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Not OK, Google

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Re: Not OK, Google

#41

Post by woah »

arkem wrote: post #31
wyager wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the predominant reason I use an iPhone. I don't like a lot of Apple's policies (mostly closed source, although that's where stock android has been gradually headed too) or their silly politics (Getting rid of the gun emoji? Really?), and I would rather go with Google on those grounds, but Apple's incentives with regard to privacy actually align with mine. In particular, they are a product company, not an adve…

What makes Google an advertising company and Apple a product company? Since both make products and sell advertising. Obviously advertising is more important to Google than it is to Apple but at what point does Apple become an advertising company and Google a product company? Is there a revenue threshold? A branding threshold? Edit: I'm not saying Google isn't an advertising company. I'm asking what makes Google (but…

Probably if 99% of their revenue comes from advertising you can call them an advertising company, and if 99% of their revenue comes from hardware you can call them a hardware company.

Re: Not OK, Google

#42

Post by daemonk »

I am not trying to inject my opinion. I am looking for genuine discussion. The idea of privacy has always been kind of vague to me. Where do we draw the line of acceptable information sharing and not? If a company is collecting data on our behavior and changing their practices accordingly to maximize their profits, is that immoral? Isn't that essentially A/B testing? The practice of using that data in a potentially manipulative way might be immoral, but is the best way to prevent that really to completely not share anything?

Re: Not OK, Google

#43

Post by nine_k »

unprepare wrote: post #24
someone7x wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's an additional nuance, that of Google knowing everything about us. If I hacked together my own home automation AI system it would need to know everything about me too and that worries me far less.

only if you hacked together your own search, maps, calendar, etc. as well. Maybe someday that will be a realistic endeavor, but it would take a lot of effort to set up and maintain your own personal versions of all of google's services, and integrate them

Hosting your own mail, calendar, cloud storage, and even a mapping application is quite doable right now. There are open-source projects for that, and you can have your own physically secured machine in a co-location facility for a reasonably small sum.

It's just not easy to do, both in setup and maintenance effort. Most people would not care about their privacy nearly enough to justify that.

Re: Not OK, Google

#44

Post by dragonwriter »

bbctol wrote: post #19
option_greek wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We always assumed they wouldn't spill their beans to third parties. I guess that was assuming too much.

I think we just envisioned a highly anthropomorphized AI: essentially, a very smart and entirely obedient person to serve as the perfect aide. The Star Trek dream emerged before computing technology was very far advanced, and well before the idea of constantly mobile wireless communication. We thought our AIs would be small and physical, easy for a single person to entirely own and unable to remember more details tha…

> The Star Trek dream emerged before computing technology was very far advanced, and well before the idea of constantly mobile wireless communication. We thought our AIs would be small and physical, easy for a single person to entirely own and unable to remember more details than a human; instead we got unfamiliar algorithms run on machines far away.

Which is kind of funny, because even if it might be accessed by personal mobile devices, the Star Trek "library computer" AI was never "small and physical, easy for a single person to entirely own and unable to remember more details than a human", it was an aspect of a large server (or networked cluster, the actual architecture is somewhat vague) that was part of a capital ship or base, had access in the server/cluster to a library of very nearly all generally available knowledge and extensive personal information about both its users and about people with little direct connection (and could reach out across a galactic network to access additional remote information sources to handle requests).

"Unfamiliar algorithms run on machines far away" is much more like the source of the "Star Trek dream" than "small and physical, easy for a single person to entirely own and unable to remember more details than a human".

Re: Not OK, Google

#46

Post by danso »

aRationalMoose wrote: post #21

I have an open ended question-- mostly born out of ignorance; But why is this a bad thing? Isn't an artificial assistant that not only knows and understands us but anticipates our needs incredibly useful? In the process, sure they'll collect your info for better advertising, but short of Totalitarian Surveillance or Data Breach Concerns (The former is a bit of a reach if you live in the west, and they can survey you…

Not an ignorant question, but a reasonable one. I think the skeptics believe that society overall does not yet understand the tradeoff. And I agree with them there. I think on a deeper level, people are creeped out that data paints such a deterministic picture of our lives. Sure, I leave home the same time every day, and I leave work about the same time every day. That Google knows where I live and work without me ever explicitly saying shouldn't be a surprise, but not everyone enjoys seeing how their daily lives are so easily circumscribed, even with just passively-collected data.

Re: Not OK, Google

#47

Post by gvurrdon »

bbctol wrote: post #19
option_greek wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We always assumed they wouldn't spill their beans to third parties. I guess that was assuming too much.

I think we just envisioned a highly anthropomorphized AI: essentially, a very smart and entirely obedient person to serve as the perfect aide. The Star Trek dream emerged before computing technology was very far advanced, and well before the idea of constantly mobile wireless communication. We thought our AIs would be small and physical, easy for a single person to entirely own and unable to remember more details tha…

Isn't it the case that Apple's attempts at similar AI assistance store much of the data on the user's iPhone?

Re: Not OK, Google

#48

Post by quickben »

arkem wrote: post #31
wyager wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the predominant reason I use an iPhone. I don't like a lot of Apple's policies (mostly closed source, although that's where stock android has been gradually headed too) or their silly politics (Getting rid of the gun emoji? Really?), and I would rather go with Google on those grounds, but Apple's incentives with regard to privacy actually align with mine. In particular, they are a product company, not an adve…

What makes Google an advertising company and Apple a product company? Since both make products and sell advertising. Obviously advertising is more important to Google than it is to Apple but at what point does Apple become an advertising company and Google a product company? Is there a revenue threshold? A branding threshold? Edit: I'm not saying Google isn't an advertising company. I'm asking what makes Google (but…

More money coming from advertising than products?

90.4% revenue from advertising for Google

https://www.statista.com/statistics/266249/advertising-reven...

https://www.google.ca/search?q=google+total+revenue&ie=utf-8...

vs Apple: http://marketingland.com/app-purchases-dominate-ads-app-stor...

Re: Not OK, Google

#49

Post by yid »

TulliusCicero wrote: post #4

What I think is interesting is that many of us nerds have probably innocuously fantasized about having a Star Trek-like AI assistant with us, but now that they're taking the first steps towards that, we're starting to realize that in order for it to do everything for us, it has to know everything about us, too.

I think people also forget that the Star Trek AI was in a semi-militarized scenario where efficiency and information greatly outweighed individual privacy needs.

Re: Not OK, Google

#50

Post by mojuba »

ubercore wrote: post #11

Google Now has done the same for me, told me how long it will take to get to a bar I frequent. My reaction was quite exactly "Oh that's neat, thanks!" and I went and had a great burger that night. Totally OK for me Google. I respect that people have different privacy thresholds, but I think the fact that it's different for everyone is being lost in articles like this.

One tiny caveat being that, Google (and others as well, to be fair) will be able to indirectly collect data even on the privacy-aware part of the population who don't use Google much. The simplest example being, even if you don't use GMail, still some part of your emails inevitably end up in GMail inboxes. Now also consider this: just being a guest in a Google-stuffed house means you are under surveillance.

So no, it is not just my problem or your problem, it's everyone's.

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