this post was submitted on 29 Jan 2025
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Privacy
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If you're receiving a service you aren't paying for, YOU are the product
some exclusions apply
Fucking Duolingo? The fuck? What do they need to track users for like that?
It's a for profit public company. I've been playing around with the idea of possibly creating a FOSS app that would run its servers via donations and (same as duolingo in the beginning at least) community created courses. Would need support from proper linguists though.
There are other apps like that but they lack the sleek UI and gamifying aspect or simply have only one language.
I pay for duolingo so I hate that they are tracking me but it's the only actually fun casual language learning app out there and honestly I don't mind paying for such a good app, but their monetization schemes are getting more aggressive: e.g. time limit games which are nearly impossible without paying for "extra time potions" which you don't get even if you have the paid version.
Edit: just to add to the time-limit games: you can just not participate in them, but fuck me for paying to the app and still having that bullshit in my UI.
https://librelingo.app/ is looking for contributors 😉 It's written in python, so if you want to take a stab at that, I'm sure they'd be very happy to have you.
Lemmy provides once again, thanks @[email protected]! I'll have to see if I can get back into python and take a look into this project
time limit games which are nearly impossible without paying for “extra time potions” which you don’t get even if you have the paid version.
Alright then, keep your ~~secrets~~ 3rd star
I can't keep a calm frodo face while seeing something that has not been completed on my ~~journey~~ duolingo learning path
Whatsapp Business? Is pedestrian Whatsapp not even on the list?
Thankfully a lot of these are accessible by the web browser if you really need to use them. I should switch to doing that for more of them
How does that help?
I didn't read the article, I came here for the jokes but then you got me curious
So my understanding is that
- apps can let them collect a lot more data than the website version. Apps have access to a bunch of device APIs, they might be running all the time vs a website tab that you close afterwards, etc.
- you just open a link vs. logging in through the play store
On top of that if you want to lock down further, it's easier to use a privacy respecting browser than it is to sandbox the apps to. For the average person it's easier to go from using the app to opening the website in a browser, than it is to swap their OS to GrapheneOS and set up sandboxing
That's also why a lot of websites mess with the mobile site, they want you to use the app
I can tell you exactly what data an app can connect since I'm an android developer, but not web since I can't dev JavaScript. My understanding is that the gap is quite small.
About "always running" that's a complicated scenario and that's not the best way to put into layman terms. And it has improved heaps in the last 5 years, gradually.
Marketers love these apps because they could send you notifications, " reminding" you that you've not being using the app enough and driving "engagement". There's heaps of companies whose main or only product is give marketers a dashboard to send push with pre sets targeting user profiles.
Good to know, thank you!
Yeah, no surprise there. The more popular they are, the more leverage they have over you and the more abuse users are willing to tolerate.
Yep.
I think to be more specific it's like popular music: the broader the reach the more it's appealing to fundamental aspects of human nature (aspects that everyone has to some degree). This makes it more useful from a data collection standpoint.
This makes it harder for outliers to avoid, even if we want to, as everyone else using something like WhatsApp means we have to fight against the tide of other people and not just the crappy companies.
Ohh duolingo... Noooo
You can still Duolingo and dodge (most of) the bullshit.
Use GrapheneOS.
Install Duolingo from the Aurora store, no Google account attached.
Sandbox the app and set its permissions to disallow location, disallow pulling contacts etc.
Make your Duolingo acct with a fake name and burner email (sucks for you if you already made one with your primary email and real info).
Manually add "friends" via their Duolingo usernames.
Note that, like Facebook, your contact info could be getting shared by other users who have your real info listed in their contacts. Not much you can do about that. (In fact, you could use none of the apps on this list but your contact info is probably still getting leaked by your normie friends and acquaintances.)
Any idea how to find this kind of info on Discord? They seem extremely tight-lipped about how it's harvested and used,, I'm sure it's more horrible than I can even imagine.
Buahahaha, nothing on this list on my phone!
ditto!
Only apps i have are Google Maps, which i try to replace with Organic Maps.
And Duolingo cause i like to "learn" a language, while having the gamification motivate me.
I currently use Waze because the features are awesome but how has your experience been with organic maps? I want to use it but worried about it not being great. I haven't actually tried it.
Waze, the Israeli app, was bought by Google.
Traffic data is missing so not great for navigation
If i just need to lookup some stuff on a map organic is great, but no rview for businesses, or looking for a pizza place google is just way better at that
magic earth will be a little closer to waze, but unfortunately the israeli app is just kinda the best at commute routing…
Spotify is my problem: I like different stuff and I don't plan on carrying Gs of it on me, but I do wish I could kick it away.
I don't know what your technical abilities are, but setting up something like Navidrome could be the ideal compromise.
How's that one? I've been using Plexamp because is the closest alternative and love the sonic analysis. But would rather do something open source.
I never used 70% of these apps (14/20) nor do I have an active account on the remaining 6. Im weird.
To delete them, I would first need to install them. Maybe I should do that? Or maybe not, as I don't think they're worth wasting my time (and my peace of mind). Beside digital ID, password manager, financial apps, my cloud (Filen.io) and a chess app, + the taxi app, I have nothing installed on my phone. Not even the email is active. I used to listen to podcast but even that I removed.
I use a few of the service listed but only on my computer, containerized in Firefox. So they and their constant tracking can go f.omething themselves ;)
If I was to really start using my smartphone, I would stop using my iPhone (which I consider less insecure privacy-wise than vanilla Android, but far from being private enough) and would buy one of the /e/ powered smartphone available. I purchased one for my spouse a few years ago and it's still working great. Worth mentioning she is like me with her phone and don't do much with it, but all the apps she needs (for work, finance, and stuff) are working fine.