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Exactly. That's what doomed it. Same with Facebook. There is no way to run an ethical business when your core business model is advertising. It's hard enough wh

Exactly. That's what doomed it. Same with Facebook. There is no way to run an ethical business when your core business model is advertising. It's hard enough when you run a company whose income relies on advertising (like a newspaper), but impossible when you yourself make advertising your primary feature. I honestly, personally, would not care much if Google had a lot of information about me if their goal was something other than influencing me to buy products and services. I know many others are uncomfortable with any sort of privacy loss, but for me, it depends entirely on the end goal and exact nature of the data usage. And for others, they should have an easy universal opt-out (e.g. disabling all Google Analytics tracking without having to install a Google browser extension: https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/181881 https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/181881).

TeMPOraL 7y ago
Agreed. Moreover, if their core business model wasn't related to advertising, their data collection practices could (and probably would) have looked much different. For instance, there's no reason to be opaque about exactly what data you collect, or to make the collection enabled by default, or apply dark patterns coercing people to opt back in when they opt out, etc. - no reason to do all that, if the data isn't used for shady purposes.
cameronbrown 7y ago
> And for others, they should have an easy universal opt-out (e.g. disabling all Google Analytics tracking without having to install a Google browser extension Problem with that is you'd require installing yet another cookie, which is another data point to fingerprint people.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  Or, they could just start voluntarily respecting the DNT header.
  - dredmorbius 7y ago
    Let's not and make that a legal (and legally punishable) mandate.
  - saagarjha 7y ago
    …which some browsers have already started removing.
- JohnFen 7y ago
  Then it should be opt-in. If you don't have the "I opted in" cookie, then you aren't subjected to the surveillance.
WalterBright 7y ago
> would not care much if Google had a lot of information about me if their goal was something other than influencing me to buy products and services Ironically, I'm the opposite. I don't care about the advertising targeted at me (I pretty much never bought anything based on targeted advertising). I worry about the knowledge about someone being used to hurt them. For example, a professor once said that each of us commits 3 felonies a day. With perfect knowledge of people, it brings the specter of selective enforcement. That selective enforcement can be used to blackmail/extort/manipulate anyone you want to. For a fictional example, check out the TV series "Suits". The "good guys" are always turning the tables on the "bad guys" by digging into their past and finding dirt on them. And vice versa. It's the plot of pretty much every episode. (But of course the good guys do this for good, and the bad guys use it for bad. But in real life, this isn't so simple.) Even if you think outing people for doing bad things is always a good thing, the data collected on people is often wrong, and innocents get hurt as well. The definition of what is "bad" also shifts over time.

TeMPOraL 7y ago

Agreed. Moreover, if their core business model wasn't related to advertising, their data collection practices could (and probably would) have looked much different. For instance, there's no reason to be opaque about exactly what data you collect, or to make the collection enabled by default, or apply dark patterns coercing people to opt back in when they opt out, etc. - no reason to do all that, if the data isn't used for shady purposes.

cameronbrown 7y ago

> And for others, they should have an easy universal opt-out (e.g. disabling all Google Analytics tracking without having to install a Google browser extension Problem with that is you'd require installing yet another cookie, which is another data point to fingerprint people.

TeMPOraL 7y ago
Or, they could just start voluntarily respecting the DNT header.
- dredmorbius 7y ago
  Let's not and make that a legal (and legally punishable) mandate.
- saagarjha 7y ago
  …which some browsers have already started removing.
JohnFen 7y ago
Then it should be opt-in. If you don't have the "I opted in" cookie, then you aren't subjected to the surveillance.

WalterBright 7y ago

> would not care much if Google had a lot of information about me if their goal was something other than influencing me to buy products and services Ironically, I'm the opposite. I don't care about the advertising targeted at me (I pretty much never bought anything based on targeted advertising). I worry about the knowledge about someone being used to hurt them. For example, a professor once said that each of us commits 3 felonies a day. With perfect knowledge of people, it brings the specter of selective enforcement. That selective enforcement can be used to blackmail/extort/manipulate anyone you want to. For a fictional example, check out the TV series "Suits". The "good guys" are always turning the tables on the "bad guys" by digging into their past and finding dirt on them. And vice versa. It's the plot of pretty much every episode. (But of course the good guys do this for good, and the bad guys use it for bad. But in real life, this isn't so simple.) Even if you think outing people for doing bad things is always a good thing, the data collected on people is often wrong, and innocents get hurt as well. The definition of what is "bad" also shifts over time.