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Google Maps Ditches Walking Calorie Counter After Backlash (engadget.com)
Following online backlash, Google is removing a planned feature in Maps that shows you how many calories you'd burn when in walking mode. Google's attempt to promote a healthy lifestyle caused a number of people to lambast the feature on Twitter, claiming it would "shame" and even "trigger" those with eating disorders. Engadget reports: Taking note of the negative reaction, Google is now dumping the experiment. It confirmed to Engadget that the update was briefly tested on iOS, and has been abandoned based on user feedback. As The Hill's Taylor Lorenz noted in her tweets, there was no way to turn off the feature. Lorenz also claimed that using pink cupcakes as the unit of measurement was "lowkey aimed at women." Others pointed out that Maps wasn't the appropriate place for the update. After all, there are plenty of fitness and calorie counting apps that keep track of your activity and consumption -- again emphasizing how misplaced the feature was.
...for the Culture of Outrage!
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>Google's attempt to promote a healthy lifestyle caused a number of people to lambast the feature on Twitter, claiming it would "shame" and even "trigger" those with eating disorders.
Those people are poisoning our society. They need to be ostracized and allowed to wallow in whatever ghetto they manage to find refuge in.
How can this feature be added back in? I'd find it handy.
What's wrong with encouraging people to walk instead of drive?
Where else could you put such a feature, apart from Maps? Adding navigation to a fitness app would be even worse.
What's wrong with pink cupcakes? Raspberry icing is awesome. How dare women try to claim it for themselves.
As a fat person myself, how is it offensive to be informed that you are burning calories by doing something? It's not like someone's telling you that you should go for a walk to burn calories because you really need it. They're telling you "hey, I noticed you're out on a walk, did you know that that's burning calories? good for you!"
-Forrest Cameranesi, Geek of all Trades
"I am Sam. Sam I am. I do not like trolls, flames, or spam."
1) change your possibly useful feature to include the ability to turn it off, modify the icon, allow customization.
2) Demand, outraged, it be removed.
Guess which one prevailed.
A number of people lambasted the feature on Twitter, claiming it would "shame" and even "trigger" those with eating disorders.
Really?
Really?
Lorenz also claimed that using pink cupcakes as the unit of measurement was "lowkey aimed at women."
That would be a valid point (sort of) if it were true. It isn't. The article shows screenshots: it just shows a calorie count.
That being said, it's still likely a useless feature. People are wildly different, and how many calories an individual burns is going to depend on their weight, posture, walking gait, and who knows what other variables. Hell, even the current temperature and wind are probably enough to make the calorie counts completely wrong.
Remove it because it's going to be mostly meaningless, not because some snowflakes don't like to be reminded of just how inactive they are.
For real, wanting to go somewhere and wanting to get exercise are two completely different things. It's rarely overlapped where I don't care how long it'd take to get there so I'll burn some calories on foot. So it is completely useless and somewhat insulting, especially to people like me with mobility issues when it comes to walking. BUT screw those in-denial fat ass whiners who can't handle being told they're disgustingly unhealthy and need to do something about it. If they can't handle that simple fact, let alone taking steps to do something about it, that's THEIR own mental illness. DO NOT cater to those types.
If only it weren't against every principle of modern UI design to, you know, actually ALLOW PEOPLE TO TURN FEATURES ON AND OFF.
Because if it were, those who find a given feature useful could turn it on (or leave it turned on), and those who don't want it could simply turn it off (or leave it turned off), all without starting a massive Twitstorm.
But of course, it's no longer fashionable to trouble the user with such responsibilities. Google Knows What's Best For Us All(tm)... and if they don't, Apple and Microsoft will be happy to take on the burden of making decisions on our collective behalf.
For a happier life, ignore everything written on Twitter.
Your reading comprehension is failing. What the OP implies is that people taking offense ON BEHALF OF OTHERS should be ostracized. These are the people that keep us from making tongue-in-cheek jokes, that keep us from calling people-of-a-non-white-skin-color black, and who generally live and breathe their own outrage, because only by trying to make the world PERFECT can they find meaning in their own pathetic little lives.
They are the ones who always know best, who will run from crusade to crusade to prove how great and noble they are, and they are a cancer upon the world.
People with eating disorders? I pity them and hope they get the help they need.
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I don't know which is worse: 1. Mentally unstable "people" who claimed this is an issue. 2. Mentally unstable "people" at Google who backed off on the feature.
I do not respond to trolls (AKA Anonymous Cowards)
many men, both straight and gay, as well as many other individuals across the gender spectrum, like the colour pink; for her to suggest this is aimed at women is sexist and insensitive.
do not read this line twice.
Rather than just taking a shit on another seemingly useful feature, why not make it opt-in instead? The weenies that will complain about its mere existence can be ignored with extreme prejudice.
There is no XUL, only WebExtensions...
What do I not get about people with eating disorders that would cause them to short-circuit by seeing a calorie estimate if they walked? Seems to me that it'd make for a positive motivator; it would encourage people to dare I suggest, "walk." I have a hard time seeing this as anything more than guilt avoidance by people choosing exercise impoverished lifestyles.
To me it looked like a pretty cool feature. It posed a "what if" that might encourage me to opt-in to walking when I otherwise might not have decided to walk and therefore opened my exercise tracking app. That's kind of a shame, I hope they revisit the idea, and just pacify the nay-sayers with an "off" switch.
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I think they mean the opposite end of the spectrum as well. Those who think they are fat, even though they wear a size 0 dress. The ones that have to burn off the calories from a banana.
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Kaltesdreckloch.
Those fat fat fatties are excellent consumers, leave them alone!
>> it would "shame" and even "trigger" those with eating disorders.
Oh no! We must shelter those delicate little flowers from facts and truthful information!
Is it not delightful to see baizou turn on their own kind and tear one another to shreds?
The screenshots in linked to the article shows that the complainer looked up driving directions for somewhere 0.7 miles away. That's a little under 1,000 steps. Unless there is some good reason (taking lots of luggage, rough neighbourhood, person is disabled) surely most people would walk that? And if there is a good reason why would anyone see it as an insult?
It's also not in Google's interest to make such core functionality unusable by people suffering from psychological diseases, as it both needlessly restricts their market/data-farm, and comes across as extremely insensitive
How far gone must you be to consider a calorie counter "extremely insensitive"?
If you find the mere existence of a calorie counter extremely insensitive, the problem is not with the calorie counter, I assure you.
I also assert that this thinking is far removed from the majority, and far removed from any rational demographic. The only people that would possibly complain about the existence of a calorie counter can accurately and reasonably be labelled as SJWs. Anyone else would, even if in disagreement, merely shrug their shoulders and move on.