Something a little ironic about putting a tracked click link in an email apologizing for adding tracking. That said I firmly believe in opt-in tracking and would likely enable it for my gitlab usage.
Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
151–160 of 285 posts
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#152I don't see where it is canceled. The closest thing I see to canceled, is postponed. From the update: 'We will not activate user level product usage tracking on GitLab.com or GitLab self-managed before we address the feedback and re-evaluate our plan.' That leaves a lot of wiggle room.
No 1/2 decent CEO, PR, Legal or any other department at work here would leave themselves without wiggle room. I’ll reserve the pitchforks for if this comes up again.
I think there's compelling evidence that there is not a "1/2 decent" CFO at work there...
I'm gonna keep my pitchfork sharp, close, and on display here.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#153Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The reaction to this whole saga has been insane. Chill out people. I very much disagree. I think the outcry was warranted, and right now I see GitLab doing the right thing (and, obviously, the outcry was a huge reason for that). Changing plans in the harsh light of public condemnation isn't easy, and for that I very much commend GitLab. As someone who was very much against the previously announced change, though (…
Yeah, if the outcry continued even after their rollback & apology, _then_ it would be unwarranted. But everyone's happy now (well, arguably GitLab may not be, but they should surely be able to work out a solution with the community on how to collect telemetrics in a privacy-conscious way). I'm also glad the feedback was so strong, as the ad-tech industry has spent the past 15 years numbing the general populace to unw…
> Yeah, if the outcry continued even after their rollback & apology, _then_ it would be unwarranted.
The outcry may stop but the trust is now gone and will take years to rebuild. Next time I'm considering/recommending on-premise git hosting I won't be recommending gitlab.
I'm also considering moving my personal repos that I pay for. Generally I only interact through the CLI and don't think about the web interface much, but apparently when I go there I'm sharing info with whatever the hell gravatar is.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#154How can you trust a company like GitLab whose default decision is always bad and then they change direction after public outcry. Either they don't think before they make decisions or they are just trying to figure out what they can get away with. This really shows their lack of morality. They kind of remind me of Facebook.
Lol, I think you're forgetting about another provider. Besides you can always try Gitea.
Is the on premise one different? The hosted one leaks data to google and cloudflare.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#155Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was done. There even was those small banners that said something in the way of "if you have gmail I won't mail you" etc. Thing is, the broader public don't care. The difference between gitlab and gmail is primarily that developers care more about this stuff and value their code more than most people care about their email. They are also much more informed in the matter, most using gmail haven't got a clue.
There's a difference between gitlab and gmail. People pay for gitlab while gmail is free. Google can easily declare "either you take it for what it is, or leave." Gitlab can't.
A lot of institutions used to run their own e-mail. Over the years I've watched as my e-mail addresses (both universities and my current employer) have been replaced by Gmail on the backend. All of them stopped being willing to manage e-mail themselves. None of them were willing to use a less surveillance-oriented provider. That choice wasn't made by consumers. It was made by the same kind of informed IT people. I suspect it wasn't free, either.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was done. There even was those small banners that said something in the way of "if you have gmail I won't mail you" etc. Thing is, the broader public don't care. The difference between gitlab and gmail is primarily that developers care more about this stuff and value their code more than most people care about their email. They are also much more informed in the matter, most using gmail haven't got a clue.
There's a difference between gitlab and gmail. People pay for gitlab while gmail is free. Google can easily declare "either you take it for what it is, or leave." Gitlab can't.
Both are freemium. However, there's slight truthiness in your claim by way of the difference in probability that any given non-business user pays.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
There's a difference between gitlab and gmail. People pay for gitlab while gmail is free. Google can easily declare "either you take it for what it is, or leave." Gitlab can't.
A lot of institutions used to run their own e-mail. Over the years I've watched as my e-mail addresses (both universities and my current employer) have been replaced by Gmail on the backend. All of them stopped being willing to manage e-mail themselves. None of them were willing to use a less surveillance-oriented provider. That choice wasn't made by consumers. It was made by the same kind of informed IT people. I su…
For universities, it actually is free (as in beer), aside from the university staff's compensation toward the migration.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#158Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, the CFO is dead wrong. I'm a very vocal Gitlab advocate and would have stopped promoting them if they did this. There are 100's if not 1000's of people like me and we help build Gitlab value. And then there is the GDPR to contend with.
The only sense in which he's "wrong" is as you describe: people won't want to use the software, and it's a bad decision when it comes to making money. He's not wrong on some principles-based reason.
That, and all the other senses (GDPR, contracts) outlined in this thread.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#159I find the anti-telemetry attitude honestly kind of confusing. I mean, you know that the shops you go to know what products you're buying from them, right? Presumably those shops look at that data in aggregate when thinking about which products to stock. How is this any different? If you're transacting with someone, it's not possible to hide that transaction from them. Of course you should have the right to have that…
> Of course you should have the right to have that data deleted, but that's different from saying it should never be collected at all.
Err...do you have that right? The whole concept of a "right to be forgotten" is a relatively new thing that generally has not been observed in the past.
Like, if I want the library to erase all records of me checking out books, they probably just aren't going to do it, and I don't see how I have a right to force them to. I willingly gave them my information and used the books there.
Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
What should really be praised... Without further, congratulations to everyone protesting against this gitlab move. This is something that should be done years back when google started with its tracking, same with facebook. This was the behaviour that should be seen each and every time some company wants to take advantage of its users. But to my sadness it is rarely seen. So once again congratulations to each and ever…
If you want to ban tracking, I would totally oppose it. I think its great that google manage to make money out of my personal data, and in return I get to use their of free service. Fortunately, in the regards of google user, there are more people who are fine (or don't care) with tracking.
The ability for people to have amazing technology and spend no currency on it is, in my opinion, a net positive for the world. But it would be nice if there were some provable toggle switch to choose between paying with data and paying with currency, for those who prefer the latter. Since proof is problematic, carefully selecting your vendor is the toggle switch, and that kind of switching unfortunately has switching costs including the massive inconvenience when, say, using an Android phone without a Google account.