Your data is worthless. Everyone's data is priceless.
An argument that companies should pay users for their data
51–60 of 175 posts
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#52The media portrayal of the tech world would be more impactful if it weren't so hyperbolic, dramatized, and skewed. There are myriad valid complaints about the tech world, but Facebook paying you for you posting your photos is not one of them. Facebook is free. Google search is free. 15gb of gmail/google drive is free. You get those free, truly amazing services for nothing because the companies found ways to generate…
First, do you or anyone you know directly or indirectly profit from these types of services? Because I find your emphatic endorsement hard to understand. To be fair, I do use some of these services, too (carefully). But, that’s only because often I can’t find quality alternatives. For instance, I would pay for a high-quality service like Mint (I don’t use it) that kept my data private, but there is none. Since gather…
>First, do you or anyone you know directly or indirectly profit from these types of services?
Of course. No one would be using them if they weren't better off from using them.
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Facebook run fun psychological experiments to see if they can manipulate their users - without calling for volunteers first or anything I recognise as ethics. I've always wondered: How is that different from A/B testing, or any other marketing experiment?
Two things: - They weren't experimenting or measuring ads, clickthroughs, or pageviews views; they were experimenting on and measuring emotions directly - It was run as a psychological study, and published as a psychological study
they were experimenting on and measuring emotions directly
Every change to an interface can potentially affect the emotions of users, whether or not you try to measure it.
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#54why is nobody here speaking about the basic attention token?
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is a conversation I have occasionally had with non tech friends. I'm sorry, you are the one being hyperbolic. It's like you haven't even noticed what's been happening the last 10 years or so. > You get those free, truly amazing services lol. Services that exist without an honest portrayal about what they do with the data they gather, or anything like clarity on the extent of what is possible. Not content with th…
> This is a conversation I have occasionally had with non tech friends. I'm sorry, you are the one being hyperbolic. It's like you haven't even noticed what's been happening the last 10 years or so. In my opinion, you're mistaking apathy for ignorance. Reasonable people can disagree about whether or not the exchange is fair. I work in tech, have heard everything you just wrote many times, and my response is continual…
> outside of tech often don't know about the data collection to quite the extent you're talking about and don't care
Quite, but some of those very same people who don't care will call it creepy when they are on the receiving end of a retargeting campaign. Of course some don't care, or just find it funny. That's how I've got dragged in to those occasional conversations - typically a friend is spooked at the fact suddenly, somehow, as if by magic, the whole internet has decided they want to see ads for Gibson guitars, everywhere. Maybe they mentioned them in a FB comment a few weeks previously, or visited a review site with tracking etc.
I put it to you that they don't care because they have understood the transaction as one of £1 for a bar of chocolate. I give you some photos and emails in exchange for chat and service. "Who cares if Google/FB/NSA know when I have pizza" and so forth.
What they haven't (and yes, I realise I'm stretching this analogy far beyond breaking point) realised is buying that bar of chocolate results in the shop photocopying all their mail, weighing them, planting a bug to listen in to later conversations and having an employee follow them everywhere for the next few weeks - just in case they express another interest in chocolate.
> discomfort that didn't seem to persist, given the person's behavior didn't change at all.
I think network effect can cover most of that - continue to use Facebook because everyone they know is there, whilst having a vague perception that Facebook doesn't have their interests at heart.
It's still valid for them not to care, of course, but I think a much more honest explanation from the services of the extent they track, and what they can achieve in aggregate, is called for. I think that because people are still surprised by retargeting and similar techniques, and often describe it as creepy. I'm surprised that they're still surprised, to be honest, given how long it's been going on.
So clearly there is still some significant dissonance out there.
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#56The thing is, I don't actually have my data. Perhaps if I collected it and stored it, perhaps put it behind an accessible API and supplied Google et al with an API key to access it I might have a case for charging them for it.
It's worse than that. We currently don't even have the right to determine who has our data, or how its being exploited. The remedy, of course, is to establish intrinsic properties rights over our own data. No different than copyrights. Maybe we need a new catchphrase. I propose bodyrights . It captures the notions of self, privacy, identity, and sovereignty all in one.
Okay, but like operationally, what does that even mean? How do we establish a legal definition of what "your data" even is?
When we talk about "big data" and data collection, the vast majority of what we're talking about basically just boils down to web logs, and derived data that's inferred from those logs. So is an entry in a web log that corresponds to something you did now your property? Is anything someone writes down about me now my property? If I walk in a store and the store owner writes down that I was there, is that my property?
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#57[deleted]
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#58I'll never understand why I can't pay Google and Facebook $20 to $50 per year to simply respect my privacy and not give me advertisements. I can't imagine they make more than this off my viewing behaviour (especially as I use adblock)
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#59I'll never understand why I can't pay Google and Facebook $20 to $50 per year to simply respect my privacy and not give me advertisements. I can't imagine they make more than this off my viewing behaviour (especially as I use adblock)
It would probably raise them so little money at their scale it's not worth the trouble, that's why they don't do it.
Re: An argument that companies should pay users for their data
#60I'll never understand why I can't pay Google and Facebook $20 to $50 per year to simply respect my privacy and not give me advertisements. I can't imagine they make more than this off my viewing behaviour (especially as I use adblock)
Use fastmail instead of gmail and some alternative search engine that respects your privacy.