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Out of all the internet giants, at least to me, Apple has time and time again demonstrated to be reasonably ethical. Their position on encryption, net neutralit

Out of all the internet giants, at least to me, Apple has time and time again demonstrated to be reasonably ethical. Their position on encryption, net neutrality (granted, a bit late), gay marriage, their willingness to fight political positions which they disagree with... It could certainly be improved in many ways, but it's still one of the few companies I somewhat trust. Their innovative character is also something I really like (again, granted, it used to be much more so in the past). I used to feel this way about Google too. Given the current events, I don't anymore, and I'm seriously considering DuckDuckGo.

tqkxzugoaupvwqr 9y ago
I’ve been using DuckDuckGo for a few years and can recommend it. Try it. There is no reason to wait. If you are not happy with a search result, prepend !g to your search query and DDG redirects you to Google search.
- juice_bus 9y ago
  Switched to DDG a few weeks ago and can count on one hand the amount of times I've needed to !g
  - eridius 9y ago
    I switched to DDG a while ago and while I do occasionally add !g to my query, I can count on one hand the number of times that it's actually helped. Usually if DDG doesn't give me good results, Google doesn't either.
- eikenberry 9y ago
  FYI you can append the bangs (!g) to the query line as well as prepend.
- ivm 9y ago
  I wanted to switch but DDG is noticeably slow in South America compared to Google. Meanwhile I've been using private windows for all searches for over 3 years already. Hopefully it helps a bit with the bubble issue.
  - pcr0 9y ago
    Noticeably slow for me in southeast Asia as well. Other issue is I ended up using !g on half my searches anyway.
secfirstmd 9y ago
What about ripping off their staff? https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/apple-google-others-settle-anti-poaching-lawsuit-for-415-million/ https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/apple-google-others-settle-anti... Or ripping off countries? https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/ireland-taking-too-long-to-collect-apple-tax-and-may-face-court-1.3089031 https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/ireland-takin... Or being a member of PRISM? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/prism-collection-documents/images/prism-slide-5.jpg http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/prism-... Or the crappy conditions of the places it manufactures its devices? https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jun/18/foxconn-life-death-forbidden-city-longhua-suicide-apple-iphone-brian-merchant-one-device-extract https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jun/18/foxconn-l...
- Karunamon 9y ago
  - Ireland granting tax benefits to Apple that turned out to be illegal (when both parties thought they were legal at the time) is not Apple's fault. - PRISM, as I understand it, is a way for large companies that may be the subject of large quantities of (legal) NSLs/warrants to upload that data. Per Wiki: PRISM collects stored internet communications based on demands made to internet companies such as Google Inc. under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 to turn over any data that match court-approved search terms. I don't fault them for taking steps to reduce their compliance burden, nor do I have a belief that a company doing these by hand is more virtuous than one that does not. - Offshore tech manufacturing in general sucks. Seriously. I can't think of a large vendor that doesn't use Chinese parts created under shitty-by-first-world-standards working conditions. The no poach agreements on the other hand are completely evil and completely on them.
  - wlesieutre 9y ago
    As far as working conditions at factories go, Apple has at least put pressure on them to make improvements. What other major electronics company has done that? http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/27/business/signs-of-changes-taking-hold-in-electronics-factories-in-china.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/27/business/signs-of-changes-...
eighthnate 9y ago
> Out of all the internet giants, at least to me, Apple has time and time again demonstrated to be reasonably ethical Their use of chinese slave labor, exporting environmental destruction to dictatorships with lax environmental laws, their use of offshore tax havens to elude paying taxes, etc. Apple is as evil as any other corporation.
- nawgszy 9y ago
  >Their use of chinese slave labor at least comes with the occasional nudge to the slave-driver >exporting environmental destruction to dictatorships with lax environmental laws Can you explain what this means? >their use of offshore tax havens to elude paying taxes This doesn't strike me as particularly evil >etc. I don't know, there's a pretty damn big list of things corporations do that are evil and you didn't seem to elucidate the comparison well enough to end it on 'etc., therefore they are evil'. They seem to genuinely care about privacy and encryption, actively fighting the American government on backdoors. That's not something I can think of another company doing. Your move.
putsteadywere 9y ago
I still trust Google over anybody, including the federal government.
- ballenf 9y ago
  And I do to for now, but the problem is that we don't know who will be running the company 5 or 10 years from now. Or how their privacy standards or security standards may change if the markets change and put pressure on revenues. Or if they just get greedier.
- dkonofalski 9y ago
  You shouldn't. Google is selling your info and your data every second of every day. That's not to say you shouldn't use their services. You just shouldn't trust your personal or private data to them.
  - X86BSD 9y ago
    This is why i never understood the willingness of people to shove all their data into the cloud, nor will i ever condone the use of or use the "cloud". Stop being lazy. Own your data.
  - icelancer 9y ago
    The difference is that I get a choice with Google. The government, not really.
- ionised 9y ago
  I find that incredibly naive.
dabockster 9y ago
> I'm seriously considering DuckDuckGo There's also Startpage since DuckDuckGo can be somewhat inaccurate at times.
appleflaxen 9y ago
> seriously considering DuckDuckGo that is a really anticlimactic conclusion. what about Apple's willingness to create a labor monopoly by creating a cartel which agreed not to poach tech talent. Certainly that's as evil as anything amazon has done, no?
gabeytani 9y ago
I have no moral string attached as to which companies and their services to choose from, because it will eventually backfire and virtue signaling is not my thing.
junkculture 9y ago
I don't care much for Apple but I agree they're the best of the lot when the lot consists of companies like Facebook, and Google. My beef with Apple is their holier-than-thou attitude when it comes to Apps on their store. They didn't allow Gab. In the past they've kicked out political parody apps. Finally they allow hate speech masquerading as religion while banning criticism of the same.
Veratyr 9y ago
> Apple has time and time again demonstrated to be reasonably ethical Along with the things others have mentioned, their campaigning against right to repair seems pretty unethical to me.
muddi900 9y ago
You mean like the time they colluded with publishers to fix prices of ebooks? Corporations aren't people and shouls not be judged for their 'characters'.

tqkxzugoaupvwqr 9y ago

I’ve been using DuckDuckGo for a few years and can recommend it. Try it. There is no reason to wait. If you are not happy with a search result, prepend !g to your search query and DDG redirects you to Google search.

juice_bus 9y ago
Switched to DDG a few weeks ago and can count on one hand the amount of times I've needed to !g
- eridius 9y ago
  I switched to DDG a while ago and while I do occasionally add !g to my query, I can count on one hand the number of times that it's actually helped. Usually if DDG doesn't give me good results, Google doesn't either.
eikenberry 9y ago
FYI you can append the bangs (!g) to the query line as well as prepend.
ivm 9y ago
I wanted to switch but DDG is noticeably slow in South America compared to Google. Meanwhile I've been using private windows for all searches for over 3 years already. Hopefully it helps a bit with the bubble issue.
- pcr0 9y ago
  Noticeably slow for me in southeast Asia as well. Other issue is I ended up using !g on half my searches anyway.

secfirstmd 9y ago

What about ripping off their staff? https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/apple-google-others-settle-anti-poaching-lawsuit-for-415-million/ https://www.cnet.com/uk/news/apple-google-others-settle-anti... Or ripping off countries? https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/ireland-taking-too-long-to-collect-apple-tax-and-may-face-court-1.3089031 https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/ireland-takin... Or being a member of PRISM? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/prism-collection-documents/images/prism-slide-5.jpg http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/prism-... Or the crappy conditions of the places it manufactures its devices? https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jun/18/foxconn-life-death-forbidden-city-longhua-suicide-apple-iphone-brian-merchant-one-device-extract https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jun/18/foxconn-l...

Karunamon 9y ago
- Ireland granting tax benefits to Apple that turned out to be illegal (when both parties thought they were legal at the time) is not Apple's fault. - PRISM, as I understand it, is a way for large companies that may be the subject of large quantities of (legal) NSLs/warrants to upload that data. Per Wiki: PRISM collects stored internet communications based on demands made to internet companies such as Google Inc. under Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 to turn over any data that match court-approved search terms. I don't fault them for taking steps to reduce their compliance burden, nor do I have a belief that a company doing these by hand is more virtuous than one that does not. - Offshore tech manufacturing in general sucks. Seriously. I can't think of a large vendor that doesn't use Chinese parts created under shitty-by-first-world-standards working conditions. The no poach agreements on the other hand are completely evil and completely on them.
- wlesieutre 9y ago
  As far as working conditions at factories go, Apple has at least put pressure on them to make improvements. What other major electronics company has done that? http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/27/business/signs-of-changes-taking-hold-in-electronics-factories-in-china.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/27/business/signs-of-changes-...

eighthnate 9y ago

> Out of all the internet giants, at least to me, Apple has time and time again demonstrated to be reasonably ethical Their use of chinese slave labor, exporting environmental destruction to dictatorships with lax environmental laws, their use of offshore tax havens to elude paying taxes, etc. Apple is as evil as any other corporation.

nawgszy 9y ago
>Their use of chinese slave labor at least comes with the occasional nudge to the slave-driver >exporting environmental destruction to dictatorships with lax environmental laws Can you explain what this means? >their use of offshore tax havens to elude paying taxes This doesn't strike me as particularly evil >etc. I don't know, there's a pretty damn big list of things corporations do that are evil and you didn't seem to elucidate the comparison well enough to end it on 'etc., therefore they are evil'. They seem to genuinely care about privacy and encryption, actively fighting the American government on backdoors. That's not something I can think of another company doing. Your move.

putsteadywere 9y ago

I still trust Google over anybody, including the federal government.

ballenf 9y ago
And I do to for now, but the problem is that we don't know who will be running the company 5 or 10 years from now. Or how their privacy standards or security standards may change if the markets change and put pressure on revenues. Or if they just get greedier.
dkonofalski 9y ago
You shouldn't. Google is selling your info and your data every second of every day. That's not to say you shouldn't use their services. You just shouldn't trust your personal or private data to them.
- X86BSD 9y ago
  This is why i never understood the willingness of people to shove all their data into the cloud, nor will i ever condone the use of or use the "cloud". Stop being lazy. Own your data.
- icelancer 9y ago
  The difference is that I get a choice with Google. The government, not really.
ionised 9y ago
I find that incredibly naive.

dabockster 9y ago

> I'm seriously considering DuckDuckGo There's also Startpage since DuckDuckGo can be somewhat inaccurate at times.

appleflaxen 9y ago

> seriously considering DuckDuckGo that is a really anticlimactic conclusion. what about Apple's willingness to create a labor monopoly by creating a cartel which agreed not to poach tech talent. Certainly that's as evil as anything amazon has done, no?

gabeytani 9y ago

I have no moral string attached as to which companies and their services to choose from, because it will eventually backfire and virtue signaling is not my thing.

junkculture 9y ago

I don't care much for Apple but I agree they're the best of the lot when the lot consists of companies like Facebook, and Google. My beef with Apple is their holier-than-thou attitude when it comes to Apps on their store. They didn't allow Gab. In the past they've kicked out political parody apps. Finally they allow hate speech masquerading as religion while banning criticism of the same.

Veratyr 9y ago

> Apple has time and time again demonstrated to be reasonably ethical Along with the things others have mentioned, their campaigning against right to repair seems pretty unethical to me.

muddi900 9y ago

You mean like the time they colluded with publishers to fix prices of ebooks? Corporations aren't people and shouls not be judged for their 'characters'.