I actually consider the tracking of my browsing/watching history to be integral to the search experience. It’s why when I search for Python, I get results about the programming language and not snakes both in Search and YouTube. Or why Commodore gets me the computer and not naval crap. Or any number of other things that steer their search results towards things in my interests and away from junk I don’t care about.
An ad blocker in my browser keeps anything else they’re targeting at me through their scraping out of my hair while also blocking a load of what they might learn about me from third party sites, so I’m not terribly bothered what they think they know about me, they’re not getting access to the bulk of the stuff I’d consider personal, and the junk they do track is kept so that they can get me results that will matter to me instead of generic crap.
I think there’s a general misunderstanding that Google tracks stuff so that they can sell it, when the reality is that they keep it so they know where to target ads (that I never see) and so that they can provide results relevant to my interests so I’ll keep coming back to (not) see ads. They don’t sell the info they collect, they sell people the ability to run ads against that info. If they were selling the info itself, they’d be killing the golden goose. So long as they’re contractually not allowed to look at my mail and files, I’m good with the rest of what they take because it 100% goes into making a better experience for me using their services so long as I’m running Firefox/uBlock.
That said, if you don’t want tracking being used to improve your search experience, a Workspace account indeed won’t get you 100% away from it. I tried using DDG for a while and I just couldn’t hang with it. Its lacking the little dossier that Google has on me made it so that I constantly had to work harder to find what I wanted vs a quick search on Google, and that’s what you’d get without the tracking and info collection. It wasn’t worth the tradeoff for me, maybe it is for you though?
I actually consider the tracking of my browsing/watching history to be integral to the search experience.
I don’t have a problem with people who are okay with it getting it. I’m not saying that Google shouldn’t be allowed to do that, just that it’s not what I want.
It wasn’t worth the tradeoff for me, maybe it is for you though?
I use DDG now, as well as some other things like dropping cookies at browser exit. But they aren’t really an alternative to, say, YouTube. And…I mean, I’ve got no problem with Google’s services. I just would prefer to pay for them with money rather than with data.
I actually consider the tracking of my browsing/watching history to be integral to the search experience. It’s why when I search for Python, I get results about the programming language and not snakes both in Search and YouTube. Or why Commodore gets me the computer and not naval crap. Or any number of other things that steer their search results towards things in my interests and away from junk I don’t care about.
An ad blocker in my browser keeps anything else they’re targeting at me through their scraping out of my hair while also blocking a load of what they might learn about me from third party sites, so I’m not terribly bothered what they think they know about me, they’re not getting access to the bulk of the stuff I’d consider personal, and the junk they do track is kept so that they can get me results that will matter to me instead of generic crap.
I think there’s a general misunderstanding that Google tracks stuff so that they can sell it, when the reality is that they keep it so they know where to target ads (that I never see) and so that they can provide results relevant to my interests so I’ll keep coming back to (not) see ads. They don’t sell the info they collect, they sell people the ability to run ads against that info. If they were selling the info itself, they’d be killing the golden goose. So long as they’re contractually not allowed to look at my mail and files, I’m good with the rest of what they take because it 100% goes into making a better experience for me using their services so long as I’m running Firefox/uBlock.
That said, if you don’t want tracking being used to improve your search experience, a Workspace account indeed won’t get you 100% away from it. I tried using DDG for a while and I just couldn’t hang with it. Its lacking the little dossier that Google has on me made it so that I constantly had to work harder to find what I wanted vs a quick search on Google, and that’s what you’d get without the tracking and info collection. It wasn’t worth the tradeoff for me, maybe it is for you though?
I don’t have a problem with people who are okay with it getting it. I’m not saying that Google shouldn’t be allowed to do that, just that it’s not what I want.
I use DDG now, as well as some other things like dropping cookies at browser exit. But they aren’t really an alternative to, say, YouTube. And…I mean, I’ve got no problem with Google’s services. I just would prefer to pay for them with money rather than with data.