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Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

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Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#231

Post by Mirioron »

erentz wrote: post #55
jerf wrote: post #26

It doesn't work. There isn't enough money in the data for anyone to care. Your entire data load might be worth $100 a year . The only reason it funds massive industries is cost-effective aggregation by dirt-cheap computer power. I ran the numbers on Facebook a while back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19462402 It comes out that they're making roughly $17/yr in annual revenue per user. Revenue , not profit . Cr…

When I see these breakdowns I think I’d pay $17 per year for Facebook without all of the ads and tracking and data mining and knowing I was just getting a good service optimized for its customers. Why not ban tracking and ad targeting and selling personal data, and force that business model to go extinct, and now they have to start charging for service and their users become actual customers.

You wouldn't, because other people wouldn't pay for it. The value proposition of Facebook comes from other people. If there aren't enough other people then you wouldn't want to use it.

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#232

Post by Mirioron »

Lendal wrote: post #155
tomjen3 wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't sound so bad on the surface, but it would mean that most of my friends aren't on facebook, or any other social network, which would mean that it is close to pointless.

Most of your friends probably pay for Netflix. The motivation for Netflix is to give you just enough quality to keep you paying every month. For a free service like Facebook you the user have no expectation of quality because you're paying nothing. So Facebook's motivation is not to provide quality but to keep you engaged and clicking. They've discovered that best way to do that is to infuriate you and to radicalize…

>Most of your friends probably pay for Netflix.

Nope. Few people I know have a Netflix subscription. The subscription model doesn't work for news media for example.

I've never used Facebook, but there have been times where I've thought of signing up. If Facebook had cost money then that would've been a non-starter from the get go. The same goes for most other services.

I don't know why, but the value proposition of something that costs money online has to be very large for me to consider it.

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#233

Post by waon »

bryan_w wrote: post #218
Avicebron wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No we want a system in which pleading to a faceless mob of people on social media is not the solution to needing a kidney transplant.

I mean, we can't make kidneys in a lab, so you probably have to ask someone for theirs if you need one. FB is useful for connecting with people, so naturally people would ask there. What solutions did you have in mind?

Perhaps better government assistance in finding donors would be nice? It shouldn't have to involve people going directly to social media so they can tell the whole world about their medical condition.

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#234

Post by gowld »

s3r3nity wrote: post #50
zffr wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook has 2.6 billion monthly active users [1]. If they pay each user $5/yr, that is $13 billion/year in extra costs. That might push Facebook to bias towards collecting less data about its users by default. [1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/264810/number-of-monthly...

You're making their main revenue stream more costly - why wouldn't they instead double down more investment to make it _more_ efficient to get your data so that they recoup those margins? They might diversify a bit (which they already have, with their hardware plays and all that jazz,) but let's not pretend this is going to be the game changing investment mover we hope it would be.

No. They have already leverged as much as possible to profit as much as possibe.

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#235

Post by purplecabbage77 »

SuoDuanDao wrote: post #204
saalweachter wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if the goal is to discourage wide-scale collection of data without making it illegal , or at least to ensure that we benefit collectively from it, there's a much more obvious model, which is taxation. It's much easier to administer, and you end up with real money to do something with, instead of buying everyone a drink. Tax any company collecting, storing and analyzing user data some small amount, say, $1 or $0.1…

Andrew Yang and co. would likely suggest a universal basic income ;)

Isn't that basically the same thing as just having data collecting companies pay users directly?

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#236

Post by paulryanrogers »

TuringNYC wrote: post #219
yibg wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What number would that be though? Any number is going to be made up and subjective based on the individual. I might day my data is worth $1000 a year while it’s worth $1 to you.

If there is a pay option, you could just pay for searches. You set the price threshold by choosing to pay a la carte (or not.)

Google did have a contributor program for a while which replaced ads when you paid them and they in turn paid the websites and services you visited. My guess is the advertisers weren't happy to be cut out of the loop.

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#237

Post by chillacy »

bena wrote: post #7
Sodman wrote: post #2

I know it might sound like a minor ding, but the signup form doesn't allow apostrophes or accents in the name fields. Many people (myself included) have these in their legal names. I know this is US focused, but for an org that's all about data, this feels like a big oversight. For starters, _most_ data-hoarding websites allow these characters these days, so it's just one more obstacle when trying to match and verify…

This is another reason why I can't understand anyone who works in software of what is generally thought of as "technology" likes Yang. He does not understand. He likes to talk about "MATH". And while the numbers he uses may work out, I wonder how he acquires those numbers in the first place. Also, it often seems like he needs "ENGLISH" more than "MATH". Because "technology" is a meaningless word. A carburetor is tech…

Yang himself is not really a tech guy (he's an econ grad who became a lawyer, then ran companies and non-profits).

But looking at his book and platform, one can't help but notice that it heavily incorporates ideas that are popular in tech circles (UBI, automation, etc). Then on top of that he spends time talking about non-mainstream topics like Ranked Choice Voting, blockchain, etc. Who else talks about these things on the debate stage?

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#238

Post by chillacy »

joshribakoff wrote: post #4
Sodman wrote: post #2

I know it might sound like a minor ding, but the signup form doesn't allow apostrophes or accents in the name fields. Many people (myself included) have these in their legal names. I know this is US focused, but for an org that's all about data, this feels like a big oversight. For starters, _most_ data-hoarding websites allow these characters these days, so it's just one more obstacle when trying to match and verify…

He tweeted about this as an idea a few days ago. It’s possible this was thrown together in a few days by a junior dev. While I’m all for data privacy, there’s much bigger issues I’m personally focused on, like the fact. Breonna Taylor’s murderers are not in jail. Andrew Yang tweeted that his solution would be to make cops wear pink. This guy is a joke.

Yang jokes around a bunch (and swears a lot in speeches too) but if you listen to his long form interviews he does go into a tremendous amount of depth, more-so than many other politicians do.

Andrew Yang talks racism in America with Bakari Sellers: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfiMfPo0u6U

But what can we DO? Six ideas for police reform: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_gd4nx-dk0

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#239

Post by sroussey »

akshaybhalotia wrote: post #142
s3r3nity wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> would making it a bit more expensive lead to nobody bothering to collect all my information? No In all respect, this is a really naive view of the ad tech marketplace. The only thing that would do what you're saying is legislation. Making it more expensive just pushes out smaller players in the marketplace, leading to consolidation towards the Google's / Facebooks of the world.

All due respect but "law cannot fix what technology has broken" is quite true. I was going through this fairly balanced view [1] on why you shouldn't sell your data, and the power imbalance strikes me real hard. Once you legalize this circus and put a price on it, this will go exactly as thousands of other businesses go. (Hint: not in customer's favor) [1]: https://slate.com/technology/2020/04/sell-your-own-data-bad-…

Users must unionize for their data access, otherwise the price goes to zero

Re: Andrew Yang's Data Dividend Project is pushing Big Tech to pay users for data

#240

Post by chillacy »

stjohnswarts wrote: post #195

What we really need is a new amendment to the Constitution about digital privacy rights, end to surveillance without a warrant, digital documetns are the same as "secures in your papers" from a constitutional perspective, etc. Half measures like Yang's simply won't work.

Perhaps a "digital bill of rights"?

> Earlier in his campaign, Yang said that data should be classified as property, and users should have certain rights over how their data is collected and used by tech companies. Yang offers more insight on what these rights would look like in Thursday’s proposal, and he pledges to pass a “Digital Bill of Rights, ensuring ownership of data, control over how it’s used, and compensation for its use” if he is elected president.

https://www.theverge.com/2019/11/14/20964834/andrew-yang-dig...

And for a balance of opinion, a counter-argument on why this might be bad:

> Or let's take the central element of yang's proposal, establishing data as a property right and allowing individuals to be compensated for the use of that data if it is used by a big tech company like Google or Facebook when selling to advertisers. This again is a bit of a problem as tech expert Gigi sohn said on this show recently.

> Gigi makes a pretty convincing case there that actual ownership of your data could have a lot of problems, while the core underlying concern is more about data privacy. why not just tackle that instead?

https://thehill.com/hilltv/rising/470719-saagar-enjeti-yangs...

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