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This is not arbitrary. There is a clear upside: the ability to quickly find all pictures of a person, either by that person themselves or by other people. The b

by Joeri 9y ago

This is not arbitrary. There is a clear upside: the ability to quickly find all pictures of a person, either by that person themselves or by other people. The benefit provided by this feature has to be weighed against its potential for harm in order to decide whether it is a permissible use of technology or not. To be honest, facebook should have gathered consent in a GDPR-compliant way: opt-in. But IMHO the feature isn't bad in and of itself. Even recognizing people not on facebook isn't necessarily wrong, as long as facebook isn't building a profile of that person (but merely doing the equivalent of recognizing bananas in all of someone's pictures so they can do a search for banana.) But given the value provided by the feature, again I ask: what is the harm you're afraid of?

jacquesm 9y ago
> There is a clear upside: the ability to quickly find all pictures of a person, either by that person themselves or by other people. That's not a benefit to me. > But given the value provided by the feature, again I ask: what is the harm you're afraid of? You're stuck. It's kind of annoying when you ask someone a question, they give you an answer and then you repeat the question again. Either you're going to have to live with my answer or you're going to have to live with not getting the answer that you want. BTW, I find it hilarious to be lectured by you on HN where your profile is as good as anonymous and mine is stating exactly who I am and where I live. What are you afraid of?
- Joeri 9y ago
  I believe I understand your point of view (and please correct me if I don't): you don't want these companies to track any data about you because you think of digital privacy as an absolute right. Now try to understand my point of view: I think treating digital privacy as an absolute right is probably a mistake. First of all it's a denial of how the real world works (where you never have absolute privacy since other people will always know things about you). Secondly, the potential for social data to create value to society is quite large, and absolute privacy means we won't have any of that value. Admittedly, there is a also a big potential for harm, but that's my point: let's be deliberate about these things, not just dismiss them without consideration.
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    You set up a strawman and then eloquently argue against it. No, I don't think digital privacy is an absolute right. Obviously some level of online interaction is ok with me otherwise we would not be having this conversation. But I do believe that individuals should have some control over what data of their ends up online and that simply exercising that control should be possible without getting accused of being afraid of specific use cases of that data. Value creation to society doesn't interest me one bit without an actual example of such value created. The only value FB cares about is the value of their stock and since I'm not a stockholder it doesn't create value for me. The fact that there is potential for harm would be enough reason for me to be considerate but if even if it weren't I'd still be within my rights to limit which bits of me are online and which are not, it is you that rejects stuff without consideration and it is you that puts the onus on the people exercising their consideration to prove to you beyond some nebulous standard of doubt that those people are not afraid of something when in fact this was never the case to begin with.

by Joeri 9y ago

jacquesm 9y ago

> There is a clear upside: the ability to quickly find all pictures of a person, either by that person themselves or by other people. That's not a benefit to me. > But given the value provided by the feature, again I ask: what is the harm you're afraid of? You're stuck. It's kind of annoying when you ask someone a question, they give you an answer and then you repeat the question again. Either you're going to have to live with my answer or you're going to have to live with not getting the answer that you want. BTW, I find it hilarious to be lectured by you on HN where your profile is as good as anonymous and mine is stating exactly who I am and where I live. What are you afraid of?

Joeri 9y ago
I believe I understand your point of view (and please correct me if I don't): you don't want these companies to track any data about you because you think of digital privacy as an absolute right. Now try to understand my point of view: I think treating digital privacy as an absolute right is probably a mistake. First of all it's a denial of how the real world works (where you never have absolute privacy since other people will always know things about you). Secondly, the potential for social data to create value to society is quite large, and absolute privacy means we won't have any of that value. Admittedly, there is a also a big potential for harm, but that's my point: let's be deliberate about these things, not just dismiss them without consideration.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  You set up a strawman and then eloquently argue against it. No, I don't think digital privacy is an absolute right. Obviously some level of online interaction is ok with me otherwise we would not be having this conversation. But I do believe that individuals should have some control over what data of their ends up online and that simply exercising that control should be possible without getting accused of being afraid of specific use cases of that data. Value creation to society doesn't interest me one bit without an actual example of such value created. The only value FB cares about is the value of their stock and since I'm not a stockholder it doesn't create value for me. The fact that there is potential for harm would be enough reason for me to be considerate but if even if it weren't I'd still be within my rights to limit which bits of me are online and which are not, it is you that rejects stuff without consideration and it is you that puts the onus on the people exercising their consideration to prove to you beyond some nebulous standard of doubt that those people are not afraid of something when in fact this was never the case to begin with.