DemianJan 2, 2025
Paul Chambers🚧

I uninstalled my local tv news weather app today. After using it for well over a decade, They changed the terms of service and privacy policy so bad that essentially anything that I do on my phone,.any app, including where I'm at or where I'm going, or inferred to be at, can be mined and used and sold / shared with their third party marketing partners to market to me.

It essentially said, in legalease, and kind words, that they are 100% snooping at all times for marketing purposes. At least they were honest. I'm glad I read the policies.

TBH, It was kind of shocking to see it in print. Usually the practical use is hidden better. #privacy

Jan 2, 2025 at 12:28pmWeb
Show threadDavid J. AtkinsonJan 2, 2025
@paul Good for you. This scooping up of your data for resale is a major reason for the proliferation of apps. Virtually all do it. Unlike web browsers, in apps there are far fewer technical barriers to snooping. Pro tip: use the web site if you can.
Show threadPaul Chambers🚧Jan 2, 2025

@meltedcheese It was benign for years. It was the weather break-a-way from the local news. We could watch local news weather replays, got alerts and push notifications when storms were coming, etc. like during power outages or when hunkering down in your basement, waiting for a storm to pass over, you could watch the local weather desk reports live from that app, etc, if you had connectivity. (Sorry about the run-on sentence.)

I always do get my main weather from NWS website. It's my browser startup page. Shame the NWS doesn't have push notifications for alerts, etc. or a PWA website. I gave feedback last summer that they needed to come up with something when they decommissioned mobile.weather.gov, which wasn't that great, as it was.

https://www.weather.gov/media/notification/pdf_2023_24/scn24-51_mobile_decommissioning.pdf

Show threadDavid J. AtkinsonJan 2, 2025
@paul NWS has a (sometimes flakey) API which can be polled by a DIY program that pushes alerts. I use “Home Assistant” to gather and push NWS alerts to my . I also use the app “Storm Shield” (iOS) and it works great.
Show threadSpaceLifeFormJan 2, 2025

@paul

I refuse to use any app if I can precisely for the reasons you mention.

As for weather apps, they usually are off anyway, and I can find the info via browser and make my own determinations as needed.

Currently, I know I will have snow and/or freezing rain in 3 days.

But, it is too early to tell where that line will be. I hope the ice stays to my south, because I would prefer snow instead of ice.

I guarantee my local tv meteorologists are already hyping this up to continue to entice people to watch their ad-laden production.

Show threadPaul Chambers🚧Jan 2, 2025

@SpaceLifeForm Yeah, I avoid the commercial weather apps for this reason.

Years ago, my local TV news broke their local online weather forecasting off to a separate app. That is where you can watch the replay of the weather portion of the local news, got real time push local alerts, warnings, etc.

For years, it was benign as far as what it did and what they collected.

This recent update, I guess they switched systems, it's a company I never heard of, and then the TOS/Privacy Policy was so much different.

It's now an #enshittification app. It's removed. I guess I won't be getting alerts and other urgent messages regarding the local weather from my hometown news anymore.

It's a shame the NWS doesn't have something setup, esp for push notifications. Back to relying on the old weather radio again, which we always did when home, anyways.