4 ms·

Stop with this "you're the product" nonsense. Please.

by sunnyps 11y ago

daveguy 11y ago
Stop making the user the product. Please.
- Karunamon 11y ago
  He's not wrong and you are. You are not "the product", and saying such is so divorced from the truth to be nothing more than a lie at this point. "You" are not being sold, access to you is. Look at some ads, get some great web services. Seems a fair tradeoff.
  - dikaiosune 11y ago
    I'm not entirely sure this is a semantic argument worth wading into, but I think there's a wrinkle worth addressing in the "you're the product" mentality. In order for Google to effectively serve you ads (and convince advertisers it's worth their prices), they accumulate vast amounts of information about their users. From some perspective one's identity is largely based on or equivalent to one's purchases, tastes, interests, friendships, knowledge, etc. Advertisers (like Google) try to know as many of these as possible about everyone they can, and I can see how for many people this is equivalent to Google selling "you" -- they have a digital representation of your identity, and their ability to comprehend it is the real service that sits behind the advertising.
    - Karunamon 11y ago
      I disagree that this is an argument over semantics seeing as how "Google is selling access to your attention based on what they know about you" is much less scary sounding (and more accurate) than "Google is selling you/your information". The latter makes it sound (willfully) as if random third parties have access to the information Google has collected, which is a pretty blatant falsehood. Anyone is able to go sign up for an Adwords account and see how "targeting" works. At no point does the advertiser get to see anything about the people. The whole "Google is selling you/You're the product" meme is a breathless, thought terminating cliche that needs to die.
- cballard 11y ago
  I have somehow managed to avoid being sold by Facebook. They have managed to sell the ability to include content in HTTP responses sent to my requests, though.
ljk 11y ago
> * Stop with this "you're the product" nonsense. Please. * what would you call it?
- sunnyps 11y ago
  The product is the service being offered, in the case of Google it's search, mail, maps, etc. How they make money is unrelated to what the "product" is. E.g. I switched from free ad-supported YouTube to the paid ad-less YouTube Red, does that mean what the "product" is suddenly changed? Also you really are the "customer" or "user" of the many services being offered by Google just like an advertiser is a "customer" of the advertising side of Google. That doesn't imply one type of customer (the advertiser) is more important than another type of customer (the user).
  - jerf 11y ago
    This is a lot of words that amount to "Nuh-uh!" The entire point of the "if you're not paying, you're the product" spiel is that everybody already knows everything you said, but there's a fundamental difference between paying and not paying. You're not going to get that far demanding that people stop thinking there's a difference, nor are people going to stop verbalizing that difference, nor should they. What's cliche on HN is something the vast majority of the rest of the world still has not heard, and in this case, ought to.
    - sunnyps 11y ago
      That was a rational argument. You know as well as I do that if you explained it the way I did above most people would not care. But instead you insist on the "you're the product" FUD nonsense to elicit an emotional response. Spreading FUD is a demagogue's job, I would never condone it.
      - jerf 11y ago
        The point is that it's a plainly obvious rational argument that is the ground state of the discussion, not some brilliant insight that once it is revealed to people they're sure to see it your way. And it's not FUD to point out where money flows really come from. In fact I find myself wondering why you are so passionate about people not talking about it? It's not an invalid observation, a lie, or something irrelevant, so people aren't going to stop talking about it. Generally jumping up and down and shouting "Stop following the money!" is, well, not how conversations on HN go, shall we say? If you're searching for something to be contrarian about I can provide a few better candidates....

Stop with this "you're the product" nonsense. Please.

by sunnyps 11y ago

Stop with this "you're the product" nonsense. Please.

daveguy 11y ago

Stop making the user the product. Please.

Karunamon 11y ago
He's not wrong and you are. You are not "the product", and saying such is so divorced from the truth to be nothing more than a lie at this point. "You" are not being sold, access to you is. Look at some ads, get some great web services. Seems a fair tradeoff.
- dikaiosune 11y ago
  I'm not entirely sure this is a semantic argument worth wading into, but I think there's a wrinkle worth addressing in the "you're the product" mentality. In order for Google to effectively serve you ads (and convince advertisers it's worth their prices), they accumulate vast amounts of information about their users. From some perspective one's identity is largely based on or equivalent to one's purchases, tastes, interests, friendships, knowledge, etc. Advertisers (like Google) try to know as many of these as possible about everyone they can, and I can see how for many people this is equivalent to Google selling "you" -- they have a digital representation of your identity, and their ability to comprehend it is the real service that sits behind the advertising.
  - Karunamon 11y ago
    I disagree that this is an argument over semantics seeing as how "Google is selling access to your attention based on what they know about you" is much less scary sounding (and more accurate) than "Google is selling you/your information". The latter makes it sound (willfully) as if random third parties have access to the information Google has collected, which is a pretty blatant falsehood. Anyone is able to go sign up for an Adwords account and see how "targeting" works. At no point does the advertiser get to see anything about the people. The whole "Google is selling you/You're the product" meme is a breathless, thought terminating cliche that needs to die.
cballard 11y ago
I have somehow managed to avoid being sold by Facebook. They have managed to sell the ability to include content in HTTP responses sent to my requests, though.

ljk 11y ago

> * Stop with this "you're the product" nonsense. Please. * what would you call it?

sunnyps 11y ago
The product is the service being offered, in the case of Google it's search, mail, maps, etc. How they make money is unrelated to what the "product" is. E.g. I switched from free ad-supported YouTube to the paid ad-less YouTube Red, does that mean what the "product" is suddenly changed? Also you really are the "customer" or "user" of the many services being offered by Google just like an advertiser is a "customer" of the advertising side of Google. That doesn't imply one type of customer (the advertiser) is more important than another type of customer (the user).
- jerf 11y ago
  This is a lot of words that amount to "Nuh-uh!" The entire point of the "if you're not paying, you're the product" spiel is that everybody already knows everything you said, but there's a fundamental difference between paying and not paying. You're not going to get that far demanding that people stop thinking there's a difference, nor are people going to stop verbalizing that difference, nor should they. What's cliche on HN is something the vast majority of the rest of the world still has not heard, and in this case, ought to.
  - sunnyps 11y ago
    That was a rational argument. You know as well as I do that if you explained it the way I did above most people would not care. But instead you insist on the "you're the product" FUD nonsense to elicit an emotional response. Spreading FUD is a demagogue's job, I would never condone it.
    - jerf 11y ago
      The point is that it's a plainly obvious rational argument that is the ground state of the discussion, not some brilliant insight that once it is revealed to people they're sure to see it your way. And it's not FUD to point out where money flows really come from. In fact I find myself wondering why you are so passionate about people not talking about it? It's not an invalid observation, a lie, or something irrelevant, so people aren't going to stop talking about it. Generally jumping up and down and shouting "Stop following the money!" is, well, not how conversations on HN go, shall we say? If you're searching for something to be contrarian about I can provide a few better candidates....