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.
It’s a really weird article. They’re trying to say that some sleazy thing Anthropic did is the same as Google Chrome having an on-device machine learning model? And making it seem extra nefarious that the file gets redownloaded when you delete it, which seems like a completely normal self-healing mechanism. And finally mentions that you can just turn it off in the AI section of the Chrome settings.
They could have just written an article about how Chrome is now 4 GB larger if you have AI stuff turned on.
Re-read the article. It’s not remotely like Firefox.
The point is that Chrome without any authorization from the user, nor notification to the user, is going to utilize 4GB worth of bandwidth as well as disk space. It is dishonest and a bad practice.
You can’t turn it off in settings, you have to set flags to turn it off. This disqualifies normal everyday users from knowing how or why this is happening.
Your comments are disingenuous and seems like you’re just here to be a Google and “AI” apologist.
This behavior by Google is gross, and any company or person that thinks it’s acceptable is equally gross. The author thoughtfully cites pieces of the GDPR and other acceptable computing policies and laws which this behavior contravenes. They also discuss the environmental impacts of this behavior.
Are you able to make a point without being a complete asshole about it? Is that how you want to be spoken to online? Please never talk to me that way, to be clear.
To be clear, they quite literally weren’t lol. Why are you tone policing a reply to someone else’s comment on another person’s post? How incredibly weird and self righteous…
Its not weird at all. The tone of that comment is shit and uncalled for, this sort of hostility has decayed the community [possibly] past the point of no return.
This isn’t some sort of unchecked fascism, we are talking about AI features in Firefox. I think it is poor behavior to lead in to that conversation with an insult and I’m going to call it out.
I have been a part of this community for almost a decade, and I’m invested in its conduct. i want to be a part of a community that is above le Reddit and X the everything app^TM; if you aren’t interested in elevating the level of discussion I guess I wonder why you wouldnt just be over there anyway.
I disagree that scolding and calling each other assholes over two words in a comment is any more called for, and I certainly don’t agree that whatever superiority complex you’re trying to invoke right now is doing anything to “elevate the level of discussion”.
I’m here to be in a space with other Marxists, consume anti-capitalist media that doesn’t sympathize with liberalism, and have conversations that aren’t in danger of being deplatformed for those stances being expressed. I am not here to feel like im better than or “above” any other community simply for language used rather than views expressed.
It’s a really weird article. They’re trying to say that some sleazy thing Anthropic did is the same as Google Chrome having an on-device machine learning model? And making it seem extra nefarious that the file gets redownloaded when you delete it, which seems like a completely normal self-healing mechanism. And finally mentions that you can just turn it off in the AI section of the Chrome settings.
They could have just written an article about how Chrome is now 4 GB larger if you have AI stuff turned on.
Firefox has the exact same thing
And for machine translation
Re-read the article. It’s not remotely like Firefox.
The point is that Chrome without any authorization from the user, nor notification to the user, is going to utilize 4GB worth of bandwidth as well as disk space. It is dishonest and a bad practice.
You can’t turn it off in settings, you have to set flags to turn it off. This disqualifies normal everyday users from knowing how or why this is happening.
Your comments are disingenuous and seems like you’re just here to be a Google and “AI” apologist.
This behavior by Google is gross, and any company or person that thinks it’s acceptable is equally gross. The author thoughtfully cites pieces of the GDPR and other acceptable computing policies and laws which this behavior contravenes. They also discuss the environmental impacts of this behavior.
Fuck you. Me and many others have critiqued Mozilla at length for this. Don’t pretend this is fine because Firefox has something similar.
Why are you starting a comment with “fuck you”?
Are you able to make a point without being a complete asshole about it? Is that how you want to be spoken to online? Please never talk to me that way, to be clear.
There’s a lot of folks in the community that actively dislike AI and will take a very nasty tone about it.
To be clear, they quite literally weren’t lol. Why are you tone policing a reply to someone else’s comment on another person’s post? How incredibly weird and self righteous…
Its not weird at all. The tone of that comment is shit and uncalled for, this sort of hostility has decayed the community [possibly] past the point of no return.
This isn’t some sort of unchecked fascism, we are talking about AI features in Firefox. I think it is poor behavior to lead in to that conversation with an insult and I’m going to call it out.
I have been a part of this community for almost a decade, and I’m invested in its conduct. i want to be a part of a community that is above le Reddit and X the everything app^TM; if you aren’t interested in elevating the level of discussion I guess I wonder why you wouldnt just be over there anyway.
I disagree that scolding and calling each other assholes over two words in a comment is any more called for, and I certainly don’t agree that whatever superiority complex you’re trying to invoke right now is doing anything to “elevate the level of discussion”.
I’m here to be in a space with other Marxists, consume anti-capitalist media that doesn’t sympathize with liberalism, and have conversations that aren’t in danger of being deplatformed for those stances being expressed. I am not here to feel like im better than or “above” any other community simply for language used rather than views expressed.