this post was submitted on 05 May 2026
141 points (99.3% liked)

Fuck AI

6935 readers
2014 users here now

"We did it, Patrick! We made a technological breakthrough!"

A place for all those who loathe AI to discuss things, post articles, and ridicule the AI hype. Proud supporter of working people. And proud booer of SXSW 2024.

AI, in this case, refers to LLMs, GPT technology, and anything listed as "AI" meant to increase market valuations.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

Cross-Posted, via Technology Community.

Google Chrome is downloading a 4 GB Gemini Nano model onto users' machines without consent, with no opt-in, no opt-out short of enterprise tooling, and an automatic re-download every time the user deletes it. The pattern is identical to the Anthropic Claude Desktop case I wrote about last month, but the scale is between two and three orders of magnitude larger. This article does the legal analysis and, for the first time, the environmental analysis. The numbers are not small.

all 29 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] RustyNova@lemmy.world 27 points 2 days ago

"Police! We saw your electricity bill! You're growing weed in there!"

"No no, I use chrome"

"Ok carry on"

[–] hexagonwin@lemmy.today 16 points 2 days ago (2 children)

a decade or more ago chrome was the nice new browser endorsed by techies replacing evil IE. kinda funny thinking back now

[–] idiomaddict@lemmy.world 12 points 2 days ago (2 children)

I think about the slogan “don’t be evil” about once a week. I wonder if the founders of google ever think about it still.

[–] Infrapink@thebrainbin.org 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Their slogan nowadays is "Be Neutral Evil"

[–] postmateDumbass@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

No, there is more money in chaos.

[–] muhyb@programming.dev 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

They think it like SpongeBob thinking "Don't need it"

[–] lemmyng@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago
[–] cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca 3 points 2 days ago

You die the hero or live long enough to become the villain....

[–] kriz@slrpnk.net 11 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Anybody know a good guide for getting off of Google? It's woven into a lot of my phone

[–] Fizz@lemmy.nz 1 points 1 day ago

Don't try do it all at once. It takes a few years usually. I recommend starting with changing your search engine and browser.

Then setup a new email and forward emails from your old email to it while you slowly migrate it. Then go service by service and look at the alternatives. If you don't like any its fine to stay on Google just do what you can every thing you remove is money out of Google pocket.

If you want to go full self-hosted there's this guide:

https://wiki.futo.org/index.php/Introduction_to_a_Self_Managed_Life:_a_13_hour_%26_28_minute_presentation_by_FUTO_software

[–] adb@lemmy.ml 6 points 2 days ago

!degoogle@lemmy.ml

[–] albbi@piefed.ca 2 points 2 days ago

Decided to disable and uninstall updates on my phone just in case. Hope that doesn't break things.

[–] Stern@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago

I was already dumpstering them for the ublock nonsense so this just gives me smug satisfaction.

[–] Tartufo@lemmy.world 7 points 2 days ago (2 children)

This reminds me of back when I first tried Chrome some many years back. I didn't like it so I uninstalled it and a few days later it was back again without me having done anything other than shutting down & restarting my PC. Had to dig deep into parts you don't ever need to touch for a normal uninstall to get rid of it for good and vowed to never install Chrome again because this is peak virus behaviour. Stuck with Firefox through it's absolute lowest performance because of this, too.

Now I do have to deal with Chrome at work and I really hate it. Sadly the CEO loves Chrome so what can you do...

[–] cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 days ago

If you're on windows, check the task scheduler. There are, by default, some update tasks that get installed when you first install chrome.

[–] Know_not_Scotty_does@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Certain websites are utter garbage if you don't use chrome. I work from time to time with the American Bureau of Shipping and even with a user agent switcher, firefox outright doesn't load. I already don't like ABS but this makes them even more irritating to deal with.

[–] cyberpunk007@lemmy.ca 5 points 2 days ago

This is all part of Google's long winded plan of destroying open browsing standards.

For those sites, I just close them and move on and use another. I do that with any site that is total shit or loaded with garbage fly out menus and paywalls and the like. See ya.

[–] Tartufo@lemmy.world 2 points 2 days ago

If it's a shop: idc, if they refuse to work with other browsers they clearly don't want my money.

If it's some form of authority: I have zero issues with escalating the problem by demanding they give me a paper version of whatever instead. I'm not living in the US, so I'm (still) able to pull this.

[–] hexagonwin@lemmy.today 2 points 2 days ago

if you really need to use the site, chromium-based foss browsers like ungoogled chromium exist so you can avoid google chrome.

[–] LostWanderer@fedia.io 4 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Hmm, I smell a lawsuit brewing...Techbros never did like to ask for consent, because they often know the answer is: fuck no!

[–] wizblizz@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

And the penalties are a gentle wrist slap at the worst.

[–] LostWanderer@fedia.io 1 points 2 days ago

Europe will probably at least deck Google in the face...The USA, well, it will do literally nothing to punish Google unless we can raise a big enough stink about this.

[–] Tollana1234567@lemmy.today 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

they got caught trying secretely install android spyware core app , they were testing the waters.

[–] krigo666@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)
[–] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I wonder if disabling the Chrome app on android helps. I've had it disabled for a while. I occasionally run into a page or app integration that fails and have to re enable it temporarily but I always go back and disable it. Fuck Google.

[–] ghodawalaaman@programming.dev 1 points 2 days ago (1 children)

try other chromium based browsers like Brave, helium etc

[–] TrickDacy@lemmy.world 3 points 2 days ago

Yeah I already use the ddg browser where applicable but I refuse to ever use Brave.