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Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

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Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#221

Post by xiphias2 »

SamReidHughes wrote: post #119
xiphias2 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They wanted to violate my rights given by Article 7.2 of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), this is clearly making the product worse. What's great with GitLab compared to other companies is that they are doing things in the open, while another company would just violate my rights without me knowing it. If you go through the comments, multiple (toxic) people in GitLab doesn't care about user rights, just w…

You can opt out by not using it, right? They'd be supposed to drop EU users, under some interpretation of the law. But even if they didn't, then as an EU user, you'd still be able to protect your own rights by ceasing use of their services.

GDPR is very clear, there are no multiple interpretations: the responsibility of telling me how they are using data about me is on the server side.

It's impossible for people in the EU to track all the time how different services use their data, so what you are suggesting is not practical.

As an example if you go with 200km/h on the German highway the responsibility of the road not ending is not yours. When I was going with a car in Albania and this happened to me, I (and my car) was quite shocked, but there are differences between countries.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#222

Post by harrygeez »

bongobongo wrote: post #172
z92 wrote: post #87

Earlier 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.

Gitlab has an excellent free plan, in fact it’s so good I honestly don’t understand how they can afford it and doubt it will last (but really hope it will for individual developers). They even give you Docker registries and thousands of CI hours.

> doubt it will last Yeah it won't. It's just too good to be true

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#223

Post by techntoke »

This just tells me that someone needs to continue working on Gitea or another open source alternative so that you can easily self host something comparable to GitLab enterprise. Yes, GitLab has an open source CE version but it has limited functionality. If another open source solution can implement the same functionality as their enterprise product, then GitLab will be forced to adopt or risk losing their business. Time to put some pressure on them.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#224

Post by t0astbread »

scotth wrote: post #205
cellar_door wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My understanding was that Gitlab wanted to collect your data to improve their product. Google is collecting your data to sell ads. I understand the reticence towards third party telemetry, but refusing basic interaction tracking for a product you pay for is just hurting yourself, even if you're already satisfied with the service. You don't go to the doctor for a checkup and then refuse bloodwork. Obviously there are…

Were people really arguing for removal of telemetry altogether? I would think that many of us are comfortable with aspects of tracking. For me, the concern was the value of the content. It might as well have been my bank saying they were going to start embedding disqus threads.

Not everyone wants tracking, even if that means sacrificing software quality. Making it mandatory is never excusable.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#225

Post by saithir »

jbk wrote: post #27

We received an apology email at the same time, well written, explaining what they did wrong, apologizing, promising to do a post-mortem, promising to not send to 3rd party trackers, and saying they did a mistake and waiting for feedbacks on the issue tracker. And with very little BS in the mail. Such level of transparency, of apologizing and clarity, especially written at the first person "I am truly sorry." is very…

No, there's nothing to praise here.

When I delete all my repositories by hand, one by one, I expect to not find a joke in that email about how "this email is sent to you because you have an active repository on Gitlab".

When I delete an account on Gitlab I expect to be deleted from all further mailings (especially ones I never subscribed separately to), yet I got this email today. How many more places do I have to delete my information from to finally be rid of Gitlab?

How many more third-party companies Gitlab shared my data with at this point? Because that they do have it, there's no question about it - after all I just got this email.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#226

Post by SamReidHughes »

bigiain wrote: post #147
SamReidHughes wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can opt out by not using it, right? They'd be supposed to drop EU users, under some interpretation of the law. But even if they didn't, then as an EU user, you'd still be able to protect your own rights by ceasing use of their services.

GDPR pretty much says "you can't do that". The advice I have bookmarked (which I'll admit is not a legal opinion or the source legislation) says: ‘specific website content’ means that you should not make ‘general access’ subject to conditions requiring users to accept non-essential cookies – you can only limit certain content if the user does not consent; and the term ‘legitimate purpose’ refers to facilitating the p…

There is some potent American law lurking about, so I'm not going to assume the GDPR is enforceable in ways untested in U.S. court.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#227

Post by onion2k »

cellar_door wrote: post #171
z92 wrote: post #87

Earlier 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.

My understanding was that Gitlab wanted to collect your data to improve their product. Google is collecting your data to sell ads. I understand the reticence towards third party telemetry, but refusing basic interaction tracking for a product you pay for is just hurting yourself, even if you're already satisfied with the service. You don't go to the doctor for a checkup and then refuse bloodwork. Obviously there are…

My understanding was that Gitlab wanted to collect your data to improve their product.

Gitlab could have collected anonymous data, with opting out of collection as the default, and promised not to sell it if they seriously believed it was about improving their product. Plenty of products record telemetry data only if you opt in to the program. Users understand and often accept that. That approach would have generated fewer headlines.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#228

Post by anoncake »

cellar_door wrote: post #171
z92 wrote: post #87

Earlier 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.

My understanding was that Gitlab wanted to collect your data to improve their product. Google is collecting your data to sell ads. I understand the reticence towards third party telemetry, but refusing basic interaction tracking for a product you pay for is just hurting yourself, even if you're already satisfied with the service. You don't go to the doctor for a checkup and then refuse bloodwork. Obviously there are…

> but refusing basic interaction tracking for a product you pay for is just hurting yourself,

If that were the case, Gitlab could have simply asked for permission.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#229

Post by samsari »

d357r0y3r wrote: post #159
notJim wrote: post #105

I 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…

>Err...do you have that right?

In the EU, yes you do.

>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.

They will. You do.

>I willingly gave them my information and used the books there.

And then you changed your mind.

Re: Gitlab cancels plan on tracking user behavior on GitLab.com

#230

Post by samsari »

sacrificedcapon wrote: post #204

Is it possible to enforce american spelling ( especially in the title )? Behavior vs Behaviour? HN is an american company and gitlab is an american company so people who participate here should use correct american spelling. The gitlab post itself uses the correct spelling - behavior. "In an effort to improve our user experience, we decided to implement user behavior tracking with both first and third-party technolog…

So if the subject on the story was a Swedish company you'd presumably be up here arguing that people who participate should use the correct Swedish spelling?
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