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Thanks, but no thanks. Ditch Chrome and don’t worry about ugly hacks to remember or bookmark or ask about in the future when they no longer work. Life is too s

Thanks, but no thanks. Ditch Chrome and don’t worry about ugly hacks to remember or bookmark or ask about in the future when they no longer work. Life is too short to put up with such nonsense. There are better alternatives [1] available. P.S.: When you uninstall Chrome on certain platforms, it’ll open your default browser and direct you to a feedback page. Be honest and tell them why, and that you wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. [1]: https://www.firefox.com https://www.firefox.com

reacharavindh 8y ago
I'll add one more to your side note. Please tell your particularly non technical friends and relatives to avoid Google like plague if they care about privacy. Show them how - give a link to Firefox, Privacy badger. A relative of mine who paid $7/month for a VPN service because he cared about his privacy from ISP, but was using Google Chrome and Gmail for sensitive personal Email. Fewer people from the non-engineering world know/understand what we assume is common sense. When you get a chance please don't hesitate to tell people of better choices.
- Tallain 8y ago
  Do you have any recommendations for a good alternative to Gmail? I've already made the switch away from Chrome, but for some reason my mind blanks on email -- I can only think of Yahoo or Hotmail
  - sidko 8y ago
    Protonmail.
  - reacharavindh 8y ago
    My alternative is not free :-( I use FastMail and pay for mine and my wife's accounts. It may not be for everybody, but it is one choice, and I'm a happy customer. It is by far a "No bullshit" email service. They do one thing, and very well. It's simple, fast and reliable.
    - Tallain 8y ago
      I'll give them a look, thanks! It may not be free but it is cheaper than I expected. Looks nice.
  - graedus 8y ago
    Here's a 15 hour old HN thread asking this exact question and getting over 500 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18054574 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18054574
- dylan604 8y ago
  >Please tell your particularly non technical friends and relatives to avoid Google like plague For anyone that has never had a conversation like this, you really have to be careful with this and pick your battles wisely. Some people are so non-technical, that they will not understand what you are explaining to them, or why you are even bothering them. You will be perceived as a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist. Some people will understand what you are explaining and might even understand your stance, but ultimately will still continue in their ways because it's so much easier and convenient. What ever you do, don't be judgemental about their decision. You will only make them less interested. Start slowly. It can be overwhelming how fubar'd the web experience has become.
  - radmuzom 8y ago
    Exactly. I regularly argue about this with my colleagues who are all mostly trained statisticians with some programming experience. Generally, what happens is that people are in awe of the "innovation" coming from Google and my protests are generally laughed off.
    - pmontra 8y ago
      There are things that can be explained but can be understood only by direct experience. This is one of them. They'll eventually get burned by their faith in Google and suddenly they'll understand.
      - newscracker 8y ago
        Latching on to GP's context, statistically speaking, most people don't see these issues themselves. So they don't care if one in a million or even one in a hundred might get affected. As long as they (or their close ones) haven't experienced it, it doesn't exist and doesn't matter. It's exhausting to deal with such people, and most of the general public are this way.
  - dsfyu404ed 8y ago
    I find it really easy to pitch privacy in a "do you really want your medical insurer to know that you're googling weight loss or pregnancy stuff?", "do you really want your future employers to know what kind of dank memes you looked at?", "when you're booking a hotel the price will go up because they'll know you've looked at it before and want to fake a sense of urgency so you buy" sort of way. Providing concrete examples of how a lack of privacy can cost money seems to be useful.
techntoke 8y ago
I've got Firefox in my Pocket, and it is just as bad as Chrome. I try to watch videos, but hardware acceleration has too high of an ohm. My CEO donated to Prop 8 and thinks JavaScript is great. I think I will just go paste about Firefox being the best, when really I am just a Mozilla fanboy that pretends to know better than the rest.
sneak 8y ago
Ditching Chrome is not an option for the security conscious; there is no other browser that has the security resources dedicated to it that Chrome has. It’s not even close.
- abhiminator 8y ago
  >there is no other browser that has the security resources dedicated to it that Chrome has. I disagree. Firefox uses the exact same URL filtering system [0] used by Chrome to block access to potentially harmful malware-ridden sites. Add some solid extensions like uBlock/uMatrix and Privacy Badger to that, you get a browser that's as secure, if not more, than Google's bloated browser. [0] https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Safe_Browsing https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Safe_Browsing
- billpaxtonjr 8y ago
  Do these security changes get rolled into Chromium?

reacharavindh 8y ago

I'll add one more to your side note. Please tell your particularly non technical friends and relatives to avoid Google like plague if they care about privacy. Show them how - give a link to Firefox, Privacy badger. A relative of mine who paid $7/month for a VPN service because he cared about his privacy from ISP, but was using Google Chrome and Gmail for sensitive personal Email. Fewer people from the non-engineering world know/understand what we assume is common sense. When you get a chance please don't hesitate to tell people of better choices.

Tallain 8y ago
Do you have any recommendations for a good alternative to Gmail? I've already made the switch away from Chrome, but for some reason my mind blanks on email -- I can only think of Yahoo or Hotmail
- sidko 8y ago
  Protonmail.
- reacharavindh 8y ago
  My alternative is not free :-( I use FastMail and pay for mine and my wife's accounts. It may not be for everybody, but it is one choice, and I'm a happy customer. It is by far a "No bullshit" email service. They do one thing, and very well. It's simple, fast and reliable.
  - Tallain 8y ago
    I'll give them a look, thanks! It may not be free but it is cheaper than I expected. Looks nice.
- graedus 8y ago
  Here's a 15 hour old HN thread asking this exact question and getting over 500 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18054574 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18054574
dylan604 8y ago
>Please tell your particularly non technical friends and relatives to avoid Google like plague For anyone that has never had a conversation like this, you really have to be careful with this and pick your battles wisely. Some people are so non-technical, that they will not understand what you are explaining to them, or why you are even bothering them. You will be perceived as a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist. Some people will understand what you are explaining and might even understand your stance, but ultimately will still continue in their ways because it's so much easier and convenient. What ever you do, don't be judgemental about their decision. You will only make them less interested. Start slowly. It can be overwhelming how fubar'd the web experience has become.
- radmuzom 8y ago
  Exactly. I regularly argue about this with my colleagues who are all mostly trained statisticians with some programming experience. Generally, what happens is that people are in awe of the "innovation" coming from Google and my protests are generally laughed off.
  - pmontra 8y ago
    There are things that can be explained but can be understood only by direct experience. This is one of them. They'll eventually get burned by their faith in Google and suddenly they'll understand.
    - newscracker 8y ago
      Latching on to GP's context, statistically speaking, most people don't see these issues themselves. So they don't care if one in a million or even one in a hundred might get affected. As long as they (or their close ones) haven't experienced it, it doesn't exist and doesn't matter. It's exhausting to deal with such people, and most of the general public are this way.
- dsfyu404ed 8y ago
  I find it really easy to pitch privacy in a "do you really want your medical insurer to know that you're googling weight loss or pregnancy stuff?", "do you really want your future employers to know what kind of dank memes you looked at?", "when you're booking a hotel the price will go up because they'll know you've looked at it before and want to fake a sense of urgency so you buy" sort of way. Providing concrete examples of how a lack of privacy can cost money seems to be useful.

techntoke 8y ago

I've got Firefox in my Pocket, and it is just as bad as Chrome. I try to watch videos, but hardware acceleration has too high of an ohm. My CEO donated to Prop 8 and thinks JavaScript is great. I think I will just go paste about Firefox being the best, when really I am just a Mozilla fanboy that pretends to know better than the rest.

sneak 8y ago

Ditching Chrome is not an option for the security conscious; there is no other browser that has the security resources dedicated to it that Chrome has. It’s not even close.

abhiminator 8y ago
>there is no other browser that has the security resources dedicated to it that Chrome has. I disagree. Firefox uses the exact same URL filtering system [0] used by Chrome to block access to potentially harmful malware-ridden sites. Add some solid extensions like uBlock/uMatrix and Privacy Badger to that, you get a browser that's as secure, if not more, than Google's bloated browser. [0] https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Safe_Browsing https://wiki.mozilla.org/Security/Safe_Browsing
billpaxtonjr 8y ago
Do these security changes get rolled into Chromium?