[crispinb]

> They make an effort to design their products and services with privacy and security in mind

This is certainly true, and given that under Cook Apple has clearly decided this is a strategic asset to invest in, will probably become more true over time

> and are much more transparent about what data is collected and how it's used

This is false - Google does just as good a job on transparency. It's trivially easy to see what data they have on you, and control it as you wish. Google's business model would be threatened if people used these facilities, but of course they don't.

[millstone]

Google has lots of data that they don't show you. In particular, Google won't show you the list of non-Google sites it knows you have visited, but they do track that via Analytics, Adsense, etc.

[crispinb]

Possibly a fair point (I only write 'possibly' because it's not an area I know that much about).