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I think Apple is making a mistake by taking the privacy first approach. I strongly believe people will be trading privacy for convenience and companies which s

I think Apple is making a mistake by taking the privacy first approach. I strongly believe people will be trading privacy for convenience and companies which shamelessly mine the customer data will win. This could also affect recruiting, since I assume it is more interesting to be working with AI projects in company like Facebook or Google where you have access to was amounts of customer information.

0xFFC 10y ago
This comment may got down voted on HN, but it is reality in real world.
Tepix 10y ago
As time moves on, customers get more aware of the privacy implications of everything they do online. I think Apple is ahead of the pack. Google cannot follow them because it's against their business interest. I know plenty of people who do not trust Google and stay away from their products (including Android phones) as much as is feasible.
- baldfat 10y ago
  The cost for Privacy is pretty big in terms of loss of convenience. If people really cared about it duckduckgo would be huge and gmail would have never gotten off the ground. Facebook would be a desert. Most people feel comfortable sharing and being a mostly open book. Only real privacy people care about is who gets to unlock their phone. Most people are lost in that their privacy is they are one flake in a snowstorm. I seriously had friends for year say "Don't put my kids on the internet." After a few years that all goes away due to the ease of sharing life with friends and families. So when people who own iPhone see Amazon's Alexia and their horrible Siri they buy the Echo from Amazon. Apple just makes things harder for their customers with their attempts on privacy.
  - grzm 10y ago
    > Apple just makes things harder for their customers with their attempts on privacy. In addition to Siri, what else would you put on the list of things made harder by Apple's privacy positions/implementations? (Edited for clarity.)
  - gurkendoktor 10y ago
    Siri being complete crap has nothing to do with privacy, in fact the original iteration of Siri sent everything to the cloud for processing. I honestly don't know how the meme got started that privacy, out of all things, is hurting Siri. Siri cannot even remember the subject of the last question. It cannot answer meaningful questions about anything on the internet. Its knowledge of "places of interest" is terrible because Apple's database is years behind Google's. I've given up on "Hey Siri" because it just doesn't work. If Siri is almost useless when it comes to publicly accessible information, then how would it help to give it centralised access to private information? (Or the other way around: If Siri worked well, but was limited to publicly available information, it would still be freaking awesome. But I have my doubts about the current iteration of AI.)
JustSomeNobody 10y ago
I want so desperately to disagree with you but when I think about the average person today, I just don't see them fighting against privacy invasions. They are too brainwashed by the terrorism drum bangers.
grzm 10y ago
> I strongly believe people will be trading privacy for convenience and companies which shamelessly mine the customer data will win. I do agree there should be a way to trade privacy for services. Some things can be a lot better when they're personalized. I'd like to see more granularity and control over the transaction, so it's more of a personal data exchange rather than privacy. Right now it seems to be an all-or-nothing proposition. Privacy first means we can have control over what data is shared. You can still choose to share what you want. That makes it much more of a trade. Right now I don't feel like I'm trading. Right now I feel more like I need to actively guard against people reaching into my "privacy" wallet while I happen to be using services they're offering. Don't get me wrong: I'm using the services they're providing, and they should be getting something in return. Using Gmail as an example, people think of it as "free email". They're not necessarily aware of the nature -- or extent-- of the exchange. I'm certainly not. I have no idea the extent to which Google is using my data. It doesn't even need to be nefarious. All I'm saying is that I'd like the exchange to be more explicit. So far we haven't figured out ways of making these kinds of exchanges easy. And I'd much rather see these exchanges happen in the market rather than solely rely on regulations to protect privacy. I'm sure others have varying opinions on this. If you have an alternate take, please share a comment or a link. Thanks!
wahsd 10y ago
Actually, their mistake is not trying to leverage the privacy first approach better. If as the author stated, Apple had more innovation in its blood, they could come up with things like social networks where the user is in control of content and data and users are not farmed and harvested like livestock.

0xFFC 10y ago

This comment may got down voted on HN, but it is reality in real world.

Tepix 10y ago

As time moves on, customers get more aware of the privacy implications of everything they do online. I think Apple is ahead of the pack. Google cannot follow them because it's against their business interest. I know plenty of people who do not trust Google and stay away from their products (including Android phones) as much as is feasible.

baldfat 10y ago
The cost for Privacy is pretty big in terms of loss of convenience. If people really cared about it duckduckgo would be huge and gmail would have never gotten off the ground. Facebook would be a desert. Most people feel comfortable sharing and being a mostly open book. Only real privacy people care about is who gets to unlock their phone. Most people are lost in that their privacy is they are one flake in a snowstorm. I seriously had friends for year say "Don't put my kids on the internet." After a few years that all goes away due to the ease of sharing life with friends and families. So when people who own iPhone see Amazon's Alexia and their horrible Siri they buy the Echo from Amazon. Apple just makes things harder for their customers with their attempts on privacy.
- grzm 10y ago
  > Apple just makes things harder for their customers with their attempts on privacy. In addition to Siri, what else would you put on the list of things made harder by Apple's privacy positions/implementations? (Edited for clarity.)
- gurkendoktor 10y ago
  Siri being complete crap has nothing to do with privacy, in fact the original iteration of Siri sent everything to the cloud for processing. I honestly don't know how the meme got started that privacy, out of all things, is hurting Siri. Siri cannot even remember the subject of the last question. It cannot answer meaningful questions about anything on the internet. Its knowledge of "places of interest" is terrible because Apple's database is years behind Google's. I've given up on "Hey Siri" because it just doesn't work. If Siri is almost useless when it comes to publicly accessible information, then how would it help to give it centralised access to private information? (Or the other way around: If Siri worked well, but was limited to publicly available information, it would still be freaking awesome. But I have my doubts about the current iteration of AI.)

JustSomeNobody 10y ago

I want so desperately to disagree with you but when I think about the average person today, I just don't see them fighting against privacy invasions. They are too brainwashed by the terrorism drum bangers.

grzm 10y ago

> I strongly believe people will be trading privacy for convenience and companies which shamelessly mine the customer data will win. I do agree there should be a way to trade privacy for services. Some things can be a lot better when they're personalized. I'd like to see more granularity and control over the transaction, so it's more of a personal data exchange rather than privacy. Right now it seems to be an all-or-nothing proposition. Privacy first means we can have control over what data is shared. You can still choose to share what you want. That makes it much more of a trade. Right now I don't feel like I'm trading. Right now I feel more like I need to actively guard against people reaching into my "privacy" wallet while I happen to be using services they're offering. Don't get me wrong: I'm using the services they're providing, and they should be getting something in return. Using Gmail as an example, people think of it as "free email". They're not necessarily aware of the nature -- or extent-- of the exchange. I'm certainly not. I have no idea the extent to which Google is using my data. It doesn't even need to be nefarious. All I'm saying is that I'd like the exchange to be more explicit. So far we haven't figured out ways of making these kinds of exchanges easy. And I'd much rather see these exchanges happen in the market rather than solely rely on regulations to protect privacy. I'm sure others have varying opinions on this. If you have an alternate take, please share a comment or a link. Thanks!

wahsd 10y ago

Actually, their mistake is not trying to leverage the privacy first approach better. If as the author stated, Apple had more innovation in its blood, they could come up with things like social networks where the user is in control of content and data and users are not farmed and harvested like livestock.