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The whole situation with Gemini Apps Activity setting is so frustrating. Even if I pay for Gemini Pro, the only way to make sure there will be no human looking

The whole situation with Gemini Apps Activity setting is so frustrating. Even if I pay for Gemini Pro, the only way to make sure there will be no human looking at your chats is to set Apps Activity to off, which means you don't have any history for Gemini chats, even for the messages from a minute ago.

bionhoward 1y ago
It’s absurdly dumb, agreed
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
Barbing 1y ago
Reminiscent of their heavy handed approach to disabling watch history on YouTube, even when paying for YouTube Premium. (Google punishes viewers who make themselves less valuable to advertisers by giving them an entirely blank homepage.)
- kccqzy 1y ago
  It's not a punishment; it's entirely transactional. You make yourself less valuable to advertisers so you also make yourself less valuable to Google. Therefore Google provides you with fewer features such as a blank homepage. The era of Google providing costly features to users with no benefit to itself is coming to an end.
  - T4iga 1y ago
    Except you missed that part where they said > Premium If you pay for it, you can expect to not be the product.
    - AlexandrB 1y ago
      I think that ship sailed a few years ago. It's better for big tech if you pay and be the product so they went ahead and did that.
- jjani 1y ago
  That's a gift, the opposite of a punishment.
- samrus 1y ago
  That was a blessing in disguise though. Its way easier for me to not binge youtube now
- Workaccount2 1y ago
  Wouldn't a blank homepage be exactly what you expect if you had no tracking enabled? The algorithm that generates the homepage is probably totally stunted with only empty logs to draw on.
  - michaelmrose 1y ago
    You could make a list of demographic fitted choices based on info on the user. One wonders if you couldn't whip up something that would whip up a list of choices by operating locally only on the users history returning just a list of things to show on the page and forgetting it when the user closed the tab.
    - Macha 1y ago
      Honestly having occasionally glimpsed the logged out YouTube page which appears to do this... I'm glad that I don't have to deal with that either. As for what they should do, I think populating the homepage from the subscriptions list (either literally as an ordered list or by some algorithmic "watch time vs average watch time for this creator", I don't care) would be preferable.
      - Barbing 1y ago
        Great idea! If the goal were anything but discouraging disabling watch history, they’d take care to design a page not so strikingly barren. Video categories, subscriptions, trending searches (not saying we’d WANT that), Google-curated selections, recommendations based on user choices (“what kinds of videos should we show you, want daily news/sportballs/music recs?”)
    - londons_explore 1y ago
      > operating locally only on the users history Most users won't understand how that works. As far as they're concerned "youtube watches what I do", and any explanations about how the algorithm runs locally but google can still see what you watch if they look at IP logs will be far beyond a typical users desire to understand.
- anton-c 1y ago
  I've had my youtube watch history off for years. It still knows what I like. Hence why I open a new private browser for each session.
  - Barbing 1y ago
    Have you seen EFF’s Cover Your Tracks or other browser fingerprinting test sites? I’m under the impression my use of private tabs & blockers & iCloud Private Relay is nearly useless when browsing sites of any sufficiently large company, and I won’t lie and say it’s not somewhat frustrating and disturbing.
    - anton-c 1y ago
      It probably doesn't stop any tracking - that's true. It does reset my video feed though.
      - Barbing 1y ago
        A success in that then! OK thanks for confirming I’m prob not _ludicrously_ paranoid :)
- ckosidows 1y ago
  Shhh! Don't let Google know about this trick. I've gotten stuck in approximately 0 doom scroll loops since disabling view history and I'd like to keep it that way.
  - Barbing 1y ago
    Oh drat, me too for you buddy!
pretext-1 1y ago
Another option although it requires using another account is using Gemini for Google Workspace.
- sega_sai 1y ago
  Thanks for the suggestion! I actually see that Business Standard Google Workspace (for 1 user) that includes Gemini Access costs less than Gemini Pro subscription for an individual. I will give it a go.
  - thimabi 1y ago
    But note that Gemini via Workspace doesn’t have all the features of Gemini Pro, and it is notoriously behind regular Gemini in terms of feature adoption. So far, there’s no access to Gemini CLI (paid separately) and no way to selectively delete chats, for instance.

bionhoward 1y ago

It’s absurdly dumb, agreed

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

Barbing 1y ago

Reminiscent of their heavy handed approach to disabling watch history on YouTube, even when paying for YouTube Premium. (Google punishes viewers who make themselves less valuable to advertisers by giving them an entirely blank homepage.)

kccqzy 1y ago
It's not a punishment; it's entirely transactional. You make yourself less valuable to advertisers so you also make yourself less valuable to Google. Therefore Google provides you with fewer features such as a blank homepage. The era of Google providing costly features to users with no benefit to itself is coming to an end.
- T4iga 1y ago
  Except you missed that part where they said > Premium If you pay for it, you can expect to not be the product.
  - AlexandrB 1y ago
    I think that ship sailed a few years ago. It's better for big tech if you pay and be the product so they went ahead and did that.
jjani 1y ago
That's a gift, the opposite of a punishment.
samrus 1y ago
That was a blessing in disguise though. Its way easier for me to not binge youtube now
Workaccount2 1y ago
Wouldn't a blank homepage be exactly what you expect if you had no tracking enabled? The algorithm that generates the homepage is probably totally stunted with only empty logs to draw on.
- michaelmrose 1y ago
  You could make a list of demographic fitted choices based on info on the user. One wonders if you couldn't whip up something that would whip up a list of choices by operating locally only on the users history returning just a list of things to show on the page and forgetting it when the user closed the tab.
  - Macha 1y ago
    Honestly having occasionally glimpsed the logged out YouTube page which appears to do this... I'm glad that I don't have to deal with that either. As for what they should do, I think populating the homepage from the subscriptions list (either literally as an ordered list or by some algorithmic "watch time vs average watch time for this creator", I don't care) would be preferable.
    - Barbing 1y ago
      Great idea! If the goal were anything but discouraging disabling watch history, they’d take care to design a page not so strikingly barren. Video categories, subscriptions, trending searches (not saying we’d WANT that), Google-curated selections, recommendations based on user choices (“what kinds of videos should we show you, want daily news/sportballs/music recs?”)
  - londons_explore 1y ago
    > operating locally only on the users history Most users won't understand how that works. As far as they're concerned "youtube watches what I do", and any explanations about how the algorithm runs locally but google can still see what you watch if they look at IP logs will be far beyond a typical users desire to understand.
anton-c 1y ago
I've had my youtube watch history off for years. It still knows what I like. Hence why I open a new private browser for each session.
- Barbing 1y ago
  Have you seen EFF’s Cover Your Tracks or other browser fingerprinting test sites? I’m under the impression my use of private tabs & blockers & iCloud Private Relay is nearly useless when browsing sites of any sufficiently large company, and I won’t lie and say it’s not somewhat frustrating and disturbing.
  - anton-c 1y ago
    It probably doesn't stop any tracking - that's true. It does reset my video feed though.
    - Barbing 1y ago
      A success in that then! OK thanks for confirming I’m prob not _ludicrously_ paranoid :)
ckosidows 1y ago
Shhh! Don't let Google know about this trick. I've gotten stuck in approximately 0 doom scroll loops since disabling view history and I'd like to keep it that way.
- Barbing 1y ago
  Oh drat, me too for you buddy!

pretext-1 1y ago

Another option although it requires using another account is using Gemini for Google Workspace.

sega_sai 1y ago
Thanks for the suggestion! I actually see that Business Standard Google Workspace (for 1 user) that includes Gemini Access costs less than Gemini Pro subscription for an individual. I will give it a go.
- thimabi 1y ago
  But note that Gemini via Workspace doesn’t have all the features of Gemini Pro, and it is notoriously behind regular Gemini in terms of feature adoption. So far, there’s no access to Gemini CLI (paid separately) and no way to selectively delete chats, for instance.