On Android, even Google Android, you're free to use fully on-device maps that don't send your location to anyone, or you could use competing apps that don't send your location to Google. Similarly, you can install apps from an APK from anywhere without telling Google or anybody else that you've installed them, even on Google Android.
User control means privacy, not just better features.
As I said, this isn't an option for most people.
GPS doesn't require Google. It just reads radio signals. Only Apple requires sending the result of analyzing those GPS signals back to Apple, even if you just want to use it to find your location on a map stored locally. Apple doesn't give you any options for privacy.
I have a friend just like you, who looks at something perfectly innocent that Apple does, screams “spyiiiiiing!” and runs into the arms of Google — a company famous for turning people into data products. That’s literally all they do. They don’t even know how to do anything else to make money.
Apple is a hardware company first and foremost that treats their users as customers, which is distasteful to you for some reason.
PS: Apple phones can acquire a GPS lock without cellular connectivity. I’ve relied on this feature many times in the Australian outback.
Oh, and you can turn Find My feature off if you’re that paranoid.
The difference between every other manufacturer and Apple is that every other manufacturer lets you turn it off if you care about privacy.
> Without help from an external service, it would take up to half an hour to acquire a fix using GPS radio signals alone
Up to. If you're under a rock and haven't previously gotten a location.
> Apple is a hardware company first and foremost
Apple is a marketing company first and foremost. Why give users control, the only way to actual privacy, when not giving them control lets you make more money off of them and marketing privacy will fool people into believing you offer actual privacy?
> PS: Apple phones can acquire a GPS lock without cellular connectivity. I’ve relied on this feature many times in the Australian outback.
And yet despite this, your iPhone will send your location back to Apple, including where you were while you were offline, as soon as it gets network connectivity.
> Oh, and you can turn Find My feature off if you’re that paranoid.
That doesn't stop Apple from getting your location.
You seem to believe I'm a Google apologist. You're wrong. I've criticized Google plenty on this forum. I'm a Firefox-using user control apologist.