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I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

onemileatatime.com

351–360 of 464 posts

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The easiest way to mirror gmail, i have heard & am using is, to set a filter in gmail, forward every mail received to Hotmail. So, any point, Hotmail inbox is a pretty segregated but exact copy of Gmail

so you give two privacy ignoring companies all of your email (as well as portions of your email correspondents) instead of one? is control and some measure of privacy not worth the $50 or whatever to set up a paid account somewhere like https://www.protonmail.com/ ?

average salary in Kiev - $300/month. Sick gramma on food stamps. Guy bankrupt from cancer. Billions of poor indian and chinese (usa population is 350mil). 15yo student on $20/week allowance. Africa.

So if we round up to most of the world, "is privacy worth a week's to a month's income?" The answer to your question is no. Privacy of their useless emails is not, and nether is mine, upper 5% of USA. but I run my own domain and email service, for $20/year, not use google.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is by far the thing I miss most about Fi, and I'm shocked that no other carrier so far has replicated the feature.

It’s because people will figure out that they don’t need voice services st all...

That's not a problem if you follow the Fi billing model: a base payment for voice and SMS/MMS service is always required to keep the account active. Data is billed separately.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm perplexed. I can see hating them for other reasons, but expensive would not be the word I associate with Google Fi. I pay $22 including taxes/fees per month, but it's probably not a good carrier for people who watch a lot of video on their phones. * they're also probably one of the only honest carriers in terms of taxes/fees. My previous carrier had a much higher tax % which I thought was normal, but now I realiz…

How are you managing such low data use? I easily burned through 1gb in my first week (partly due to my podcast app downloading 400mb -> me changing the settings -> it downloading 200mb the next day -> me finding the right setting to block it from using mobile data). I've been keeping mobile data turned off unless I explicitly need to use it. I turned it on last night to google something quickly, and it managed to use…

I used ~20mb last month. heremaps with offline - faster, less battery. carbonOS rom on my pixel w/ no trace of google anything. read news type sites only on the toilet or in bathtub, so that's on wifi. when I'm out and on the subway or whatever, I'm playing a korean learning game on my phone. don't have any social network stuff. That 20mb was mostly email headers, set to only fully download on wifi and I only opened a couple of those emails.

googling something does not take 60mb. as soon as you turned on data, a whole bunch of google's android crap and other apps started phoning home and sending the data they've been collecting on your phone at the expense of your battery life.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Show up at Google HQ security gate with cash in hand and journalist in tow?

Forget the journalist, just live stream it via a YouTube account with a psuedonym first/last name. Considering how disorganized Google is, I doubt they'd take it down for a good while (if at all).

Paging Banksy

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#355
post #33

Despite everything else said, I’ve gotta say that there’s no better feeling than touching down in a new place, turning on your phone, and having it just work . No stupid voip apps. No managing prepaid balances. No switching sims. Just direct dial and go. Fi service is incredible for the mobile roaming alone and I’m not quite sure why nobody else can do it. I love it so much and it’s my favorite product. It makes a me…

Yeah, this. We've been out of the US for a year now, works everywhere we've been (except Vietnam, though that worked out okay too because Hangouts has calls/text). Can't imagine having to hassle with a new sim every new country, esp with there being 5 of us.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#356
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can relate to this. I was in Japan for two weeks and the international data worked flawlessly for me. I was diligent about tracking my usage and didn't see any charges out of line with my expectations. It made navigating the public transit a cakewalk. I'm in the same boat.

Why not download the maps before hand? Whenever I go abroad, I just download the maps in advance, and have no issue at all with just being on airplane mode.

Because the data doesn't cost anything different than when I'm at home. Do you always do that when you're at home too? That's very conscientious of you, I can tell you that my data bill is already under $5-10/mo most months, there is just WiFi everywhere so I don't always go to the trouble.

The fact is that the calling rates are very reasonable by default while traveling abroad, and there are no extras charged for data or text. I rarely travel internationally, but not to be held back by my phone! There are no special travel packages to buy, it just works wherever you go.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#357
post #346
post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recommend anyone who likes Gmail to use your own domain name@example.com and just forward all messages to your Gmail address. Only give out your own example.com email and set it as the reply to. Even the cheap budget registrars offer email forwarding for free and I have never had any trouble. This gives you the benefits of free Gmail without handing your entire life over to them. At least with a tld there is some d…

I wouldn't advise doing this. Forwarding all your email from one provider to another doesn't really work in today's Internet. The problem is that from gmail's point of view your registrar is now sending it a lot of spam. So it'll block the registrar or filter it more aggressively. Also if you get email from a 3rd party who uses domain-keys, spf, etc (eg just about everyone) then those emails will be failing all the c…

This is inaccurate.

I have namecheap forward all of my email from *@my-domain-name.com to my.name@gmail.com. Works no problem, has for several years. Prepared for the eventual switch to FastMail when they support multi-label messages.

The only messages that end up in my spam folder are spam for knock off online pharmacies.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#358
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not download the maps before hand? Whenever I go abroad, I just download the maps in advance, and have no issue at all with just being on airplane mode.

That is a great suggestion. I did rely on more than just transit information however. Using translate, looking up services and reviews for services, reserving a rental vehicle for two days, etc. Some of my needs couldn't be anticipated such as meeting a bartender in Osaka and being recommended a Japanese band to check out. Researching how to purchase tickets was something I didn't anticipate needing to do while plann…

You can actually download an offline translation file as well for google translate.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#359
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not download the maps before hand? Whenever I go abroad, I just download the maps in advance, and have no issue at all with just being on airplane mode.

You cannot download offline maps for Japan, at least on Google Maps

Here maps you can.

Re: I Can No Longer Recommend Google Fi

#360

The lede here is somewhat burried: "From what I’ve since learned, if a card in your Google Pay is stolen, or someone uses your Payments account fraudulently, or anything happens that leads to a security flag being raised, it can lead to your Google Payments account being frozen. ... If you can’t use Google Payments, you can’t pay for Google Fi This, fundamentally, is why I can’t suggest anyone use Project Fi anymore.…

> The only suggestion of a solution we’ve been given is that he abandon both his email address and phone number of the past twenty years and start fresh.

rofl thanks google you at least showed us you would treat everyone equally, and no exceptions even for your employees

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