I’m a bit conflicted over this. Part of me loves the tech but the grumpy old man in me is a bit afraid of the level of info. we now routinely give away.

Any Google Now users here? Is it the knees of the bees?

Have you actually checked Google’s privacy policy, though?

I’m a privacy/information law professional (I’m not a lawyer – but lawyers come to me for UK DPA implementation advice) – and I’m perfectly happy with the very limited personal data Google holds about me, and how it uses those data.

Awesome? I’m can’t be bothered to track the movements of 20 engineers with trackers, I can’t imagine Google with its bazillion users really cares what time I’m going to work or what my favourite restaurant is 🙂

However, I don’t really use Google Now that much, but I use Android Auto and the voice commands all the time.

I use it loads and it generally works really well for certain tasks particularly in the car.

E.g.
“navigate to …. “
“Call ….. contact or business on Google maps”
“Send WhatsApp message to …. ” Then dictate the message
“New appointment…”

I wouldn’t be without it however I am still a bit concerned about the privacy stuff. I’ve tried seeing what can be turned off within Google settings and found that it really doesn’t work. It wants access to everything, or it won’t let you do even the simplest tasks. So I’m fairly sure Google knows more about me than I do.

So very helpful tx. Part of me is comfy with the I’m only a teeny tiny ant and why would they be interested in me but another part of me likes to limit what they know should they be interested. Think I might turn it on and see if it is worth the effort though

It keeps trying to have me sent to jail by posting up things about the royal family that would have be charged with Les majeste here.

The last.king dies, I read a few.aticles.on him, Google Now thinks because I was interested in thstz I’m interested in all royal stuff, and now sends shit through that would get me 15 years in jail. Thanks Google

and now sends shit through that would get me 15 years in jail. Thanks Google

Partly the problem is the government of the country you are in. Have you hit the I’m not intereted thing or even strangly enough send a help request into google?

Great for me, keeps my calandar sorted, in a few hours it will offer me directions to my hotel, warn me about traffic on the way to the airport and many other things. It’s a quick fast summary of news of the day and more.

It keeps trying to have me sent to jail

This is partly what I’m interested in. Not the jail bit but rather can you clear what it knows about you so you can start again.

In any case it refuses to start on my phone. Gives me a ‘network error’ and I don’t seem to be able to overcome that using anything I can find online 🙁

Old Android phone I had got heavy battery drain due to Google Now getting its fingers into everything and constantly running in the background downloading shed loads of data.

Out of interest for those who like these tools, does anyone use Cortana instead or as well as? That being Microsoft’s app of a similar vein. While I used to be a Google person I’m all in the MS ecosystem now. Don’t even use Chrome. Edge is my main use. So it’s MS who know my habits and can advise me.

It’s great.

Not my area of expertise but I’m a IT grad / geek.

I’m a very boring person. If someone at Google or wherever else really cares about my commute, browsing habits and schedule then I pity them rather than worry about my privacy. If I was doing something of interest to anyone with the know how or ability to keep track of it all, then they could without needing me to click ‘I agree’.

It’s the knees of the bees and the bollocks of the dogs. Ambient and pervasive tech is awesome.

does anyone use Cortana instead or as well as?

I used to use Cortana but it didn’t do anything useful for me. In the end the only good thing was linking phone notifications to my computer so I could reply to messages without having to pick up my phone. The rest didn’t do a lot

Edge is my main browser as well, seems faster and nicer. Drop back to Chrome for some stuff and IE for others (banking mainly). Not all sites work well in all browsers any more. Fondly remembers the days when it was all plain HTML around here…

It is teh awesomeness.
Of all the users Google has, are they really bothered which site I visited for work today, or what shops I have been in? Yes a small privacy concern, but the benefits far outweigh the cost of me surrendering some data.