According to that diff, Google moved from opt-in sharing of DoubleClick cookies, to...potentially default-in, with a possible opt-out option buried in some unidentified settings page?
when verizon did their super cokie, everyone went crazy (as they should).
now that its google (doing that since before verizon it seems) the top coment is a googler throwing the issue to the side in a hitchhikers-guide-to-galaxy way ("you should have checked the alpha centaury records in 2012")
>Our Privacy Policy may change from time to time. We will not reduce your rights under this Privacy Policy without your explicit consent.
Admittedly it is not as easy to spin this as a more explicit ToS, but I am sure that with a sufficient number of legal experts, this has considerable leeway in terms of interpretation.
because they did change that, according to this very thread. With nice diffs and all.
to be fair, one was a thing that happened, the other is a "by my reading of the ToS, they could do this"
I was quite sceptical about Android, partly because it has a foreign userspace and partly because there were no nice vanilla Android forks without Google code and with a focus on privacy.
I'm now tired of waiting for any Maemo successor to catch up and I reckon F-droid has become a pretty nice ecosystem. Also the announcement of CopperheadOS, Guardian Project and F-droid joining forces is exciting [1].
[1] https://guardianproject.info/2016/03/28/copperhead-guardian-...
Otherwise, in case you do try it, here's some things that I found useful: If the apps on F-Droid aren't enough for your taste, you can also use Aptoide [0] to access a big portion of the apps that are available on the Play Store.
The Amazon Store is also an option, although their store is also not really the greatest when it comes to not invading your privacy.
And if you cannot live without some of the apps on the Play Store, or if you've paid for some apps there and would prefer to not lose access to them, I can recommend Raccoon [1] for accessing them.
There's also some online-services, like for example Evozi [2], which can download unpaid apps from the Play Store for you, but well, for one, usually only unpaid apps, and secondly, I have yet to find one of those services which is not hopelessly overloaded.
I think, if you look more into app-piracy tools, you might also find a web-service which let's you download paid apps, but I've personally just stuck to Raccoon, so I can't make any recommemdations there.
Finally, if one of your apps really does need Google Play Services, there's a project aiming to reimplement the functionality without the privacy problems, called microG [3]. I haven't personally tried it yet, but I think, it's somewhat hit-and-miss, so while it's probably worth trying, you shouldn't expect too much from it...
[1]: http://www.onyxbits.de/raccoon
[2]: https://apps.evozi.com/apk-downloader/
[3]: https://microg.org/
Default language on their page is in German but everything is available in English (including support).
But the surprise twist is that Apple does the same thing!
To disable it on iPhones go to: Settings -> Privacy -> Advertising -> Limit Ad
That is absurd revisionism: iAd died because Apple stipulated a minimum ad spend of $1 million. They later dropped the minimum spend to $50, but the damage was already done and the platform was in a death-spiral.
iAd died because Apple unsuccessful tried to capture the 'premium' end of the Ad Market, not because it "respected user privacy too much".
...is false. They are loathe to allow anyone else access to it, and sold ads as many exchanges (like Facebook) do - not sharing user info, but promising they can target the demographic you want with precision.
And just to drive home the point, they will still be using targeted data when they start showing App Store ads in iOS 10. If you think there is no targeting there, you're hiding your head in the sand.
My theory goes like this - Apple gets to still advertise, lose its full iAd sales team, has a captive audience and ad platform and so can set pricing however they want, use native (better) ads instead of banner (worse and dying) ads, and so on.
Important to note is that it also says "...if you clear your cache, you will lose your opt-out setting." What cache?
You can control a lot of what you see from that page (which has been around for at least 6 years).