>> Likely we had walked past each other every other week for three years with our heads down, or in the clouds, paying very little notice to the people around us.
Or looking at your phone...
How fateful?
101–110 of 343 posts
Re: How fateful?
#102I was reluctant to mention this kind of story in such a sweet context but a few comments have already touched on privacy, so I want to add my two cents. At some point in the past I had the surreal experience of opening a news website and seeing a familiar face on the front page. Not a celebrity, rather a man whose face had been in some small subfolder of my brain for several years. The man had been convicted of seria…
I took the pragmatic approach and said to myself "look, if Google really wants to know where I am the only way to avoid it is to go into the woods without my phone, so why not?" Then one day the Toronto Transit Commission police thought I was re-using someone elses streetcar fare because of how old it was. I just prefer the streetcar to subways, so I took a longer route. As soon as I pulled out my phone with my locat…
I turned my location history off when I saw this story https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/google-tracked-his-bike...
headline: "Google tracked his bike ride past a burglarized home. That made him a suspect."
HN discussion about it (March 7, 2020): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22511637
Re: How fateful?
#103I was reluctant to mention this kind of story in such a sweet context but a few comments have already touched on privacy, so I want to add my two cents. At some point in the past I had the surreal experience of opening a news website and seeing a familiar face on the front page. Not a celebrity, rather a man whose face had been in some small subfolder of my brain for several years. The man had been convicted of seria…
I took the pragmatic approach and said to myself "look, if Google really wants to know where I am the only way to avoid it is to go into the woods without my phone, so why not?" Then one day the Toronto Transit Commission police thought I was re-using someone elses streetcar fare because of how old it was. I just prefer the streetcar to subways, so I took a longer route. As soon as I pulled out my phone with my locat…
I think it was Isaac Asimov who wrote an article once speculating on a future utopia where there would be total information freedom and transparency - everyone would know everything about everyone's movements. You could see why it would be appealing - how could there be crime if you knew where everyone was at all times? No body could cheat on their spouse, no child would ever go missing. Seems hopelessly naive now of course but you can see how it would work as a thought experiment. In reality there'll always be a protected class who get to hide their movements.
Re: How fateful?
#104This is the cutest thing I've seen all year.
Re: How fateful?
#105I was reluctant to mention this kind of story in such a sweet context but a few comments have already touched on privacy, so I want to add my two cents. At some point in the past I had the surreal experience of opening a news website and seeing a familiar face on the front page. Not a celebrity, rather a man whose face had been in some small subfolder of my brain for several years. The man had been convicted of seria…
I took the pragmatic approach and said to myself "look, if Google really wants to know where I am the only way to avoid it is to go into the woods without my phone, so why not?" Then one day the Toronto Transit Commission police thought I was re-using someone elses streetcar fare because of how old it was. I just prefer the streetcar to subways, so I took a longer route. As soon as I pulled out my phone with my locat…
That's because you haven't been the victim of fabricated narratives supported by your tracked locations as data in order to imprison or blackmail you. This is just a rehashed "if you're not doing anything wrong you have nothing to worry about".
Thank you to the other commenter for pointing out the banality of the "crime".
Re: How fateful?
#106> It makes me feel very philosophical. Likely we had walked past each other every other week for three years with our heads down, or in the clouds, paying very little notice to the people around us. Past Channon had not the foggiest clue what impact an unnoticed stranger would come to have on her. Since learning this I can’t help but look at the passers-by in my day-to-day life in a different light. And no shame in g…
> And no shame in getting philosophical. It may not have been time. Perhaps you were not the same person, or nor was he
This is a really good point. My wife and I often laugh about how in high school especially and college too we wouldn’t likely have been friends, much less good romantic partners. Both of us then were different people yet now both of us are perfect for each other.
But back then? Likely not even friends.
Re: How fateful?
#107These are amazing ETL skills, but a big red flag, I thought I was watching the revival of the infamous Overly Attached Girlfriend. As someone said there, this is great and scary at the same time. Also, how come 2 people be so ok with Google having all their location history? There are only two reasons why someone leaves that function enabled: A) they are Google employees B) totally ignorant to the fact that Google tr…
> but a big red flag How can you infer that? She clearly had access to his location history, it's extremely unlikely that it happened without his consent. This is rather a vibe of two enthusiastic geeks being genuinely curious about analyzing some cool data about themselves, rather than anyone being "overly attached". We can't tell for sure without more details about their relationship, which isn't our business at al…
> it's extremely unlikely that it happened without his consent
"My partner kindly agreed to download his data and sent it to me."
Re: How fateful?
#108Kinda creepy how you have access to your partner's google maps history and you go through it. But hey, if he is happy with it
He volunteered the data
Re: How fateful?
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
I took the pragmatic approach and said to myself "look, if Google really wants to know where I am the only way to avoid it is to go into the woods without my phone, so why not?" Then one day the Toronto Transit Commission police thought I was re-using someone elses streetcar fare because of how old it was. I just prefer the streetcar to subways, so I took a longer route. As soon as I pulled out my phone with my locat…
That's because you haven't been the victim of fabricated narratives supported by your tracked locations as data in order to imprison or blackmail you. This is just a rehashed "if you're not doing anything wrong you have nothing to worry about". Thank you to the other commenter for pointing out the banality of the "crime".
That's really making the assumption that this didn't happen before data tracking.....
And that argument is much, much older than the digital age. If anything, extra tracking helps exonerate more than without it (false imprisonment, etc) https://time.com/wrongly-convicted/
Re: How fateful?
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
I took the pragmatic approach and said to myself "look, if Google really wants to know where I am the only way to avoid it is to go into the woods without my phone, so why not?" Then one day the Toronto Transit Commission police thought I was re-using someone elses streetcar fare because of how old it was. I just prefer the streetcar to subways, so I took a longer route. As soon as I pulled out my phone with my locat…
I think it was Isaac Asimov who wrote an article once speculating on a future utopia where there would be total information freedom and transparency - everyone would know everything about everyone's movements. You could see why it would be appealing - how could there be crime if you knew where everyone was at all times? No body could cheat on their spouse, no child would ever go missing. Seems hopelessly naive now of…
I do expect the Right to Privacy will be brought up again to the Supreme Court as a result of making use of location history sometime in the next five years.
Indeed, I believe the first use of the "Right to Privacy" was by a lawyer and Louis Brandeis, and future Supreme Court Justice, upset that a journalist had written that one of them attended a wedding.
Depending on who brings to suit, I expect it's likely that even the conservative justices will suddenly agree with a right to privacy.