Thankfully a lot of these are accessible by the web browser if you really need to use them. I should switch to doing that for more of them
this post was submitted on 29 Jan 2025
102 points (97.2% liked)
Privacy
516 readers
211 users here now
Protect your privacy in the digital world
Welcome! This is a community for all those who are interested in protecting their privacy.
Rules
PS: Don't be a smartass and try to game the system, we'll know if you're breaking the rules when we see it!
- Be nice and no bigotry/prejudice
- No tankies/alt-right fascists
- Stay on topic
- Don't promote proprietary software
- No crypto
- If you post news exclusive to a country please name it. ~(This isn't a bannable rule, just a recommendation!)~
Related communities
founded 2 months ago
MODERATORS
How does that help?
I didn't read the article, I came here for the jokes but then you got me curious
So my understanding is that
- apps can let them collect a lot more data than the website version. Apps have access to a bunch of device APIs, they might be running all the time vs a website tab that you close afterwards, etc.
- you just open a link vs. logging in through the play store
On top of that if you want to lock down further, it's easier to use a privacy respecting browser than it is to sandbox the apps to. For the average person it's easier to go from using the app to opening the website in a browser, than it is to swap their OS to GrapheneOS and set up sandboxing
That's also why a lot of websites mess with the mobile site, they want you to use the app
Any idea how to find this kind of info on Discord? They seem extremely tight-lipped about how it's harvested and used,, I'm sure it's more horrible than I can even imagine.
I never used 70% of these apps (14/20) nor do I have an active account on the remaining 6. Im weird.
Ohh duolingo... Noooo
imo duolingo isnt really the best for learning languages anyway. You should check out anki
I'm interested, but also confused. They're flash cards, and I guess other users have made sets of cards already so I don't have to make my own. Is it just word=word translation, or do people use pictures and sound? How does it teach things like grammar, etymology, and mnemonic tips? Can I write on it? Can it listen to my pronunciation?
You're right, they're just flash cards. This helps a huge amount in it being flexible in general, and yes; they can put images to help :)
You're supposed to create your own decks, but i usually just use shared decks from other users.
How does it teach things like grammar, etymology, and mnemonic tips
In a [good] card-deck, it probably has an explanation before you start, but many of them are vocabulary based.
Can I write on it? Yes
Can it listen to my pronunciation? No, you'll have to manually compare your own voice to the voice of the card.
Overall its stellar for vocabulary but so-so in grammar. For the latter i don't really recommend apps, i've had a better experience reading about them and using the vocabulary i learned as practice. I used to use a hebrew deck but i'd only learn words, conjugation i'd use Wiktionary or articles about hebrew conjugation. So i'd understand "Yalad" means boy, then i'd add "-im" so i could understand Yaladim means "boys" without using an app to learn it.
Overall it's personal taste and may not fit you. But it's the best free app for many languages, but there are apps exclusive to 1 only that are probably better.
You can still Duolingo and dodge (most of) the bullshit.
Use GrapheneOS.
Install Duolingo from the Aurora store, no Google account attached.
Sandbox the app and set its permissions to disallow location, disallow pulling contacts etc.
Make your Duolingo acct with a fake name and burner email (sucks for you if you already made one with your primary email and real info).
Manually add "friends" via their Duolingo usernames.
Note that, like Facebook, your contact info could be getting shared by other users who have your real info listed in their contacts. Not much you can do about that. (In fact, you could use none of the apps on this list but your contact info is probably still getting leaked by your normie friends and acquaintances.)
"Coming up at eleven: The politician is just lying for your vote; The stripper doesn't really like you; Corporations are NOT your friend; If you're receiving a service you aren't paying for, YOU are the product; and, finally, we conclude our three-part series: Water - It's Wet As Fuck Tho"
If you're receiving a service you aren't paying for, YOU are the product
some exclusions apply
Fucking Duolingo? The fuck? What do they need to track users for like that?
It's a for profit public company. I've been playing around with the idea of possibly creating a FOSS app that would run its servers via donations and (same as duolingo in the beginning at least) community created courses. Would need support from proper linguists though.
There are other apps like that but they lack the sleek UI and gamifying aspect or simply have only one language.
I pay for duolingo so I hate that they are tracking me but it's the only actually fun casual language learning app out there and honestly I don't mind paying for such a good app, but their monetization schemes are getting more aggressive: e.g. time limit games which are nearly impossible without paying for "extra time potions" which you don't get even if you have the paid version.
Edit: just to add to the time-limit games: you can just not participate in them, but fuck me for paying to the app and still having that bullshit in my UI.
https://librelingo.app/ is looking for contributors 😉 It's written in python, so if you want to take a stab at that, I'm sure they'd be very happy to have you.
Lemmy provides once again, thanks @onlinepersona@programming.dev! I'll have to see if I can get back into python and take a look into this project
time limit games which are nearly impossible without paying for “extra time potions” which you don’t get even if you have the paid version.
Alright then, keep your ~~secrets~~ 3rd star
I can't keep a calm frodo face while seeing something that has not been completed on my ~~journey~~ duolingo learning path
Buahahaha, nothing on this list on my phone!
ditto!
Whatsapp Business? Is pedestrian Whatsapp not even on the list?
Yeah, no surprise there. The more popular they are, the more leverage they have over you and the more abuse users are willing to tolerate.
Yep.
I think to be more specific it's like popular music: the broader the reach the more it's appealing to fundamental aspects of human nature (aspects that everyone has to some degree). This makes it more useful from a data collection standpoint.
This makes it harder for outliers to avoid, even if we want to, as everyone else using something like WhatsApp means we have to fight against the tide of other people and not just the crappy companies.
Only apps i have are Google Maps, which i try to replace with Organic Maps.
And Duolingo cause i like to "learn" a language, while having the gamification motivate me.
I currently use Waze because the features are awesome but how has your experience been with organic maps? I want to use it but worried about it not being great. I haven't actually tried it.
Waze, the Israeli app, was bought by Google.
Traffic data is missing so not great for navigation
If i just need to lookup some stuff on a map organic is great, but no rview for businesses, or looking for a pizza place google is just way better at that
magic earth will be a little closer to waze, but unfortunately the israeli app is just kinda the best at commute routing…
Spotify is my problem: I like different stuff and I don't plan on carrying Gs of it on me, but I do wish I could kick it away.
I don't know what your technical abilities are, but setting up something like Navidrome could be the ideal compromise.
How's that one? I've been using Plexamp because is the closest alternative and love the sonic analysis. But would rather do something open source.
Very Light user of Amazon, WhatsApp. Heavy user of Spotify . That’s all.
Edit : very light PayPal .
Check out Hermit and Native Alpha. They make websites work like apps. I use them for Amazon, my bank, my medical insurance portal, Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, my local libraries, dictionary.com, etc. Pretty much any website I use regularly.
Combine it with a password manager (Bitwarden), and it's almost exactly like using an app except much less phone data collected: no location, no installed apps, no phone number, no device or advertising ID, no battery level, etc, etc. Only what I allow the browser to give it (and both of these have settings to limit data collection).
Also, I find it works way faster than some (bloated) apps, and it's a single install for multiple services so I'm not eating up storage for crappy apps.
great - will look them up
To delete them, I would first need to install them. Maybe I should do that? Or maybe not, as I don't think they're worth wasting my time (and my peace of mind). Beside digital ID, password manager, financial apps, my cloud (Filen.io) and a chess app, + the taxi app, I have nothing installed on my phone. Not even the email is active. I used to listen to podcast but even that I removed.
I use a few of the service listed but only on my computer, containerized in Firefox. So they and their constant tracking can go f.omething themselves ;)
If I was to really start using my smartphone, I would stop using my iPhone (which I consider less insecure privacy-wise than vanilla Android, but far from being private enough) and would buy one of the /e/ powered smartphone available. I purchased one for my spouse a few years ago and it's still working great. Worth mentioning she is like me with her phone and don't do much with it, but all the apps she needs (for work, finance, and stuff) are working fine.