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Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#371

Post by thegrasshopper2 »

gerash wrote: post #358
wildfire wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not let the user decide what their personal privacy trade-off is? That is, fundamentally, what the original post is about.

Because it adds to the software complexity. several boolean toggles for deciding what to incorporate into the localization algorithm: one toggle for GPS, another for wifi, Bluetooth, cell tower, barometer, etc. and fusing these in all the various combination, testing them, etc. and after doing all that users will mess up their config and then complain that this app sucks not knowing someone on HN had this feature req…

Though the software complexity was already there, and they decided to remove it (by adding another kind of software complexity), effectively deleting a feature that apparently people are using.

It cannot even be claimed to be an UX improvement since it's creating disruption for everybody that had this feature disabled.

At this point they should have added it to the terms of use and deleted the toggle directly (which I suspect they are going to do down the line, when they can prove that nobody keeps that toggle off).

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#372

Post by f1refly »

propogandist wrote: post #301
em-bee wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

big yes to this. whenever an app asks for a permission i want these options: allow deny pretend allow but send empty responses (like no wifi found) pretend allow but send fake responses

this was supported with Xprivacy many years ago and it was fantastic, but it stopped getting support. The entire pro-privacy android scene seems to have become a very small niche over the years

That's mainly googles fault. Xposed still lives on somewhat with the Riru project, but even a rooted phone without any mods will fail securitynet checks today, rendering it useless for most consumers that would have been willing to do the process before. With every android version things become less modular and less moddable, so the community shrinks as a consequence.

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#373

Post by MagnumOpus »

DocTomoe wrote: post #336
nmstoker wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting that they have no choice but to completely stop locating the user as there's absolutely no way they could offer non-lane specific navigation? The vast majority of it would be identical and I'm sure they could easily and gracefully degrade to that when strictly necessary.

How much does a company need to degrade a service - at potentially great cost - to be compliant before they can claim it then would be better not to provide the service at all to customers unwilling to share data? I am not claiming that this is where Google needs to draw the line in the sand - but there obviously is such a limit to these considerations.

Google was able to provide the service before, now they patched it out. So clearly it is not a question of ability to gracefully degrade but of willingness.

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#374

Post by aembleton »

Minor49er wrote: post #260
philsnow wrote: post #215

Not related to Google maps, but just today I got tired of the Amazon app sending me "you might like this deal" notifications and dug into whether it's possible to disable them. You can , but if you do, Amazon will no longer send Amazon "Smile" micro-donations to whatever charity you've selected: https://i.imgur.com/wNAkUAT.jpeg . I can't say that this is underhanded, but it does cast into sharp relief the fact that A…

Why not just set aside some money yourself and donate to a charity of your choosing without tying it to how you spend your money on Amazon? Making your donations directly will help you better see how your money will be used. For example, Girls Educational & Mentoring Services (GEMS) tells you basically how contributions are used when you donate to them: https://www.gems-girls.org/donate-now

Maybe he does both. I certainly do. I choose to use Smile because I can give 0.5% of my Amazon purchases to my chosen charity with no extra charge to myself. I also give a regular monthly donation; I know that the smile donations help them a lot.

I don't have the Amazon app though; I just use the website.

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#375

Post by Gasp0de »

uneekname wrote: post #128
app4soft wrote: post #85

> I immediately installed Organic Maps, and I'm sure there are loads of others as an option. Here are OSM -based maps applications for Android .[0,1] Not all OSM-based Android apps listed on OpenStreetMap Wiki, so check out also maps apps in various F-Droid repos.[2] Also here are maps apps for Symbian[3,4] and Maemo[5]. For other platforms there are also a lot of other apps.[6] [0] https://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wik…

Does anyone have a favorite that has worked well for them?

I don't know why, but I love Mapy.cz. Someone recommended it to me when I was hiking in eastern europe, and I use it daily for hiking and biking. I don't own a car but I occasionally also use it when I have rented or borrowed one and it works fine.

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#376

Post by iamtedd »

nickpp wrote: post #299
meristohm wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m guessing it’s more like being a frog in a stewpot as the temperature slowly rises.

Describe the boiling please.

Easy. The insidious infiltration of advertising and marketing in nearly every aspect of your life. Behind every purchase you make, there's money changing hands between the seller and the person who nudged your hand just a little bit to the left. You're not in control of where you spend your money. Don't notice it? That's the point.

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#377

Post by chippy »

phh wrote: post #356
yojo wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google is a large monopoly that subsidizes “free” products to burn a thousand mile clearing around their money engine. If Google maps was not free, there would be more of a market for competing mapping products. A mapping product has a natural intersection with advertisements - a non-negligible number of mapped trips are commercial in nature, and can thus catch consumers right before the moment of purchase. This migh…

Thank you :-) I wholeheartedly agree with you, and I'm sad not seeing it reported more often. I consider that Google Maps being free stagnated the maps market, and stopped any innovation from happening. Often when I say this, I get "But OpenStreetMap". When only volunteers can compete, that's a definite proof something's wrong. (though arguably Google Maps did improve a bit over time, while gmail really didn't at all…

It's worth pointing out that OpenStreetMap has Microsoft, Amazon, Apple and Facebook and many other corporate contributors and they are contributing huge amounts of data, all the time, everywhere.

"Apple Maps, is by far the most prolific current corporate editor and was responsible for almost 80% of all edits to pre-existing roads in 2018."

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-02-19/openstree... https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Jennings%20Anderson/diary...

Openstreetmap has never been volunteer only, but to be fair its only in the last decade that we've seen this change.

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#379

Post by zibzab »

tadfisher wrote: post #279
jdiez17 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that is fairly concerning. The last news I had about this was that using Google Play Signing (their key escrow and app signing service) was only mandatory for new apps as of August 2021. Not sure if that has changed recently. But everyone can see it coming a mile away, that Google will only continue tightening that grip. To be honest, I understand the potentially good intentions behind Google's push to manage ke…

The other reason is that they want to repackage your app for different target systems. Right now they are stripping assets and native libraries, but I hear they are going to start precompiling dex and shipping OAT directly in the APK. I wonder if there's an internal fight between the Tools and Play teams, because all of this should be possible via the Gradle plugin, but understandably the Play team probably wouldn't…

This can be solved in many different ways that don't require you to give them your keys.

It is pretty typical of Google to choose the most invasive solution.

Re: Google Maps now requires WiFi scanning to use navigation

#380

Post by zibzab »

propogandist wrote: post #301
em-bee wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

big yes to this. whenever an app asks for a permission i want these options: allow deny pretend allow but send empty responses (like no wifi found) pretend allow but send fake responses

this was supported with Xprivacy many years ago and it was fantastic, but it stopped getting support. The entire pro-privacy android scene seems to have become a very small niche over the years

Can someone explain this to me?

Have people just given up?

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