I at least get a substantial value add to my life having Google track me everywhere. It might be overly sentimental but being able to see everywhere I've been in the last ~seven years on Maps feels to me like one of the great innovations Google has made. If people accept Google will sell that data to subsidize the cost of persisting it you get a permanent record of everywhere you've gone. I think its cool to have.
Its something you can probably build off the shelf - log position with durations, draw vectors on Open Street Maps. But Google has already given me the convenience in exchange for my privacy. Its one of the rare times I'm alright with that tradeoff.
I haven't used the same phone for 7 years. The value add is that its automatic and remotely archived. I've already been burned by lost / wiped / bricked devices without recovering all the photos / video / data on it before it became inoperable. I still have an iphone 3gs with my last photos with my late grandmother on it that I've tried to frankenstein back to life long enough over a usb connection to just grab the photos with no success.
I've tried a lot of automatic backup solutions like syncthing but have had myriad performance or inconsistency problems over the years.
Its tied to my Google account rather than the physical device, and its not data I need to manually somehow keep consistent across devices because Google does it for me.
Stating it as a direct trade for the service being no charge is fallacious in that Google does not actually give you the option to just pay money for the service/storage and skip the surveillance. Instead, the true price remains nebulous - with your "permanent record" continuing to grow and becoming ever more of a liability.
It's certainly possible to develop user-centric software with the same functionality and polish, at a grassroots level. The fact that the industry is being dominated by VC money looking for scalable winner-takes-all growth is indicative of the magnitude of what's really at stake.
I run Lineage on my phones, I always have the option to purge Google entirely and not let them track me. The choice is between spying vs money, its between spying or not being spied on.
I sympathize with the plight of those unknowingly being spied upon - I've had enlightening conversations with family members when I show them this very feature they weren't aware of on their Android devices - but it often feels like the demonization of Google treats it like nobody ever volunteers in. Because I definitely wouldn't pay for it, but its a nice service to have.
I love that Google Photos is able to add location information to my old photos and pictures I take on my actual camera without manually mapping everything. It's surprisingly accurate and really enjoy seeing where all I've been over time.
I love that Google Photos is able to add location information to my old photos and pictures I take on my actual camera without manually mapping everything. It's surprisingly accurate and really enjoy seeing where all I've been over time.
Apple's phones and computers do this, too. This is not unique to Google. What is unique to Google is that Google uses the information to profile you, while Apple just uses the information to draw a map.
Its something you can probably build off the shelf - log position with durations, draw vectors on Open Street Maps. But Google has already given me the convenience in exchange for my privacy. Its one of the rare times I'm alright with that tradeoff.