Database Develop

Petition to rid the market if Khalid Shaikh's apps!

I browse the market every day and I see this guy putting apps that consistently get low reviews. His highest ranking app is 3 stars. He spams the market with apps that are overpriced photo galleries that show pics and play sounds of one specific thing. I think we should help him get the message that his high refund/low ranking rates are not giving him. Please reply if you agree that his apps need to stop spamming the market. If you have not tried one yet, look here. I am not doing this to be mean, but he needs to be told not to quit his day job.

Where's the option for "No. I dislike spam apps, but I hate censorship more." ?

So if his apps were malicious would you vote to have them removed? Do you feel spam filters on email are censorship? They fill your box with junk in hopes of making a few dollars off of you. I am against censorship but his apps are rediculous.

So if his apps were malicious would you vote to have them removed?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There are rules in place for the Market in regards to malicious apps. There would be no need to vote because the gatekeepers of the Market have already said malicious apps would be removed.
Do you feel spam filters on email are censorship?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of course not. The key difference is who gets to decide what is removed. With a spam filter, each user gets to decide whether he wants to see content or not. Any system that removes apps from the Market (that aren't infringing the basic rules as stated above) without your knowledge and consent is basically censorship, whether the decision is made by ten people at Google or a hundred people on xda-dev.

Not if your email provider passes your email through spamhaus you dont. Also I would ****LOVE**** to have a configureable filter but I doubt we will. As an acceptable alternative, I would like for consistantly low rated and highly returned items to be removed. Guess what walmart does if a product gets returned 80% of the time it is sold. Do they ask you?
Also, I am not trying to start a fight with anyone, just stating my view on the subject.

Darkrift said:
Also, I am not trying to start a fight with anyone, just stating my view on the subject.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I don't care to start a fight either; I'm just pointing out that what you are proposing is a path down a slippery slope, and it generally goes against the "open participation" ethos of Android. You should also keep in mind that one person's junk may be another mans treasure. Would I ever buy one of Khalid's lame $5 joke apps (literally, they're joke books!)? No probably not. That doesn't mean that someone else might not want it.
Edit: Just as an example, back in the early days of Market before developers could geotarget the regions for distribution, some Chinese developers put up some app whose interface was completely Chinese. I think it was a Chinese input method or a frontend for a Chinese website. Regardless, the ignorant fresh T-Mobile masses downloaded it, didn't understand what it was for, and then promptly uninstalled it and rated it zero stars. If you do a filtering system based on ratings, you are giving every uninformed ignoramus an equal say in whether an app is allowed to stay or go.

The Markets sucks! It needs the possibility for user to set their own filter
e.g.
dont show apps publiced by Khalid Shaikh! lower than 2stars, more expensive than x$ and so on..
only show apps of a specifig language (e.g. for traffic,taxi,bus,tv gadgets..)
sort for recently updated and so on .. that's what the market app really needs!

bassbox said:
The Markets sucks! It needs the possibility for user to set their own filter
e.g.
dont show apps publiced by Khalid Shaikh! lower than 2stars, more expensive than x$ and so on..
only show apps of a specifig language (e.g. for traffic,taxi,bus,tv gadgets..)
sort for recently updated and so on .. that's what the market app really needs!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yes, the market app needs customizable local (meaning on a user's own device) filters. That will partially solve the problem of crap apps littering the marketplace. However, I think overhauling Market client is low on the Google Android team's priority list. Unfortunately since it is a proprietary closed source app, there is no way for the dev community to take the matter into its own hands.

You would think that the king of searching would have some sort of decent searching on their own platform..

jashsu said:
Yes, the market app needs customizable local (meaning on a user's own device) filters. That will partially solve the problem of crap apps littering the marketplace. However, I think overhauling Market client is low on the Google Android team's priority list. Unfortunately since it is a proprietary closed source app, there is no way for the dev community to take the matter into its own hands.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I am planning on developing an interface to the Market which allows for custom filters. I have a prototype Yahoo Pipe, which uses Cyrket to display Market data and allow simple filters. Basically, I can filter out apps that have certain words in the title, are from a certain developer (or more than one), or are below a certain rating threshold.
I will have to agree though on the statement about censorship. While it is true that his apps may be without any true merit, I do not believe that they are (or he is) breaking any of the Market rules or developer agreements. Unfortunately, as we've seen in the the "free" market and the iPhone AppStore, people are willing to download and even spend money on useless apps. I think as long as there is a market for this type of app we will continue to see them. Now, unfortunately that means we all have to deal with him, his apps, and others like him and his apps until either the Market allows for better filtering/sorting or a developer creates this for the community... It is much needed nonetheless.

nEx.Software said:
I am planning on developing an interface to the Market which allows for custom filters. I have a prototype Yahoo Pipe, which uses Cyrket to display Market data and allow simple filters. Basically, I can filter out apps that have certain words in the title, are from a certain developer (or more than one), or are below a certain rating threshold.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thats awesome. if its anything like BarTor its going to be good

nEx.Software said:
I am planning on developing an interface to the Market which allows for custom filters. I have a prototype Yahoo Pipe, which uses Cyrket to display Market data and allow simple filters. Basically, I can filter out apps that have certain words in the title, are from a certain developer (or more than one), or are below a certain rating threshold.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's good to hear. What I meant is that the actual Market App itself cannot be modified to work the way we want it to. While being able to display Market data with filtering on a PC is nice, the bulk majority of users are still going to be suffering the standard Market app interface.
Unfortunately, as we've seen in the the "free" market and the iPhone AppStore, people are willing to download and even spend money on useless apps. I think as long as there is a market for this type of app we will continue to see them. Now, unfortunately that means we all have to deal with him, his apps, and others like him
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There will be more, that much I can assure you. As the Android platform grows, there will be more opportunist developers seeking to make a quick buck. It really is like spam. You throw a line out and because digital publishing is free, anything you get back is profit. There is basically no monetary risk involved in creating and distributing crapware. Atleast we won't have to suffer iPhone's idiotic ninety-nine cent "custom" name dialers. Although the number of soundboards posted daily is reaching dangerous limits...

I intend to make it an Android app. While it won't be a permanent fix,it might be what is needed to get Google moving on updates to the official Market app.
Anyway, on another note. I haven't looked at any one of the apps in question but I would venture a guess that they are in violation of copyright laws and as we have seen with the Tetris clones, Google does take action on matters of copyright. Maybe the best recourse then is to inform this developer of the copyright issues either directly or through Google.
?

Frankly i can't agree with having a dev (does this word really apply in this case) removed from the market for producing crap. However i am completely in favour of spamming his inbox with as much crap as i can possibly manage just to see how he likes it. Free porn search here i come!
Anyone wants to help it's --EMAIL REMOVED-- Yes this is a very childish response but i'm pissed with having to sift through his crap every morning, i think it's only fair!
Ideally google can resolve this issue by allowing to create a list of blocked developers. And the ability to block any apps containing the word soundboard would make my day

nEx.Software an app that was basically cryket.com for the android would be awesome. What would really be sweet was if it had an independant comment system that was filterable as well. So we could ban commenters based on their username, words, etc... Filtering by ratings, developer, keywords, etc.. I love it already. Just link the products to their entries in the market. Basically, cryket for the android with comments... I CAN HAZ IT NOW PLZ K?

Also, I'd love to add IndiaNIC, LLC to the filter list. I'm sure *someone* out there likes that they're putting out 300 e-books about India a day, but I'm sure tired of scrolling past them.

The last thing I'd want is to see rigorous policing on the Android Market. He's spreading expensive crapware but I'm sure people are buying it and I'm sure some actually enjoyed it. I don't think removing his apps from the market is the best solution, keep the market as free from censorship as possible if you ask me.
I think the best solution is market search filters as discussed above.

I agree, the ability to "ignore" certain developers would be nice. The new developer I would instantly add to this list would be IndiaNIC, LLC. or whatever the hell they are called. They have about 40 apps on the market, and I don't think a single one has a comment.
/if anyone affiliated with IndiaNIC, LLC reads this, no offense, but please get the message when nobody is buying what you're selling

The more I think about it, the more I realize a filter would be a better idea than removing junk from the market. While I do not agree that anyone will find his apps useful, I do see the point in letting them choose. But at the same time we should be able to choose not to see his crap. As for IndiaNIC, I disagree with placing them in the same category. They have products with good ratings and seem to be making at least SOME useful apps. While I agree they put out too many at once, they seem to have a market for their apps unlike Khalid Shaikh.
Still, a filter would be better for all. I wish I could edit the poll now to add that as an option

ryan75 said:
/if anyone affiliated with IndiaNIC, LLC reads this, no offense, but please get the message when nobody is buying what you're selling
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Spammers don't need to "get the message"! They know exactly what they are selling (junk). The whole point is they are trying to make a quick buck. And in the immortal words of P.T. Barnum: "There's a sucker born every minute."
Nevermind the fact that all of those texts can be downloaded for free from manybooks or feedbooks and then read on FBReaderJ...

Finally, an ORGANIZED place for cooks to put their ROMs

I am working on a website where XDA cooks along with others can post their custom ROMs. I always tought this site is a disorganised mess if you are a newcomer. I built this solution from scratch and it's fully dynamic (PHP+MySQL). I'm almost done with the basics (registering, submitting, browsing...) but I'm still open to suggestions.
Here are a few screenshots. I'd love to get some opinions.
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}

A few possible domains for the website:
deviceroms.com
wmroms.com
To-do:
-Implement the ratings system
-Spread the word
-"Share this page" and other similar features.

[this used to be a reply to a post that was deleted]
I'm also looking for a complete list of Windows Mobile devices so I can list them in the catalog. I already have HTC devices, but I'd need the devices from Acer, HP and the rest too.

So, what do you people think?

Too many usernames
Hi,
That's a tidy looking design, from a user point of view I like XDA Developers because I sign in, and have access to some user support, software downloads, and ROM updates - without having to sign-up for another website...
I really like the idea of a dedicated portal for ROM updates, and detailed instructions for newbies - how about using your portal as an affiliate to XDA developers? So, for instance, I would use the same credentials to log into either site, or even a shared cookie / user database?
For obvious reasons I do not like to use the same credentials between sites, so for you to broker an arrangement with the administrator of this website for sharing the credential database / profiles / and web site traffic would make life for people like me easier....
If I were the administrator of this website with a large following I'd jump at the opportunity for portals and shared resources on other hosts to boost popularity...
There is a new portal on xda-developers coming soon, perhaps they'll address this?

there's no place like xda for ROMs, i'll pass. nice effort though.

mybetrayal said:
I really like the idea of a dedicated portal for ROM updates, and detailed instructions for newbies - how about using your portal as an affiliate to XDA developers? So, for instance, I would use the same credentials to log into either site, or even a shared cookie / user database?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
mybetrayal said:
If I were the administrator of this website with a large following I'd jump at the opportunity for portals and shared resources on other hosts to boost popularity...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unless they bring you on as a contractor to add something to their existing vBulletin install, having a new 3rd party website access their user database is a major security worry. I guess they could create a user authentication API for you to plug into but that'll still be something to be concerned of both from XDA and existing XDA users trusting a new website.
Also with the gray shade legality of these non-MS authorized ROMs, I wouldn't expect their stance to be that accomodating to this. Perhaps you should consider focusing on helping them orginize these new software releases created by the XDA community. That's even harder to sort thru than the ROMs.
Just giving honest opinion from a fellow web developer.

I mostly made this to practice PHP while creating something that could potentially maintain itself financially (domain name+hosting).
I want to provide a way for newcomers and old users to easily find and compare ROMs for their devices. The forum as it actually is is not exactly a welcoming place for those looking for step-by-step guides and organized information. As for software releases, I'd be glad to support them to and even host them if I can afford it. Once the main frame is built, it can and will be reused for Android and software.
As for working with XDA-developers, I'd love it. I aim to integrate XDA-devs as tightly as possible with the rest of the site. However, credentials will stay separate from this site. It's not secure as stated above and might require ridiculous amounts of work from me and the (possibly disinterested) XDA-developers admin. Yet, there will be XDA-developers integration to a certain level.
deviceroms will be a tool, not a community.

I like this concept, please make it real soon and use a better design and simpler design for it

Semseddin said:
I like this concept, please make it real soon and use a better design and simpler design for it
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried to make it as simple and efficient as possible; navigation is simple, registration does not require email confirmation and everything is listed as to make browsing easier for a "ROM shopper". There WILL be moderation as I opted for full HTML support in the description.
As for the delivery date, expect it to be soon enough. I've got only a few work hours and I've done 75 percent of the job after already after 40 days.
The site as it is works but lacks critical features (editing existing listings, rating ROMs and changing account password).

If you need help with maintenance or moderating, let me know. Btw a small forum wouldn't hurt,too. At least a tool to comment on roms will be nice. People might read the reviews of them before downloading.
All the best !

nice job
really hope that you finhish the site soon

Semseddin said:
If you need help with maintenance or moderating, let me know. Btw a small forum wouldn't hurt,too. At least a tool to comment on roms will be nice. People might read the reviews of them before downloading.
All the best !
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hey, you just gave me an idea! I know there are a lot of support/bug report posts in the ROM threads. This will also happen in the comments, so I'll include a dropdown box where they can select the comment's nature so they can be filtered.

You're welcome

That's a great idea.
N1c0_ds said:
Hey, you just gave me an idea! I know there are a lot of support/bug report posts in the ROM threads. This will also happen in the comments, so I'll include a dropdown box where they can select the comment's nature so they can be filtered.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You should consider DIV tabs separating between comments/bug reports. Also you should consider doing a multi-faceted rating system:
Speed
Stability
Free Memory
Built-in Applications
Style/Visual
Then allow people to search and filter based on date plus the rating criteria they are looking for. (ie. within last 3 months that have average 5-star speed ratings)

Also please please please make sure your coding is secure.
The last person who posted on the board showing off that he made a windows mobile application blog/website had made his site public with major security flaws (SQL injection). If I didn't point it to him that there was a major flaw, it might have been left open and someone could have stolen all the e-mails and login info. Since it was a custom job he could have also stored the passwords in plaintext in the database, so any hacker using sql injection could have gotten XDA member's e-mail addresses and passwords which could be horrible if the XDA member is the type that uses the same password on multiple websites.

SeanFromSoCal said:
You should consider DIV tabs separating between comments/bug reports. Also you should consider doing a multi-faceted rating system:
Speed
Stability
Free Memory
Built-in Applications
Style/Visual
Then allow people to search and filter based on date plus the rating criteria they are looking for. (ie. within last 3 months that have average 5-star speed ratings)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's a great idea. There is no ratings system yet, so that might be a cool idea. I still can't figure out a better way than storing individual votes in a table to limit users to a single vote per ROM.
SeanFromSoCal said:
The last person who posted on the board showing off that he made a windows mobile application blog/website had made his site public with major security flaws (SQL injection). If I didn't point it to him that there was a major flaw, it might have been left open and someone could have stolen all the e-mails and login info. Since it was a custom job he could have also stored the passwords in plaintext in the database, so any hacker using sql injection could have gotten XDA member's e-mail addresses and passwords which could be horrible if the XDA member is the type that uses the same password on multiple websites.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm a starter but I am well aware of the risks of SQL and script injection attacks. I am actively reading on the topic in order to prevent these before going live.

N1c0_ds said:
That's a great idea. There is no ratings system yet, so that might be a cool idea. I still can't figure out a better way than storing individual votes in a table to limit users to a single vote per ROM.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah that's the best way to do it. You could always have a CRON script to run everynight to parse the votes and store that value in a separate "ROM_Rating_Summary" table.
ROM_ID, RatingCount, AverageSpeedRating, AverageStabilityRating, AverageMemoryRating, AverageFeatureRating, AverageStyleRating, TotalSpeedPoints, TotalStabilityPoints, TotalMemoryPoints, TotalFeaturePoints, TotalStylePoints
So the cron will add up all the SpeedPoints from each user rating (4+3+5+2+3+4+4) and then divide it by RatingCount. 4+3+5+2+3+4+4 = 25 / 7 = 3.57 avg rating in Speed category. The cron will add the last days' new rating points and increment the rating count and then you divide and get the revised average rating. By parsing only the last day's worth of comments this way, it should be fast to loop thru even 1000 ROMs.
Have fun with it.

Alright folks! I'm 90% done! Once I get the BBCode support working, I'll upload it online for bug testing

Google Drive LIVE

Its live now with android app...
desktop client too..
very nice in my opinion. love that it just makes a folder on my desktop to share stuff with all of my devices and the public if i wanted...
also the share feature is very nice as you can pick and choose who you want to share the content with !
great
Thanks google

Google Drive
Google Drive for Android

italia0101 said:
Its live now with android app...
desktop client too..
very nice in my opinion. love that it just makes a folder on my desktop to share stuff with all of my devices and the public if i wanted...
also the share feature is very nice as you can pick and choose who you want to share the content with !
great
Thanks google
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well, the same way as Dropbox...

100 GB for $4.99 month.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using Tapatalk 2

david279 said:
100 GB for $4.99 month.
Sent from my Nexus S 4G using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It hit, I upgraded to 80g for $20/year. Not more then 20min later they rolled out the new plans. Sooooo happy i upgraded when i did!

25 GB $2.49
100 GB $4.99
200 GB $9.99
400 GB $19.99
1 TB $49.99
2 TB $99.99
4 TB $199.99
8 TB $399.99
16 TB $799.99
16 000 Go for 605€ !

For me it says "Google Drive is not ready"

Interesting read....
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/how-far-does-google-drives-terms-go-in-owning-your-files/75228

seriosbrad said:
For me it says "Google Drive is not ready"
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Same here...any workarounds for this?

Nick N said:
Interesting read....
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/how-far-does-google-drives-terms-go-in-owning-your-files/75228
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Very interesting.. Not only will they host my files, but they will also allow anyone access to them. Glad someone dug around the privacy policy a bit, we'll see how this all pans out in the coming months. I for one will be staying away from google drive..

swamp goblin said:
Very interesting.. Not only will they host my files, but they will also allow anyone access to them. Glad someone dug around the privacy policy a bit, we'll see how this all pans out in the coming months. I for one will be staying away from google drive..
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
FUNK THIS ****!
Google Drive — Terms
“Your Content in our Services: When you upload or otherwise submit content to our Services, you give Google (and those we work with) a worldwide licence to use, host, store, reproduce, modify, create derivative works (such as those resulting from translations, adaptations or other changes that we make so that your content works better with our Services), communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display and distribute such content.
The rights that you grant in this licence are for the limited purpose of operating, promoting and improving our Services, and to develop new ones. This licence continues even if you stop using our Services (for example, for a business listing that you have added to Google Maps).”

i'd rather use skydrive, since i like the ms office web apps better then the google docs, but they dont have an official android app

just to mention about google "owning " your files once you upload... this isnt correct
it may be badly worded , but it basically means that if you share something with public / google + then it will be used with these services ,
not that they can go through your drive and save whatever they want...
basically this:
“Some of our Services allow you to submit content. You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours.”
Reasons for the uses:
Use, host, store: Obvious
Reproduce: Backup
Modify, create derivative works: Convert to Google Docs format, Resizing photos etc
Communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display, distribute: Sharing (If you ask them to)

italia0101 said:
just to mention about google "owning " your files once you upload... this isnt correct
it may be badly worded , but it basically means that if you share something with public / google + then it will be used with these services ,
not that they can go through your drive and save whatever they want...
basically this:
“Some of our Services allow you to submit content. You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours.”
Reasons for the uses:
Use, host, store: Obvious
Reproduce: Backup
Modify, create derivative works: Convert to Google Docs format, Resizing photos etc
Communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display, distribute: Sharing (If you ask them to)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I readed article about that. It says: when you upload any file to google drive, you give licence/permission to google to use, change, modify, share with public your material etc.
http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57420551-93/who-owns-your-files-on-google-drive/
Sent from SpeedMachine i9023

yea but most forgot to mention that other paragraph i posted before...
they arnt steeling your data... it just says you can share it using there services if you want 2
for example of that article of yours....
Updated at 8 p.m. to clarify that the first sentence of the Google terms states: "You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours." For more on this topic, See Rafe Needlemen's FAQ.

italia0101 said:
just to mention about google "owning " your files once you upload... this isnt correct
it may be badly worded , but it basically means that if you share something with public / google + then it will be used with these services ,
not that they can go through your drive and save whatever they want...
basically this:
“Some of our Services allow you to submit content. You retain ownership of any intellectual property rights that you hold in that content. In short, what belongs to you stays yours.”
Reasons for the uses:
Use, host, store: Obvious
Reproduce: Backup
Modify, create derivative works: Convert to Google Docs format, Resizing photos etc
Communicate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display, distribute: Sharing (If you ask them to)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
"Derivative works" is a legal term.. It means they can modify, add to, or delete from your items and reuse however they see fit, for the purpose of improving their services. That's broad enough that they technically could, say photoshop that nude picture of your gf and use it somehow. But don't take my word for it.. I'm only a lawyer.
Sent from my Nexus S using Tapatalk 2

I think im gonna keep it but I'm gonna wait it out to see if they kinda clear the air with their terms. I hope they integrate it with chrome 20 for regular desktops though that would be cool.

uansari1 said:
"Derivative works" is a legal term.. It means they can modify, add to, or delete from your items and reuse however they see fit, for the purpose of improving their services. That's broad enough that they technically could, say photoshop that nude picture of your gf and use it somehow. But don't take my word for it.. I'm only a lawyer.
Sent from my Nexus S using Tapatalk 2
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Quite honestly, why does Google want a picture of anyone's girlfriend? They just have very broad terms to avoid being sued as much as possible. I highly doubt they'd ever do anything like that, but either way, as with any website, don't upload anything that could ever get you into trouble or anything you don't want publicly seen. Nothing ever gets deleted completely and you don't want to do something later regrettable.

Rblacula said:
Quite honestly, why does Google want a picture of anyone's girlfriend? They just have very broad terms to avoid being sued as much as possible. I highly doubt they'd ever do anything like that, but either way, as with any website, don't upload anything that could ever get you into trouble or anything you don't want publicly seen. Nothing ever gets deleted completely and you don't want to do something later regrettable.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's exactly my point... "technically", they can do what they want. Will they? Probably not. I write contracts to protect my company as much as possible... Google's lawyers are no different.

thing is they need those rights to be able to to index the files and create thumbnails... thats what they are using it for

Why does Omnirom exist?

Forgive me if this thread is out of place. I mean everything I say with the greatest respect for omnirom's devs and users.
I found out about omnirom recently. I was struck by its motto: "Omni isn’t better, just different." There has to be a better reason to go to the trouble of building a rom that's only going to be slightly different from AOSP or Cyanogenmod.
I want to make a suggestion. As a new android rom, why not fill a need in the community instead of saying, we've got nothing better to offer you, only something different. Novelty wears off and people want more than just "different" from their operating systems.
Can I suggest a huge glaring need in the Android rom space that no major mod is filling? Security and Privacy.
The NSA and other intelligence agencies and corporations are launching attacks on people. Even Google is doing that. Months after I got my new android device, I was shocked when I found that Android was uploading all my contacts and other data to google's servers without asking me.
Read this article (Ars Technica: Google’s iron grip on Android: Controlling open source by any means necessary) to see how Google is making a walled garden with Android.
With 4.4, Google seems to be going even further. They won't stop. Google is using android as a trojan horse to collect information from people and sell it. Facebook is also doing it. The NSA is doing it.
Is there anybody out there who respects people and their privacy any more? I can't think of any major rom that does it.
Omnirom has xplodwild, Dees_Troy and Chainfire and many other talented developers, but why is the only thing they offer us a slightly different rom?!
We techsavvy people want more from our roms than that. Our pressing need in this day and age is not split screen apps. We're being constantly spied on by everybody and being monetised by everyone. What about end-to-end email security via Mailpile and the Dark Mail alliance? What about the Freedombox project?
Omnirom's description says, "Omni is what custom ROMs used to be about – innovation, new features, transparency, community, and freedom." Every android rom innovates new features and they're all open source because Android is open source. Most of them have a community focus. How is Omnirom any different?
Every project needs a reason to exist. I can't see omnirom's reason for existence.
There is a lack of respect for people by governments and corporations. They seek to use us or buy and sell us. Omnirom has the chance to fill a need in FOSS android world: A rom that respects and protects the data and the individual from legalized spying.
Let me respectfully ask this question. Wouldn't it be more reasonable to put all your talents to something useful and filling a need in the android world instead of being another flavour of stock Android?

Hoodahottie said:
Forgive me if this thread is out of place. I mean everything I say with the greatest respect for omnirom's devs and users.
I found out about omnirom recently. I was struck by its motto: "Omni isn’t better, just different." There has to be a better reason to go to the trouble of building a rom that's only going to be slightly different from AOSP or Cyanogenmod.
I want to make a suggestion. As a new android rom, why not fill a need in the community instead of saying, we've got nothing better to offer you, only something different. Novelty wears off and people want more than just "different" from their operating systems.
Can I suggest a huge glaring need in the Android rom space that no major mod is filling? Security and Privacy.
The NSA and other intelligence agencies and corporations are launching attacks on people. Even Google is doing that. Months after I got my new android device, I was shocked when I found that Android was uploading all my contacts and other data to google's servers without asking me.
Read this article (Ars Technica: Google’s iron grip on Android: Controlling open source by any means necessary) to see how Google is making a walled garden with Android.
With 4.4, Google seems to be going even further. They won't stop. Google is using android as a trojan horse to collect information from people and sell it. Facebook is also doing it. The NSA is doing it.
Is there anybody out there who respects people and their privacy any more? I can't think of any major rom that does it.
Omnirom has xplodwild, Dees_Troy and Chainfire and many other talented developers, but why is the only thing they offer us a slightly different rom?!
We techsavvy people want more from our roms than that. Our pressing need in this day and age is not split screen apps. We're being constantly spied on by everybody and being monetised by everyone. What about end-to-end email security via Mailpile and the Dark Mail alliance? What about the Freedombox project?
Omnirom's description says, "Omni is what custom ROMs used to be about – innovation, new features, transparency, community, and freedom." Every android rom innovates new features and they're all open source because Android is open source. Most of them have a community focus. How is Omnirom any different?
Every project needs a reason to exist. I can't see omnirom's reason for existence.
There is a lack of respect for people by governments and corporations. They seek to use us or buy and sell us. Omnirom has the chance to fill a need in FOSS android world: A rom that respects and protects the data and the individual from legalized spying.
Let me respectfully ask this question. Wouldn't it be more reasonable to put all your talents to something useful and filling a need in the android world instead of being another flavour of stock Android?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Something that perhaps doesn't come across when reading about Omni is about our thoughts on security and privacy. I'm one of the loudest complainers about the actions of a few companies (Google being the main one), who are using Android as a platform to spy on people.
Make no mistake, Omni will seek to address that. One issue the community faces though is that it is currently at the ebb and whim of Google. If Google decide to do X, pretty much every custom ROM has no real choice other than to follow. The aim of Omni is to offer an alternative "upstream" to look towards, when you find out that Google has started to call home every inbound phone number that it doesn't "recognise", in order to find out if it's a company from Google Maps/Local... And presumably log that forever more with your account...

This is a timely question with a very reassuring response. There is F-Droid instead of PlayStore (but it tends to be a few months behind) and OsmAnd instead of Maps (which is better in some ways). I would like to see more in this direction too.

IMO unless your a spy or a criminal I don't see why someone would care about all that NSA stuff.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app

pulser_g2 said:
Something that perhaps doesn't come across when reading about Omni is about our thoughts on security and privacy. I'm one of the loudest complainers about the actions of a few companies (Google being the main one), who are using Android as a platform to spy on people.
Make no mistake, Omni will seek to address that. One issue the community faces though is that it is currently at the ebb and whim of Google. If Google decide to do X, pretty much every custom ROM has no real choice other than to follow. The aim of Omni is to offer an alternative "upstream" to look towards, when you find out that Google has started to call home every inbound phone number that it doesn't "recognise", in order to find out if it's a company from Google Maps/Local... And presumably log that forever more with your account...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Are you thinking of implementing off the shelf carddav / caldav syncing? Instead of syncing with Google for calendar and contacts, you can sync with any other source (like ownCloud).
Something that Davdroid does.
I am using this setup on my own private Linux server the last few days and seems to work well.
Sent from my TF300T using Tapatalk 4

jonathanxx1 said:
IMO unless your a spy or a criminal I don't see why someone would care about all that NSA stuff.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately, this is the biggest problem that the security industry (ie. people like me) face, in trying to explain the issues here.
Here's a small example, to show you the problems, not specifically with the NSA, but with anything "cloud". Let's imagine a malicious attacker is going after you...
Let's look at your gmail account. It's likely that you signed up for it with your old Hotmail account (the previously most common type of email service). Most people did. It's also likely that you protect your Gmail account fairly well, but have likely not changed your Hotmail password in a while. That's likely the best way in for an attacker.
Now, before you say "OK, but what's the risk", let's take a look at what information is accessible to someone getting into your Google account.
Firstly, they know the details of all your android devices (IMEI etc) - they know what tablets you have, what phones you have, and their serial numbers and identifiers. They can also carry out a remote wipe on any of your devices via Mobile Device Manager. Let's come back to this later though
From Google Mail, they have a fair idea of what you're up to, based on your communications to other people. They can access your location history, and data-mine that, to figure out where you are. They can also look at your communications with other people via Hangouts and G+, and attempt to work out where you are (or simply use the GPS location). They can access the location sharing features of google's services, and see where you and your family are. They can see you're not at home (getting your address from an email), and go to your house, aware your kids are home alone, and rob the place, abducting them.
When you return home, you meet a scene of devastation. You take out your phone and call the cops. You call 911/999/112/whatever, but the call was intercepted and passed to the attackers, via software that was installed onto your phone remotely (via the play store's remote push system).
At this point, the attacker takes your phone, and puts you in the back of the van. He uses Google Device Manager, and removes the lockscreen password from your phone (via the forgot lockscreen code feature). This also resets your device encryption password to a known one. At this point, all the devices are turned off, and their SIMs removed, and you are driven to a remote location.
The attackers then call your partner (having got their number from your Google contacts), and demand $1 million, while telling your partner that you know they are currently in <name of place from their google shared location feature>. The same remote access toolkit is installed onto their phone (given they had used your email as a recovery email for their Google account), and this permits monitoring of their phone to check if they call 911 etc.
OK, that all sounds far-fetched, but that is all entirely possible. The sheer amount of data being held about you, by google and other cloud providers, is insane. I didn't even go into the possibility of financial theft here. Cellphones are a very important thing to people, and they often take them for granted. Would you consider that when you called 911 in a moment of need, that someone had remote-installed a piece of malicious software, which exploits an android security hole, to replace the dialer app, and route the call to a rogue attacker, pretending to be the emergency services?
The amount of control that "other people" have over a phone running "Google Apps" is immense. Don't just think about the "NSA" aspects of this - consider how devastating it would be if someone had access to your Google account. And now remember that anyone on the technical team of Google could (in theory) issue an access token to your account to a well-paying attacker...
Oh, and one of the best ways an attacker can get into your Google account is simply to steal a phone or tablet, and extract the Google authentication token. Sure, they might not be able to change your password, but they are now "into" the chain, and will be able to start the attack.
If this don't bother you, I don't know what will...

scanno said:
Are you thinking of implementing off the shelf carddav / caldav syncing? Instead of syncing with Google for calendar and contacts, you can sync with any other source (like ownCloud).
Something that Davdroid does.
I am using this setup on my own private Linux server the last few days and seems to work well.
Sent from my TF300T using Tapatalk 4
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I currently use {Card,Cal}dav syncing via my OwnCloud server. Thanks for the link to DavDroid, I'd not seen it before!

jonathanxx1 said:
IMO unless your a spy or a criminal I don't see why someone would care about all that NSA stuff.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's shocking that so many people don't (want to?) see the actual problem. The whole spying system is not just about tracking down terrorists.
Google, Facebook, etc and even governmental institutions collect our data to predict and influence our future actions.
So please devs, give us the option to be more independent from the big companies.
Gesendet von meinem Find 5 mit Tapatalk

I
pulser_g2 said:
I currently use {Card,Cal}dav syncing via my OwnCloud server. Thanks for the link to DavDroid, I'd not seen it before!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
DavDroid is a pretty nice solution and you can set it up for multiple accounts.
I am still looking for a good note taking app (using Evernote now) to sync with my OwnCloud server.
Do you have any suggestions for a sort of Evernote replacement that can sync with OwnCloud?
Sent from my Xperia T using Tapatalk
---------- Post added at 03:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:53 PM ----------
boernie said:
It's shocking that so many people don't (want to?) see the actual problem. The whole spying system is not just about tracking down terrorists.
Google, Facebook, etc and even governmental institutions collect our data to predict and influence our future actions.
So please devs, give us the option to be more independent from the big companies.
Gesendet von meinem Find 5 mit Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For your calendar and contacts there are solutions already. Main problem is where so you store your data. You will need your own server or trusted third party.
Sent from my Xperia T using Tapatalk

I'm trying to set up my own infrastructure
But I was surprised that there was not out-of-the-box solution to use CardDav and CalDav.
Maybe you could include the apps mentioned above as they are/will become open source.
Gesendet von meinem Find 5 mit Tapatalk

scanno said:
I
DavDroid is a pretty nice solution and you can set it up for multiple accounts.
I am still looking for a good note taking app (using Evernote now) to sync with my OwnCloud server.
Do you have any suggestions for a sort of Evernote replacement that can sync with OwnCloud?
Sent from my Xperia T using Tapatalk
---------- Post added at 03:57 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:53 PM ----------
For your calendar and contacts there are solutions already. Main problem is where so you store your data. You will need your own server or trusted third party.
Sent from my Xperia T using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've found a nice notepad app, but none yet that use OwnCloud sync.
I was thinking about looking into https://github.com/spacecowboy/NotePad and trying to get it working with the API. It would be fairly easy to remove the "closed" bits like Dropbox sync etc, and use the OwnCloud backend. It would also be nice to add proper encryption of notes later on.
Anyone else interested? (I hate android app coding, I can't even get the dependencies to resolve for it to build... Thus contributing to my dislike for ANYTHING java based)

pulser_g2 said:
Something that perhaps doesn't come across when reading about Omni is about our thoughts on security and privacy. I'm one of the loudest complainers about the actions of a few companies (Google being the main one), who are using Android as a platform to spy on people.
Make no mistake, Omni will seek to address that. One issue the community faces though is that it is currently at the ebb and whim of Google. If Google decide to do X, pretty much every custom ROM has no real choice other than to follow. The aim of Omni is to offer an alternative "upstream" to look towards, when you find out that Google has started to call home every inbound phone number that it doesn't "recognise", in order to find out if it's a company from Google Maps/Local... And presumably log that forever more with your account...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm thrilled to hear this! Do other omnirom devs share your opinion?
I know it's early, but does the omnirom team have specific security/privacy ideas they want to implement?
In the long run, I don't see the Android ecosystem remaining in one piece. It's going to fragment. Amazon has already done it. Samsung may make this move. And people who want privacy and secure communications need a rom (and perhaps it's own app ecosystem) to which they can turn.
Please think about changing your why omnirom page. Right now, its pitch is very weak. Add a section about privacy and security and people will flock to this rom.
boernie said:
It's shocking that so many people don't (want to?) see the actual problem. The whole spying system is not just about tracking down terrorists.
Google, Facebook, etc and even governmental institutions collect our data to predict and influence our future actions.
So please devs, give us the option to be more independent from the big companies.
Gesendet von meinem Find 5 mit Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'm absolutely shocked every time I hear people say this. So many people just dismiss the NSA spying because they're not terrorists. They don't have the imagination it takes to understand that today's citizen is tomorrow's terrorist. Every country that spied on it's citizens has oppressed them.
I'm not a spy or terrorist, but I don't want my every thought and action logged away to be used against me later.
boernie said:
I'm trying to set up my own infrastructure
But I was surprised that there was not out-of-the-box solution to use CardDav and CalDav.
Maybe you could include the apps mentioned above as they are/will become open source.
Gesendet von meinem Find 5 mit Tapatalk
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can't post links, but if you want your own secure cloud, look at the Freedombox project. It's Debian based and it has some radical ideas. Eben Moglen and Bdale garbee have worked on it since 2010. Eben Moglen's talk about countries spying on citizens came long before the NSA story came to light.
The website is kind of dead, but in August Bdale gave a talk where he said Freedombox 1.0 should come before 2014. It's on youtube.

boernie said:
It's shocking that so many people don't (want to?) see the actual problem. The whole spying system is not just about tracking down terrorists.
Google, Facebook, etc and even governmental institutions collect our data to predict and influence our future actions.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
There is a pretty simple solution to this!
Don't behave like expected.
Sent from my Find 5 using Tapatalk

Hoodahottie said:
Even Google is doing that. Months after I got my new android device, I was shocked when I found that Android was uploading all my contacts and other data to google's servers without asking me.
We techsavvy people want more
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
With all due respect to the OP, the above is the major problem. While many of us are "tech savvy" to one degree or another, I think we forget how to read sometimes.
When you're given that stack of papers to sign for your mortgage, car loan, credit card or bank account, how many blindly sign where we are told to be the agent of that company? Do you read what you are signing? If you answer yes, why is setting up your phone any different? We are told that such and such information is going to be collected when we sign up for our Google accounts. We are told that additional information is going to be collected when we set up our phone. Every time we start up GPS services, we are told Google is going to use this data they collect.
This causes me to wonder why it takes people by surprise when they learn that Google isn't a computer hardware and software company, but a marketing company. And even more wonder happens when they mention it's without their knowledge. Reading terms of service is important. They spell out exactly what they are going to do and give you the option not to participate. When I worked for IBM in the 80's, I had to sign away any rights to technology I developed while working there (with the exception of anything I started before employment and listed on their agreement). If I didn't want to do that I was my choice to not work there. The same thing happened with Tricord, Wang, Computer Associates, MAI, Excactium, Pivotal, etc
The other response about the NSA is troubling as well. We elect our representatives in this country every two four or six years. How many of those people that you voted into office voted yes to the Patriot Act? You want some scary reading, research the rights we gave up allowing that to happen.
We are innocent until proven guilty. The NSA "spying" doesn't just ensnare terrorist, but easily the whole population of the USA. Their model of two, three and more levels of contact captures everyone. The real question isn't I'm not a terrorist so why does it matter, it is I'm not a terrorist so why are you doing it?
We setup up these phones with the knowledge we would be tracked. We walk down the street and see security cameras watching. Then we complain about it? We allowed it to happen to have a whiz bang new phone or to feel safer.
" Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." Benjamin Franklin
I work in retail. Every year I hear people complain that we set Christmas stuff too early. Those same people are buying their lights, cards and trees in the same visit. If they didn't buy early, we wouldn't set early. If we truly cared about not being used as marketing data, we wouldn't be using these phones. We wouldn't use Google.com to search. We wouldn't re-elect many of those in office at the local state and federal levels.
Sorry for the rant, I'll step of the soapbox and allow this discussion to get back on track.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

With no disrespect, I wonder if people who ask me to take full responsibility understand life and power.
I understand that I have to take some responsibility for signing on for services and programs, but I blame the government and corporations more because they are many times richer and more powerful than me.
And they take advantage of that.
How many Terms of service agreements have I had to sign to use internet services? If I really read all of their ToS, I wouldn't have time for anything else. I'll bet that the ceos of these companies haven't read the ToS of their own products. They don't have to because they have the money to hire 50 of the best lawyers and ask them to craft a bullet-proof ToS.
They probably spent tens of thousands of dollars on the ToS. And I stand against all of that money and power, with limited time and resources and no law degree. Am I the one to be blamed? They know I'm tired from work, that I don't have a legal background and my attention span is limited and I need this product, and there is no other choice unless I'm willing to suffer a lot.
Often these multinational corporations control the whole market and I don't really have any choice. Look at the phone OS market now. I can choose between Android, iOS or Windows Phone. My choices are an open source OS built to facilitate spying, an overpriced, closed source, simplistic OS built by a company that co-operates with the NSA or a closed source, proprietary phone from an industry giant accused of anti-competitive behaviour and also collaborating with the NSA.
There's no real choice. Not just in the phone industry, but in most places in life. Powerful people don't become powerful by giving everyone else choices and freedom. They take freedom away. You ask me to take responsibility as if I had another, better choice. Apple, Google and Microsoft ToS will be mostly similar and it'll always protect their interests. There are no other real choices. It's always been that way, and why I blame the government, corporations and powerful people more than myself.
To really win, I'd have to devote my life to fighting all these powerful forces and even if I win, I'll have to spend the rest of my life defending against other crooks who'd try to do the same thing. I wouldn't have any time left for a life.

"You ask me to take responsibility as if I had another, better choice."
Who else is responsible for your actions?
"Apple, Google and Microsoft ToS will be mostly similar and it'll always protect their interests. There are no other real choices."
Yes, these companies are in business to make money. That is no different than you having a job to make money.
But do not tell me you or Bill or Steve or Larry do not have à choice. Ever heard of CP/M? An Altair? AltaVista? If you haven't, here is some history.
CP/M was a dominant operating system before DOS. Bill Gates made a choice to create Altair Basic for the Altair microcomputer being sold mail-order. That was the start of Micro-Soft (now Microsoft). He made another choice to create MS-DOS to compete against CP/M for the IBM PC and clones. He made another choice to start work on Windows to compete against Apple's graphical interfaces and IBM's TopView.
Before Steve Jobs made the choice to sell Woz's garage built microcomputer (later named the Apple) there was the Altair mentioned above. They made a choice to build an alternative.
Larry Page and Sergey Brin made the choice to start Google, thinking they could do search better than AltaVista, Yahoo, Excite, HotBot, MetaCrawler, etc.
Powerful people become powerful many times by giving others alternatives. The above mentioned powerful people are examples.
We can make the choice to use prepaid basic phones and not worry about anyone watching us because you don't use personal information to activate.
"To really win, I'd have to devote my life to fighting all these powerful forces"
You should. Doing so makes you powerful. Recently two women changed how one of the world's largest food brands makes their products. One of them eventually dropped out of the spot light and it became the crusade of ONE woman. Kraft Foods is changing how they make some of their Mac and Cheese products due to the efforts of one individual. No more Yellow #5 in their Mac and Cheese products specifically marketed at children. That was a choice she made. A fight that became part of her life.
We all have choices. We are all responsible for our own actions. We can't blame government as a whole because they are largely elected by us. We work to make money to live the life we choose. Corporations (started by individuals) do the same thing.
Sorry again for diverting off topic, but I have a difficult time with responsibility shifting to account for mistakes. We all make them (this reply is probably one of mine). A wise person once said, the man who makes no mistake, usually doesn't make anything worthwhile.
This particular set of threads, all the Omni threads, are what make communities like this work. We can voice opinions, state facts, help with commands to build a repository, compile a kernel, even agree to disagree.
This is how XDA started, while maybe some sections have stayed from the roots, Omni has brought it back full circle.
Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

jonathanxx1 said:
IMO unless your a spy or a criminal I don't see why someone would care about all that NSA stuff.
Sent from my Nexus 7 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You may want to skim through this: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052748704471504574438900830760842
Some laws (in many? all? countries) are so loosely worded that you're probably breaking some of them right now. Now remember that the government/google/facebook/whoever is watching everything you do. If you ever become "a problem" you're not going to be too difficult to "deal with". Just a potential look at one of the many problems with complete surveillance.

You guys talk about this as if Google, Facebook and all these companies willingly gave up this information.
But the reality is this: the government (NSA) asks for the data. If the companies deny them this, the NSA then goes to obtain a generalized warrant from the FISA courts, secret courts with a 99.7% warrant approval rate, and then obtain the data regardless of what these companies want.
And for those of you who STILL think it's the companies, read this: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...1d661e-4166-11e3-8b74-d89d714ca4dd_story.html
---------- Post added at 10:38 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:31 AM ----------
And yes, these companies DO own your data. As soon as you click "I accept these terms" on the registration page, they are now the owners of everything that goes through their online services.
But, here's the catch. Companies are individuals too, as established in Citizens United v. FCC, and are protected under the same rights as any other individual. And it logically follows that because of this, it is a breach on each company's 4th amendment rights for the NSA to obtain generalized warrants, that list NO goal for the investigation, and use these in order to force each company to fork over account details among other things.

frustration pure
one of the most common arguments of those who don't care or don't want to face the
risks of others knowing anything or almost everything of us is:
i have nothing to hide so what !
now to make a point i would like to come up with a very simple and for many
perhaps a bit strange example but i think most will understand what i mean.
ALBEIT I'M ALLOWED TO MAKE LOVE TO MY WIFE AND IT'S TOTALLY LEGAL
AND RIGHT, I DO NOT WANT ANYONE TO LISTEN OR WATCH :laugh:
UNDERSTOOD ?
regards

+1
I've been lurking and decided to give my opinion. First though, let me give a little background. Two years ago I bought my first Nexus and I rooted it right away. I left the bootloader unlocked, the CWM recovery installed, and USB debugging left on. Any app that could log me in automatically I allowed...Ebay, Amazon, Gmail, etc. I thought I was doing a good job protecting my privacy by using a strong password lock and installing Lookout.
I had no idea how easy it was to gain access to all of my data. My ignorance would not have protected me. Now to today. I have a rooted phone, but the bootloader is locked with the stock recovery installed. I will install a custom rom when a good one is available, but the stock recovery will be re-flashed and the bootloader locked when I'm done. I still use Lookout. I'm using LastPass to manage unique strong passwords now...no more saving passwords. I'm waiting for ADB Toggle to be fixed for Kitkat and USB Debugging will be turned off when my phone plugs into a computer. I am constantly looking for ways to protect my data.
To have total convenience, you must give up privacy and security. To have total privacy and security, you must give up convenience. I know that google has access to EVERYTHING I do with my phone and am not happy about it. I try to be informed and balance convenience, privacy, and security.
:good: I second the suggestion that OmniROM should attempt to become the ROM for people who want to protect their privacy and security. :good: There is a lot that can be done at the operating system level that cannot be performed by individual apps. Sure, I love all the features that custom ROMs offer and look forward to see what can be done, but privacy and security are #1 for me.
If you agree, then +1 this post.

Google's thirst for your info.

i guess this is a general subject, but fits in this forum because we're (nexus users) probably more affected than the rest of the android world. In short, i'm not liking Google's thirst for collecting info in order to sell us ads, tailor and filter information that gets to us, or even sell our info to other companies (android police had an article a while back about a company who was doing this). But let's go back in time a bit first...
My first android device was back in 2010, and i've been through a few htc and samsung devices, galaxy nexus, nexus 4 and of course nexus 5. Now, whoever had a galaxy nexus might remember how android was back then, ICS just came out, it was the first version that could actually compete with it's rival OS's, and the official builds on the galaxy nexus were very close to AOSP.
On the nexus 4 we started to see some changes, Chrome replaced AOSP's browser (Browser) even though it was still not ready for that role yet and despite it coming a long way to where it is now, IMO it's still not as good as the stock browser was. Google Play Music also replaced Music as the default music player and so on..
On the nexus 5 Hangouts replaced stock Messaging (in my opinion it also is not ready for that role yet) and last but not least we're witnessing how G+'s Photos is going to replace Gallery (which is simple and fast, works great, and has a mighty lil photo editor).
Let's add to that Photosphere, a feature exclusive to nexus devices, and the Google Experience launcher (exclusive to nexus 5). So we've reached quite a big divergence from AOSP.
Another thing is how Google is forcing it's social network, either through binding playstore/youtube comments with it, photos, G+ sign in, Game hub (Play Games) etc.. Basically, you have to have G+ to be able to do simple stuff.
Also, we all know that one of the reasons they killed microSD support was to get people to use their cloud services, Keep, Drive, GMusic, G+ autobackup photos...
Other than forcing it's services, Google likes to tailor things for us. A simple example is the Youtube app, it's default opening screen is "What to watch" instead of subscriptions.
Also, Google Now is a cool concept, and it can be very helpful, but it kind of adopts the concept of offering you the info (it thinks) you need, according to certain algorithms. And that's the way Google's search engine has been functioning for years. And it's not only a Google thing, everybody does it, facebook, yahoo etc..
If you've read this far, and this subject interests you, watch this TED talk http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8ofWFx525s
I've been thinking about this subject for a while, and honestly, i have mixed thoughts about it. I use Google's services and i actually like Google as a company -despite the lil rant above- but i try my best to control what info i share with them, and i'm definitely not liking the route Google is taking with android, causing fragmentation even between nexus devices, closing down a lot of open source services and forcing it's own, and tailoring stuff for me. I don't need someone to think or make decisions on behalf of me, i want to be able to decide what i want to see/read/know about/use. I also want android to stay as open sourced and available to everyone as it can be.
So what's your take on this subject? do you have any concerns about your privacy and the info you share with Google's servers? and how about the android -or should i say Google- experience on the N5 compared to AOSP or past experiences you had with previous nexus devices, do you see any difference?

Google uses your data to build out great services. They also get a lot of money for advertising, and that's just the way it is. Do you think they should give Maps and Gmail away for free to people without getting something in return? Everyone who buys a Nexus device or uses Google's services understands this. You said in your post that Google forces their services on us, but you aren't being forced to use a Nexus device, or use Maps and Gmail. You made that decision yourself, so I don't understand why you're complaining.

Oh no, Google can't do nothing bad. It's Apple's fault.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

I don't really understand what you are getting at. If you don't like all of the Google services then why not install cyanogen mod? The sole purpose of a business is to make money for it shareholders and Google is a business. They provide amazing apps and services for "free". I put free in quotes because you are indirectly paying for it. No one is forcing you to use Google phones or Google services.
Edit* okay I do understand what you are getting at but I don't feel that Google is hiding it from its users. It's no secret that Google sells ads. That is their business. They can become a more successful business if they gather more information about its users. I am aware of what Google does when I use its services and I accept it because I use the services they provide and don't have to pull out my credit card.

It's not that hard to understand; why are we all flaming this dude? He was just asking for everyone's opinions.
I agree with you 100%. Especially as I initially made the switch from CM9 to CM10, I was really wary about Google Now. It seemed like it was collecting waaaayyyyy too much info. The G+ integration in Google Play and Youtube also ticked me off.
However, the more I think about it, Google is still being sensible. Google Now can't be compared to Siri because Siri can't do crap; Siri just takes what you say and searches it up. Google Now can be turned off, and if you don't want it always tracking your location, just turn off location and it'll turn off all the location-based cards.
I'm also intrigued (not concerned) by Google's recent actions, especially with the acquisition of Moto, the release of Moto X and Moto G, and the introduction of so many GPe devices. Perhaps Google feels threatened by Samsung and feels the need to tighten its grip? The Nexus/GPe community used to be solely dominated by Samsung, but now it's seen entrances by HTC, LG, Asus and Sony. It seems to me that everything Google has done in the past few months has been forced by Scamsung and Crapple, and that we shouldn't really feel concerned in any way...yet.

The whole world runs on information and EVERYONE is trying to collect as much as possible. You might as well let it benefit you. Imagine if you had to pay for an email client, gps, countless news subscriptions, data hosting, and on top of that, had to pay for every new software version as it was made available. Even paid services are focused primarily on learning as much about you as possible. At least they are trying to learn what interests you to offer you something you might actually want!
I for one am very sad to see Google's Android deviate so far from pure Android. I am not a fan of the Google Experience launcher and I miss the beautifully simple AOSP experience. Even when I do run stock android, I fill it up with Google services. I think the point here is that you should choose what you want... ESPECIALLY with a Nexus device. The Nexus has become too commercial with the N5.
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I dont want anyone selling my data. I do appreciate that I use many Google services for free so I'm happy for their bots to analyse my data to sell tailored advertising to support these services.
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rootSU said:
I dont want anyone selling my data. I do appreciate that I use many Google services for free so I'm happy for their bots to analyse my data to sell tailored advertising to support these services.
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Long as i dont get junk in my email or mailing address, besides what do you got to hide huh? unless you're al qaeda right? or some terrorist..
Google doesn't sell your info to other people, and nor does it "read" your inbox or someone is "reading" it, it looks for certain keywords then deliver ads based on that... test it your self on your phone email your self with any subject and just make a random sentence containing the word viagra, you will now receive ads that have to do with "Male enhancement pills".. google does this to provide cheap devices such as the chromecast and nexus line they want you to buy it in return for your interests then deliver ads based on that then google gets paid by the advertiser or the marketing campain, so lets just call this instead of google stalking you or like mining your information like gold think of it as google trying to see what you're interested into and deliver that to you!
oh also inb4 someone says punctuation is your friend

I've always been very bugged about this that's why I try to download privacy apps to control what permissions they are asking for
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

Google is just a modern day netzero (from back in the days). The sooner you realize that, the better you'll be able to set your expectations.
That being said everything you find worrisome, you can substitute with a different service. It's not being forced to you.
The reality is, you made a calculation that the benefits outweighs the costs. You just may not be conscious of it.
Lastly, the nexus line is pure Google, it's not pure asop. It's Google flavored android, just as htc one is htc flavored android.
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---------- Post added at 12:08 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:04 AM ----------
nohcho said:
Oh no, Google can't do nothing bad. It's Apple's fault.
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Stawman
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markdapimp said:
Long as i dont get junk in my email or mailing address, besides what do you got to hide huh? unless you're al qaeda right? or some terrorist..
Google doesn't sell your info to other people, and nor does it "read" your inbox or someone is "reading" it, it looks for certain keywords then deliver ads based on that...
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Click to collapse
This is exactly my point. You seem to be arguing my point back to me, which makes no sense. Perhaps you misread my post

Nothing online belongs to you.. there are many ways to stay frosty on android.
Sent from my AOSP on HammerHead using Tapatalk

i guess some people didn't get my point, maybe since English is not my native language.
Anyways, as i mentioned in my previous post i do use Google services, and i'm grateful that most of them are free. But it's getting harder and harder to control your privacy. Look at the new location concept in kitkat, you can't switch location OFF completely from the power widget, you have to take additional steps and go into settings. Furthermore, on previous versions, you could use GPS, let's say for sport tracking apps, but deny location from all Google apps. Now you can't do it anymore, even if you use "device only" Google's apps (and facebook and others) are able to ask for your location.
Same goes to the Photos app, if you log in your G+ account, and choose photos from the slide menu, you'll see all your photos, even if they are still only on your device (autobackup OFF), something like the GMusic concept with on-device/cloud music. Honestly, i don't want my photos on G+, and i have a feeling i'll be forced soon to upload them whether i like it or not, just like the location thing.
Also i want to be able to choose what G services i want to use. AOSP still gives that freedom, but no one can deny that Google progressively is stopping to develop AOSP apps, and it's forcing it's own. I think some around here take stuff that Cyanogenmod or the Paranoid team (and others) do for granted. I think people should be thankful for things like 8Sms , Focal and so on, and recognize the effort put in them, and help (test/report bugs) and donate to those devs to encourage them to polish these apps and make them even better. Honestly, i think we were lucky to get to choose what sms client we want as default, if it was up to Google, we wouldn't have that option available.
And lastly, look at what happened to App Ops, it would've been a nice tool to give back control to the end users, but it was killed in the last update with a statement that it was never meant to go public. If they are afraid some people will misuse it and break app-functionality (then whine about it) , well they could've put it in Developer Options right beside ART and the rest of the stuff that can potentially break things on your device.
So as a conclusion, i do like and use Google services, but i also don't want to be forced to share my private data, i just want to be able to do it in the range that i'm comfortable with, and putting everything on Google's servers does not make me feel comfortable :good:

You're never forced to share your data... You don't even have to use your real name on an account!
Sheesh.
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Cirkustanz said:
You're never forced to share your data... You don't even have to use your real name on an account!
Sheesh.
Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk
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That's cool, can I use your name when buying my next phone.... how about my Google store/wallet account, oh yeah and PayPal
makes you wonder why so many laws in the past prohibited such practises... they must of been real stooooopid!! haha
also if it was a bad thing lots of literature would have been written about it, warning us

meangreenie said:
That's cool, can I use your name when buying my next phone.... how about my Google store/wallet account, oh yeah and PayPal
makes you wonder why so many laws in the past prohibited such practises... they must of been real stooooopid!! haha
also if it was a bad thing lots of literature would have been written about it, warning us
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Click to collapse
Don't be silly.
You can pay cash for an Android phone. You can even pay cash for a Nexus 5.
You have the option of paying for mobile purchases with your carrier account, and have you never heard of a pre-paid visa card? There are all kinds of ways to get one without providing any personally identifiable information of any kind. The point of google store purchases being an invasion of your personal information is also entirely moot as you can very easily use an Android phone without making a single purchase on the play store.
You don't even have to use wallet, in fact most Android users CANNOT even use wallet to its fullest since they don't have NFC in their phones.
For real now, if you think your personal data is so valuable and sacred, have fun not having a checking account, loan, a real job, or a real place to live.
You don't even have to have google services running on your phone. This is XDA...install a custom rom and just don't load gapps. Or be even more lazy about it and just disable those apps in settings and they don't run.
That's me being silly. See how that works?

Here's my theory on the issue...
The way I see it is that a person has three choices:
1. Go completely off-the-grid, paying (limited) bills in cash, never engaging with the internet, and forgoing many modern technological conveniences.
2. Allow some personal information here and there, trying to maintain control by engaging with services that can be discontinued when they "cross the line".
3. Allowing access to all personal information online, engaging with anything and everything.
The third is simply not an option for me. I have no desire to have for-profit corporations spamming me with offers for crap I don't want and selling my private, personally identifiable information to anyone and everyone.
The first is really not an option, either. I don't want to be completely cut off from friends or have contacting them be excessively difficult. It is convenient to pay my rent, utilities, and other bills online. Frankly, I'm not good enough with any type of work that allows one to go off the grid to make a living.
So, that leaves me with the second option. I monitor changes to privacy and terms of service policies for the services that I use. I try to limit the services that I use. Obviously, I have a bank account and that comes with the need to provide some information to the bank, but also the ability to monitor my money and immediately flag appropriate people if anything suspicious happens. I have a Google account and a Nexus 5, ergo I use Google's services. And here's what's important to me: I can delete my Google account any time I want. With something like Facebook, it was a lot more difficult to do that once I became uncomfortable with my of the changes Facebook was making. Also, with Google, I can opt-out of many of the services that make me uncomfortable, such as targeted advertising or using my +1's as endorsements. If that ever goes away, I will absolutely reconsider my position. I maintain multiple Google accounts, actually, as a means of limiting who can see what information about me. I have a personal account, which has the most information about me and which is as locked down vis-a-vis Google as I can make it, but which allows my friends and family the best means of interacting with me. I have a professional account, which has only information relevant to my work. I have an "partial-incognito" account, which does not have explicitly identifiable information about me. I have a few completely incognito accounts, which I only ever access through very restricted circumstances, like a proxy server, and have absolutely no information that could be tied back to me. Frankly, that's about the best I can do.
I have chosen to make a tradeoff, information for convenience. The line where I am willing / unwilling to make that tradeoff is a massive grey area and I constantly reevaluate it. Sure, it's annoying to have to stay on top of it, but it's a fact of modern life. As long as Google gives me the option to delete my account whenever I want, I give them the benefit of the doubt and continue providing (limited) information about myself in exchange for some extremely useful services (unfortunately, this isn't the same deal I can make with the NSA).

Lokitez said:
Here's my theory on the issue...
The way I see it is that a person has three choices:
1. Go completely off-the-grid, paying (limited) bills in cash, never engaging with the internet, and forgoing many modern technological conveniences.
2. Allow some personal information here and there, trying to maintain control by engaging with services that can be discontinued when they "cross the line".
3. Allowing access to all personal information online, engaging with anything and everything.
The third is simply not an option for me. I have no desire to have for-profit corporations spamming me with offers for crap I don't want and selling my private, personally identifiable information to anyone and everyone.
The first is really not an option, either. I don't want to be completely cut off from friends or have contacting them be excessively difficult. It is convenient to pay my rent, utilities, and other bills online. Frankly, I'm not good enough with any type of work that allows one to go off the grid to make a living.
So, that leaves me with the second option. I monitor changes to privacy and terms of service policies for the services that I use. I try to limit the services that I use. Obviously, I have a bank account and that comes with the need to provide some information to the bank, but also the ability to monitor my money and immediately flag appropriate people if anything suspicious happens. I have a Google account and a Nexus 5, ergo I use Google's services. And here's what's important to me: I can delete my Google account any time I want. With something like Facebook, it was a lot more difficult to do that once I became uncomfortable with my of the changes Facebook was making. Also, with Google, I can opt-out of many of the services that make me uncomfortable, such as targeted advertising or using my +1's as endorsements. If that ever goes away, I will absolutely reconsider my position. I maintain multiple Google accounts, actually, as a means of limiting who can see what information about me. I have a personal account, which has the most information about me and which is as locked down vis-a-vis Google as I can make it, but which allows my friends and family the best means of interacting with me. I have a professional account, which has only information relevant to my work. I have an "partial-incognito" account, which does not have explicitly identifiable information about me. I have a few completely incognito accounts, which I only ever access through very restricted circumstances, like a proxy server, and have absolutely no information that could be tied back to me. Frankly, that's about the best I can do.
I have chosen to make a tradeoff, information for convenience. The line where I am willing / unwilling to make that tradeoff is a massive grey area and I constantly reevaluate it. Sure, it's annoying to have to stay on top of it, but it's a fact of modern life. As long as Google gives me the option to delete my account whenever I want, I give them the benefit of the doubt and continue providing (limited) information about myself in exchange for some extremely useful services (unfortunately, this isn't the same deal I can make with the NSA).
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's the type of answer i was looking for, thank you for this :good:
i can recognize myself in most of the things you wrote, basically that's how i feel about it too. i hope we won't get to the part where we'll have to "reconsider our position", but all the closing down and limitations are an indication that we're heading that way (i hope i'm wrong).
I started this thread to hear what others think about this subject, and to see if maybe i'm being excessively paranoid

Cirkustanz said:
Don't be silly.
You can pay cash for an Android phone. You can even pay cash for a Nexus 5.
You have the option of paying for mobile purchases with your carrier account, and have you never heard of a pre-paid visa card? There are all kinds of ways to get one without providing any personally identifiable information of any kind. The point of google store purchases being an invasion of your personal information is also entirely moot as you can very easily use an Android phone without making a single purchase on the play store.
You don't even have to use wallet, in fact most Android users CANNOT even use wallet to its fullest since they don't have NFC in their phones.
For real now, if you think your personal data is so valuable and sacred, have fun not having a checking account, loan, a real job, or a real place to live.
You don't even have to have google services running on your phone. This is XDA...install a custom rom and just don't load gapps. Or be even more lazy about it and just disable those apps in settings and they don't run.
That's me being silly. See how that works?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
well none of that was my point, but don't worry about it. your willing to give my and my children's freedom away.. no argument will ever be good enough for you to stop you doing that.

Personally i don't care what Google knows about me (i'm not that interesting and i got nothing to hide - heck let the NSA spy on me too. don't care). I love their services and don't see anything wrong with them using my info to make $$. They are providing me with a service that makes my life a lot easier/better. I also really like the consolidation of Google aps and services and the synergy it creates. Google may force you to use one service to access part of another, but they do not force you to use anything you choose not to. If you don't like G+ integration, don't use Google's suite. I'm not trying to flame the OP, but i just don't get the point of this post. If you don't like something the best way is the speak with your wallet. If enough people do that maybe Google will pay attention.
---------- Post added at 12:58 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:49 PM ----------
rayiskon said:
That's the type of answer i was looking for, thank you for this :good:
i can recognize myself in most of the things you wrote, basically that's how i feel about it too. i hope we won't get to the part where we'll have to "reconsider our position", but all the closing down and limitations are an indication that we're heading that way (i hope i'm wrong).
I started this thread to hear what others think about this subject, and to see if maybe i'm being excessively paranoid
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
this is why you started the thread? to hear opinions that validate your own? i thought it was to spark discussion?