You don't seem to have noticed that in concluding "It’s fine for a responsible (read public-sector) technocrat to mine and process your data" you're replying to

You don't seem to have noticed that in concluding "It’s fine for a responsible (read public-sector) technocrat to mine and process your data" you're replying to a quote that explicitly states "and not mining your data". It's perfectly possible to deliver services using only the data necessary to deliver the service. Selling none of it to advertisers or other third parties, gathering nothing other than that necessary to make the service the best you can provide. Not only would it feel a much more equitable exchange for the customers providing the data, it would no doubt end up with a better service. Adding data mining for sale corrupts every service, as they twist to gather ever more for less, or poorer and poorer results. You become a data cow for the milking.