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Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

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Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#31

Post by nonbirithm »

2bitencryption wrote: post #7

Is it just me, or is FLoC simply an act? A way for Google to say, "See, regulators, we're trying! You don't have to regulate us, we're doing it on our own!" While they know full well the web will never get on board with this. Seems like just a way to buy time, to muddy the waters. Make the ecosystem more complicated. Pin the blame on others for not getting on board with your attempt to "fix" the situation. "We tried…

The way I see FLoC is that it's nothing more than a compromise.

This isn't a web standards feature like WebMIDI or WebHID that fulfills the (ever expanding) requests for features from web developers. It isn't a feature that the average user would ever ask for. It's simply a way for Google's ads business to continue functioning in spite of a web community that is gradually becoming privacy-conscious.

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#32

Post by marvinblum »

tomxor wrote: post #29
marvinblum wrote: post #24

As a website owner, you can opt out by setting the Permissions-Policy header to "interest-cohort=()". I rolled that out for pirsch.io today.

Cmon, this is as backward as the "do not track" header... asking websites to explicitly opt out... in order to protect users from the users's own browser!? No, just don't build stupid things into browsers.

Yeah, it's stupid, but the only option we have right now if the user does not disable FLoC in Chrome. We also honor the DNT header btw :)

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#33

Post by xnx »

I'm definitely in the minority of commenters on these FLoC threads. I hate that 3rd party cookies exist, and support FLoC if it would hasten the demise of 3rd party cookies. It seems like many consider the alternative to FLoC to be an anonymous web where content can be accessed without login. The migration of content into walled gardens like Instagram seems more likely to me.

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#34

Post by livre »

xnx wrote: post #33

I'm definitely in the minority of commenters on these FLoC threads. I hate that 3rd party cookies exist, and support FLoC if it would hasten the demise of 3rd party cookies. It seems like many consider the alternative to FLoC to be an anonymous web where content can be accessed without login. The migration of content into walled gardens like Instagram seems more likely to me.

The idea that FLoC is a more privacy-friendly alternative to third-party cookies is deeply flawed, please read [this](https://github.com/WICG/floc/issues/100).

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#35

Post by chmod775 »

nonbirithm wrote: post #31
2bitencryption wrote: post #7

Is it just me, or is FLoC simply an act? A way for Google to say, "See, regulators, we're trying! You don't have to regulate us, we're doing it on our own!" While they know full well the web will never get on board with this. Seems like just a way to buy time, to muddy the waters. Make the ecosystem more complicated. Pin the blame on others for not getting on board with your attempt to "fix" the situation. "We tried…

The way I see FLoC is that it's nothing more than a compromise. This isn't a web standards feature like WebMIDI or WebHID that fulfills the (ever expanding) requests for features from web developers. It isn't a feature that the average user would ever ask for. It's simply a way for Google's ads business to continue functioning in spite of a web community that is gradually becoming privacy-conscious.

"Okay, it is true I can do nothing to force you to eat this pile of poo and I have nothing as means of payment, but let's make a compromise: How about you eat half?"

How about no, Google?

DRM made its way into browsers only barely, and in that case they at least had something people wanted.

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#36

Post by bluefirebrand »

qnsi wrote: post #26
bluefirebrand wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy false equivalence batman. Organ donation is a great good for society, saves lives. Google's FLOC does what exactly?

ad targeting is good for economy and small businesses. Imagine all the wealth created by being able to show people ads they might be interested in seeing

I'm extremely anti-ads and tracking.

Part of that was because I used to work for a website that was an ads publishing platform.

And I'm here to tell you: More accurate metrics don't actually generate any kind of wealth. What they do is allow ad buyers to push down the prices they have to offer to publishers for clicks or lower the overall numbers of impressions they are willing to buy, based on the targeting metrics they have for the publisher.

More precise, fine-grained targeting information = fewer and lower value spends to gain the same conversion rate value.

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#37

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

marvinblum wrote: post #32
tomxor wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cmon, this is as backward as the "do not track" header... asking websites to explicitly opt out... in order to protect users from the users's own browser!? No, just don't build stupid things into browsers.

Yeah, it's stupid, but the only option we have right now if the user does not disable FLoC in Chrome. We also honor the DNT header btw :)

Chrome users should just run a local proxy that inserts the header for them.

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#38

Post by marvinblum »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #37
marvinblum wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, it's stupid, but the only option we have right now if the user does not disable FLoC in Chrome. We also honor the DNT header btw :)

Chrome users should just run a local proxy that inserts the header for them.

That is a good solution for corporate networks.

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#39

Post by xnx »

livre wrote: post #34
xnx wrote: post #33

I'm definitely in the minority of commenters on these FLoC threads. I hate that 3rd party cookies exist, and support FLoC if it would hasten the demise of 3rd party cookies. It seems like many consider the alternative to FLoC to be an anonymous web where content can be accessed without login. The migration of content into walled gardens like Instagram seems more likely to me.

The idea that FLoC is a more privacy-friendly alternative to third-party cookies is deeply flawed, please read [this]( https://github.com/WICG/floc/issues/100 ).

Thanks. Good thread. Sounds like FloC is definitely more anonymous than third party cookies that are already in use today. There might are some hypothetical situations with FLoC where some information might be able to be inferred given sufficient data, but this is not trivial/direct like it is today.

Re: Nobody is joining Google's FLoC

#40

Post by madeofpalk »

qnsi wrote: post #26
bluefirebrand wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy false equivalence batman. Organ donation is a great good for society, saves lives. Google's FLOC does what exactly?

ad targeting is good for economy and small businesses. Imagine all the wealth created by being able to show people ads they might be interested in seeing

did small businesses not exist before google?
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