommend it to anyone trying to live without Google services.
> Not using Google Maps is difficult, but it can be done. It's not difficult to use Apple Maps on an iPhone. You make it sound like Google are the only realistic maps provider available.
Not at all, and going with what the article talks about, Apple Maps is a viable option. Although a lot of the users out there don't have Apple products.