just figured out a way to avoid advertising from appearing in my gmail emails (re: google spying)

[Divine Discontent]

I watched that video, and really like gmail, but I hate the sidebar of text ads, and the hotlink above the inbox that shows a text line, and tested to see if they would dare put ads in an email where you said you were sexually assaulted, and put abortion, rape, and other words, and looked at the email I sent myself - and no ads were with it. So, I tried just putting "assault" in the subject of my email along with "buying a new lenovo laptop", and sent it to myself, and opened it up and it still showed no ads, whatsoever!

When I just put new lenovo laptop as the email subject title, it put all the ads up on the side.

Interesting how they have it programmed. My brother asked me if they would risk getting sued by bringing up "assault counseling" or other ads on the side - and they don't! They actually have that thought out ahead of time.

I don't believe that what they do with the crawlers and the storage on their server is anything different than what other free (or even pay) email providers do. I guess there's an expert around here that knows that answer.

[zane25]

1. Better idea

Don't use a service that you know going in is spying on you. I personally avoid google like the plague.

[Divine Discontent]

2. what do you use? thanks

[zane25]

6. Fastmail

I have been using fastmail.fm for about 10 years. It's a pay service but you get what you pay for in my opinion. I also use a large url filter to keep the ads out of my web browsing.

[Divine Discontent]

14. thank you for your reply! :)

[silverojo]

21. You can use FastMail for free, too

And you can get "[e-mail]" instead of "[e-mail]". It's a great service!

[Mind_your_head]

3. Your first mistake is using gmail AT ALL

The post in response #1 is "right on target".

People who use gmail and then "figure out ways to avoid their spying" are 'slowly boiling frogs' (hope you can appreciate the analogy/reference)!

Peace,
M_Y_H

[Divine Discontent]

9. you aren't giving any answers to the question about what would you use, so what do you use or

suggest?

Many different Yes We Did items in the Obama/Biden section www.cafepress.com/warisprofitable

[Mind_your_head]

12. I think you misdirected you question to 'me' when it should have been more

appropriately directed elsewhere.

However, what would/do I use to maintain confidentiality? Hmmmmmm.....

"carrier pidgeon"

[Divine Discontent]

15. ha. no, was asking you since you commented on what they said to me in post 1

they said they use fastmail, a pay service. I may do that. I really like gmail's great features, but after seeing what they can do with them, I don't like what they do.

[Mind_your_head]

19. Sure.

Fight the "good fight".

Peace,
M_Y_H

[Muttocracy]

4. GMail has never sent ads with your email (unlike Yahoo and others) - it displays them to YOU

depending on what you're viewing. And for me, I only get them when I'm reading a message, and it's easy to completely ignore them.

[greguganus]

7. Me too. I never see the ads. It's easy to ignore them. I never get spam in gmail. n/t

[Muttocracy]

10. their spam filter takes care of nearly all incoming messages, and it doesn' put spam into your own

messages, unlike some footers on mail (yahoo does that I think)

[IDemo]

5. I must have missed this story. Gmail is spying on me, how?

[Divine Discontent]

8. search google in video forum eom

[zane25]

11. You tell us

How do they manage to target the ads? Why are they offering the service for free, out of the kindness of thier hearts? They are making money from your info.

[Muttocracy]

13. apparently people are shocked that their email and internet providers

have access to the information they transmit :shrug:

[zane25]

17. Encryption

Is your friend. Using Linux is a plus as well, no calling home.

[Antigone2]

16. EVERYBODY is spying on you!

Are you serious? How do you think Amazon knows how to greet you by name when you go to the site? I can sometimes go to a completely new site and be greeted by name or have references to the city in which I live in the ads displayed by that site. It's all in the cookies you have knowingly or unknowingly accepted on your browser.

And you can also play the old google game. Google yourself by your own name or by one of your usernames. If you have ever written a letter to an editor (where you almost always have to sign you real name) it will come up on Google.

[greguganus]

18. It's funny when I get pop-up ads from women living in my town wanting to meet me.

I live in the country and have never seen any of these women at the general store.

[Greyhound]

20. Firefox and noscript works just great. I never have any idea what you guys

are talking about when complaining about the ads/sponsors.

DU has agreed to accept the Devil's deal, learn to deal on your own.