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> This is entirely the wrong approach. Just don't harvest the data in the first place. Have opt-in measures if you must. That's it. That's what a serious commit

> This is entirely the wrong approach. Just don't harvest the data in the first place. Have opt-in measures if you must. That's it. That's what a serious commitment to privacy looks like. Anything else is a serious commitment to get away with harvesting as much data as possible while minimizing PR backlash. I'm sorry, but it's not economically realistic to demand that companies trying to minimize cost stop all data collection. They're not selling it: they're using it to make their developers work on real problems and improve real features. That's the same as nearly every mobile app. Watch how much your phone sings to mixpanel, kahuna, or google analytics to get a sense of what I mean. You can raise the price substantially, or you can find ways to make things cheaper. The market is really clear they want the cheaper and are fine with benign telemetry collection. But what's really absurd is that you then decide that doing what a small minority of users are asking for is a PR stunt because it doesn't go far enough in one step.

cmdrfred 10y ago
>They're not selling it: they're using it to make their developers work on real problems and improve real features Are you aware that Windows 10 is ad supported? If the data isn't being sold today, it will as soon as quarterly profits dip low enough.
gizmo 10y ago
Your appeal to economic realism is just a different way of saying that tracking is advantageous for Microsoft, which I don't think anybody disputed. Which brings me to your second point, that customers are fine with it. The underlying assumption is that consumers are Homo Economicus: rational agents making intelligent, informed decisions. This is not the case, as evidenced by the overwhelming difference between opt-in, opt-out, and must-choose behavior. Customers don't care about tracking, as you say, but not because they've thought about the issue and concluded the trade-off is in their benefit -- in reality they've never thought about the issue at all. Regular people are indifferent to iPhone privacy until they're asked if they ever have conversions or ever take photos they don't want to become public. And then it all clicks, and then they do care about their privacy. People don't care, until they do. When you call telemetry "benign" you're begging the question: the definition of benign implies you can't reasonably be opposed to it. So that's fallacious. I never said what Microsoft did was a PR stunt. My claim is that Microsoft isn't genuinely committed to the privacy of their customers, because these privacy measures are (a) insufficient (b) an afterthought (c) opt-out only. I see this as an effort to appease disgruntled customers, not as PR stunt. And as somebody else pointed out already, it still isn't possible to opt-out entirely.
- KirinDave 10y ago
  > Customers don't care about tracking, as you say, but not because they've thought about the issue and concluded the trade-off is in their benefit -- in reality they've never thought about the issue at all. Regular people are indifferent to iPhone privacy until they're asked if they ever have conversions or ever take photos they don't want to become public. And then it all clicks, and then they do care about their privacy. Yes I suppose if you draw an unrealistic line between data collection and Facebook suddenly sharing photos you could scare up any sort of response you want. Sharing content vs app usage metadata are quite different in point of fact though. > People don't care, until they do. Yes. I suppose this is true in the sense that it's tautological. I only bring that up because of your meticulous dedication to discarding social context in: > When you call telemetry "benign" you're begging the question: the definition of benign implies you can't reasonably be opposed to it. So that's fallacious. (P.S., this is not "begging the question". "Begging the question" is not "Obviously we should ask." If you're going to use a technical term, perhaps look up its technical definition? I do not think this assertion is unusually cyclical.) > I see this as an effort to appease disgruntled customers, not as PR stunt. I sure do wish people would hold desktop to the same uncompromising standard they hold Windows to... > And as somebody else pointed out already, it still isn't possible to opt-out entirely. Actually, they were referring to the current state of affairs for specific editions of windows. We are not entirely sure how this will change with the new edition.
  - gizmo 10y ago
    1. Your claim is people don't care about privacy. I say they never considered the implications, and provided evidence that people do switch from "not caring" to "caring" in some situations. We don't know whether people would care about the collection of meta-data because they've never seriously thought about the matter. Your assertion that people don't care is still false. 2. I am using the technical (dictionary) definition of "begging the question" and I'm using it correctly. We're not in agreement whether the data collection is fine. You say it is, I say it isn't. Begging the question is the fallacy where you assume the statement under examination to be true, which do you when you label collection "benign". After all, if I agreed it's benign we wouldn't be having this discussion. 3. Non-sequitur. 4. No evidence has been provided that opting out entirely will be possible, and it's not possible today, so it stands to reason it won't be possible in the future either (except perhaps with registry hacks).

cmdrfred 10y ago

>They're not selling it: they're using it to make their developers work on real problems and improve real features Are you aware that Windows 10 is ad supported? If the data isn't being sold today, it will as soon as quarterly profits dip low enough.

gizmo 10y ago

Your appeal to economic realism is just a different way of saying that tracking is advantageous for Microsoft, which I don't think anybody disputed. Which brings me to your second point, that customers are fine with it. The underlying assumption is that consumers are Homo Economicus: rational agents making intelligent, informed decisions. This is not the case, as evidenced by the overwhelming difference between opt-in, opt-out, and must-choose behavior. Customers don't care about tracking, as you say, but not because they've thought about the issue and concluded the trade-off is in their benefit -- in reality they've never thought about the issue at all. Regular people are indifferent to iPhone privacy until they're asked if they ever have conversions or ever take photos they don't want to become public. And then it all clicks, and then they do care about their privacy. People don't care, until they do. When you call telemetry "benign" you're begging the question: the definition of benign implies you can't reasonably be opposed to it. So that's fallacious. I never said what Microsoft did was a PR stunt. My claim is that Microsoft isn't genuinely committed to the privacy of their customers, because these privacy measures are (a) insufficient (b) an afterthought (c) opt-out only. I see this as an effort to appease disgruntled customers, not as PR stunt. And as somebody else pointed out already, it still isn't possible to opt-out entirely.

KirinDave 10y ago
> Customers don't care about tracking, as you say, but not because they've thought about the issue and concluded the trade-off is in their benefit -- in reality they've never thought about the issue at all. Regular people are indifferent to iPhone privacy until they're asked if they ever have conversions or ever take photos they don't want to become public. And then it all clicks, and then they do care about their privacy. Yes I suppose if you draw an unrealistic line between data collection and Facebook suddenly sharing photos you could scare up any sort of response you want. Sharing content vs app usage metadata are quite different in point of fact though. > People don't care, until they do. Yes. I suppose this is true in the sense that it's tautological. I only bring that up because of your meticulous dedication to discarding social context in: > When you call telemetry "benign" you're begging the question: the definition of benign implies you can't reasonably be opposed to it. So that's fallacious. (P.S., this is not "begging the question". "Begging the question" is not "Obviously we should ask." If you're going to use a technical term, perhaps look up its technical definition? I do not think this assertion is unusually cyclical.) > I see this as an effort to appease disgruntled customers, not as PR stunt. I sure do wish people would hold desktop to the same uncompromising standard they hold Windows to... > And as somebody else pointed out already, it still isn't possible to opt-out entirely. Actually, they were referring to the current state of affairs for specific editions of windows. We are not entirely sure how this will change with the new edition.
- gizmo 10y ago
  1. Your claim is people don't care about privacy. I say they never considered the implications, and provided evidence that people do switch from "not caring" to "caring" in some situations. We don't know whether people would care about the collection of meta-data because they've never seriously thought about the matter. Your assertion that people don't care is still false. 2. I am using the technical (dictionary) definition of "begging the question" and I'm using it correctly. We're not in agreement whether the data collection is fine. You say it is, I say it isn't. Begging the question is the fallacy where you assume the statement under examination to be true, which do you when you label collection "benign". After all, if I agreed it's benign we wouldn't be having this discussion. 3. Non-sequitur. 4. No evidence has been provided that opting out entirely will be possible, and it's not possible today, so it stands to reason it won't be possible in the future either (except perhaps with registry hacks).