9 ms·

The biggest unintended consequence I see is that more tech businesses will have to charge for their service rather than make money in opaque ways.

i_am_nomad 8y ago
That would be a very positive consequence.
- paulcnichols 8y ago
  Very true in some cases, i.e. unrollme. But I also like free content and am mostly willing to trade a little privacy for access.
  - Etheryte 8y ago
    I think the trade-off should be a lot more explicit though, e.g. you get to choose whether pay 5€ per month or your usage data gets sold.
    - scarejunba 8y ago
      If you want to be GDPR compliant I don't think you can do that. If you offer the "usage data gets sold" option you also have to make that full opt-in _and_ not deny the service if they don't opt-in.
      - esotericn 8y ago
        Is charging a (reasonable) fee 'denying the service'?
        kruczek 8y ago
        Possibly. Under GDPR, if your data processing is based on user consent, then that consent must be given freely. That means you should provide equivalent service, regardless of consent being given. Providing one service for free and another for a fee is not equivalent, so I'd argue that such consent would be invalid, as it was not freely given. However, consent is only one of several conditions for processing data. Another would be "legitimate interests" of the business. If you choose to process data based on it, then you do not need consent at all. In such case you can provide separate services: free with data sharing, and paid without data sharing. The trick here is that you actually need to be able to prove that "legitimate interests" of your business require collection and processing of that data. And additionally such interests are overridden by "fundamental rights and freedoms" of users. Which is probably why most businesses went the consent route, as it appears to be more clear-cut.
        Etheryte 8y ago
        Thanks a lot for the insight, wasn't familiar with the GDPR logic. I think it'd be very hard to make a business case for processing non-paying users only so it's pretty easy to understand the consent option now.
oliwarner 8y ago
That's not a bad thing. The big tech companies are edging towards complete monopolies in their spaces and a significant part of this is that they know everything and they're allowed to leverage that data. Why would you go to anybody else to advertise? Unbundling this, making advertising harder again will spread out the budget, probably push more towards publishers rather than networks. Again, not a bad thing. It also means that new players get to compete. It's been very tough to compete with similar services on price when the incumbents can operate at zero "cost". Not having your data traded under the table is just gravy.
- weberc2 8y ago
  I would expect it to drive monopolization, since you now have to have resources and competency in yet another thing. Seems like it would be harder on incumbents. EDIT: since people are downvoting this, I should clarify that I’m not advocating against the policy, it just doesn’t seem intuitive to me that this policy would reduce monopolization (data privacy may well be worth the tradeoff). If I’m wrong I’d love to be corrected!
- jimmaswell 8y ago
  I think it would be a pretty horrible thing if all these once free internet services suddenly cost money. Nobody seems to be thinking about the significant amount of people who wouldn't be able to afford monthly subscriptions to Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc. even if it did all add up to "only" $15/month. Poor people should not be priced out of the online spaces where modern discourse happens. Single mothers should not be priced out of getting to post baby pictures on Facebook. I think it's indicative of living in bubbles that nobody else seems to be giving this consideration any weight.
  - zoul 8y ago
    Currently the price we all collectively pay for these “free” services is a decrease in the sanity of public discourse. Is that really a better option?
    - 8y ago
chiefalchemist 8y ago
Not only that: 1) It encourages companies to be silent or remain ignorant. 2) I didn't see anything mentioned about the cyber-sec aspect, but I would imagine this will put a bounty on the heads of the largest companies. Perhaps I watch too many (bad?) movies but shorting a stock on the cusp of being hacked could be lucrative.
zaru27 8y ago
That sounds like the renaissance we've all been waiting for. Every would-be entrepreneur's wet dream is a $20/month subscription for Facebook.
- wu_tang_chris 8y ago
  i would pay $2/month at most for facebook.
  - zaru27 8y ago
    Exactly
  - erichurkman 8y ago
    That cost is actually spot on: Facebook, for US users, makes about $26 per user per year IIRC.
    - Namrog84 8y ago
      I know the majority of people I know have at least 2 fb accounts. And then considering bots and other things. I'd imagine then that at least double your quoted amount per real human. Which is bonkers to me personally considering how little I use it.
  - jlgray 8y ago
    $50bn/year would be more revenue than fb had in 2017, though of course the majority of their 2.23bn monthly users would disappear if asked for $.01/mo. It is an interesting thought experiment, though, to consider what facebook would look like if its revenue was derived from convincing users that it was worth a monthly subscription.
    - maxxxxx 8y ago
      Running Facebook would become much cheaper if they could focus on being a social network instead of being an ad selling business. Right now they have to do both.
Spooky23 8y ago
Or it could make things more transparent. Twitter wouldn’t need to pretend that it didn’t know that a substantial part of its user base is fraud-bots if it just charged some nominal fees for something other than advertising.

i_am_nomad 8y ago

That would be a very positive consequence.

paulcnichols 8y ago
Very true in some cases, i.e. unrollme. But I also like free content and am mostly willing to trade a little privacy for access.
- Etheryte 8y ago
  I think the trade-off should be a lot more explicit though, e.g. you get to choose whether pay 5€ per month or your usage data gets sold.
  - scarejunba 8y ago
    If you want to be GDPR compliant I don't think you can do that. If you offer the "usage data gets sold" option you also have to make that full opt-in _and_ not deny the service if they don't opt-in.
    - esotericn 8y ago
      Is charging a (reasonable) fee 'denying the service'?
      - kruczek 8y ago
        Possibly. Under GDPR, if your data processing is based on user consent, then that consent must be given freely. That means you should provide equivalent service, regardless of consent being given. Providing one service for free and another for a fee is not equivalent, so I'd argue that such consent would be invalid, as it was not freely given. However, consent is only one of several conditions for processing data. Another would be "legitimate interests" of the business. If you choose to process data based on it, then you do not need consent at all. In such case you can provide separate services: free with data sharing, and paid without data sharing. The trick here is that you actually need to be able to prove that "legitimate interests" of your business require collection and processing of that data. And additionally such interests are overridden by "fundamental rights and freedoms" of users. Which is probably why most businesses went the consent route, as it appears to be more clear-cut.
        Etheryte 8y ago
        Thanks a lot for the insight, wasn't familiar with the GDPR logic. I think it'd be very hard to make a business case for processing non-paying users only so it's pretty easy to understand the consent option now.

oliwarner 8y ago

That's not a bad thing. The big tech companies are edging towards complete monopolies in their spaces and a significant part of this is that they know everything and they're allowed to leverage that data. Why would you go to anybody else to advertise? Unbundling this, making advertising harder again will spread out the budget, probably push more towards publishers rather than networks. Again, not a bad thing. It also means that new players get to compete. It's been very tough to compete with similar services on price when the incumbents can operate at zero "cost". Not having your data traded under the table is just gravy.

weberc2 8y ago
I would expect it to drive monopolization, since you now have to have resources and competency in yet another thing. Seems like it would be harder on incumbents. EDIT: since people are downvoting this, I should clarify that I’m not advocating against the policy, it just doesn’t seem intuitive to me that this policy would reduce monopolization (data privacy may well be worth the tradeoff). If I’m wrong I’d love to be corrected!
jimmaswell 8y ago
I think it would be a pretty horrible thing if all these once free internet services suddenly cost money. Nobody seems to be thinking about the significant amount of people who wouldn't be able to afford monthly subscriptions to Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, etc. even if it did all add up to "only" $15/month. Poor people should not be priced out of the online spaces where modern discourse happens. Single mothers should not be priced out of getting to post baby pictures on Facebook. I think it's indicative of living in bubbles that nobody else seems to be giving this consideration any weight.
- zoul 8y ago
  Currently the price we all collectively pay for these “free” services is a decrease in the sanity of public discourse. Is that really a better option?
  - 8y ago

chiefalchemist 8y ago

Not only that: 1) It encourages companies to be silent or remain ignorant. 2) I didn't see anything mentioned about the cyber-sec aspect, but I would imagine this will put a bounty on the heads of the largest companies. Perhaps I watch too many (bad?) movies but shorting a stock on the cusp of being hacked could be lucrative.

zaru27 8y ago

That sounds like the renaissance we've all been waiting for. Every would-be entrepreneur's wet dream is a $20/month subscription for Facebook.

wu_tang_chris 8y ago
i would pay $2/month at most for facebook.
- zaru27 8y ago
  Exactly
- erichurkman 8y ago
  That cost is actually spot on: Facebook, for US users, makes about $26 per user per year IIRC.
  - Namrog84 8y ago
    I know the majority of people I know have at least 2 fb accounts. And then considering bots and other things. I'd imagine then that at least double your quoted amount per real human. Which is bonkers to me personally considering how little I use it.
- jlgray 8y ago
  $50bn/year would be more revenue than fb had in 2017, though of course the majority of their 2.23bn monthly users would disappear if asked for $.01/mo. It is an interesting thought experiment, though, to consider what facebook would look like if its revenue was derived from convincing users that it was worth a monthly subscription.
  - maxxxxx 8y ago
    Running Facebook would become much cheaper if they could focus on being a social network instead of being an ad selling business. Right now they have to do both.

Spooky23 8y ago

Or it could make things more transparent. Twitter wouldn’t need to pretend that it didn’t know that a substantial part of its user base is fraud-bots if it just charged some nominal fees for something other than advertising.