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Google and Facebook benefitted the most from GDPR and grew in size, fyi. Google helped write GDPR. I am tired of hearing this troupe of putting more and more

• pwdisswordfish2 6y ago
  I am tired of hearing this troupe of there is no perfect solution so therefore no solution is acceptable. Another favourite is "I see unethical behaviour at my job, but if I quit nothing would change, therefore I will keep helping them do what they do." If laws were passed that gave users a cause of action against Google and Facebook for breaking rules, then there would be some motivation for those companies to change their behaviour. It is sad but that is how corporate behaviour is shaped in America. Threat of litigation. Fear. Empowering David to keep Goliath honest. That is one of the ideals America was once known for. Big tech however knows no David. They have little to fear. Alternatively you can support the "system" we have now -- tweet and/or post your complaints to the web, which of course Big Tech is controlling and monitoring. Vent your frustrations till you turn blue. This system is not working. Nothing is changing. These companies are doing things users know is wrong but none of this violates any law or any user's rights in America. I am not for more regulation. I am for change. Giving David the ability to take on Goliath is one way to facilitate change that is known to work in America. Is it perfect? Not even close, but it is effective at changing corporate behaviour. Choosing to shoot down every proposed solution is also choosing to keep things the way they are. Sitting on your hands is not keeping things from getting worse. I never said anything about GDPR and personally I was never a fan. However I do appreciate that it is something. Someone, outisde America, had the balls to take action.
  • searchableguy 6y ago
    You still didn't propose a solution. You just said you want to regulate advertising industry but how will you do that? There is a clear precedent that fining doesn't stop companies and political systems won't overfine. So are you going to fine companies more? Are you going to limit the number of fines and dissolve the company? Are you going to propose another GDPR-eiqsque but for advertising? Because GDPR helped big companies - especially ad networks. What happens when companies become too big (as if they aren't already)? Do you really believe government can always do what it wants with the big companies? No. History has proved it wrong multiple times. Companies used to slave and colonize countries. Today, they probably won't do that. They can just push misinformation and change behavior by manipulating what you see/hear/read. They are going to affect your government officials and policy makers. Those use facebook and google too probably. Your president use twitter, are twitter's algorithm manipulating him? Have you seen his feed? What if his feed is an echo chamber? What is the actual regulation? I am not against change but if you don't specify how, then I am not sure it's a conversation worth having. Everyone wants things to change. Some people would like if everyone moved to fb. But without explaining your position with actual stats, how your solution will likely affect the problems, how am I going to differentiate your proposal from several thousands asking for more consolidation i.e opposite of what you are asking.
    • pwdisswordfish2 6y ago
      Not fines, but the potential for litigation brought by end users with potential for unpredictable damages. This is what creates fear in companies and forces them to change their behaviour to avoid. Other industries have to contend with the threat of such lawsuits. Big tech is mostly free from such threats. This is not "my" solution. This is "a" solution. You only want specifics so you can shoot it down. If online advertising was regulated, e.g., prohibited, then it would take away some of the incentive for Facebook and Google to profit from data collected from/on users. We already saw this "no advertising" rule in effect when commercial use of the early internet was prohibited. AFAIK it was not backed by any legislation. We saw the Google founders release their work as an academic project vowing to combat internet advertising. We saw the Facebook founders disagreeing over whether to show ads. We can see how things played out. The temptation of onlne ads was just too great. Now they are beholden to Wall Street to keep up the surveillance and keep selling ads. This time around, we could permit commercial transactions, including "e-commerce", but we could prohibit the use of the internet to advertise with violations giving way to not just fines, but potential for lawsuits from end users against advertisers and anyone selling online ads or online ad services. I have never heard any argument that claimed that what Facebook does is valuable only if they are allowed to use the data they collect in any way they choose. If Facebook was simply a service to allow users to have a page on the Facebook website, and the company was not allowed to conduct surveillance and give third parties (e.g., advertisers) access to those users, I think users would still find Facebook valuable. If users would not pay for such a service, then the problem is Facebook's, not users'. This is why "Facebook will always be free." It must be free. Otherwise users would find other free solutions. I believe were Facebook to begin charging fees, we would still find ways to use the web to share photos/video and exchange messages with each other, through a website, for free. Facebook could prove me wrong by charging fees to all their users and letting us see what happens. They will not do that. They are afraid to test their monetary worth to end users. It is the same story with Google, their search engine and all the works they acquired from third parties, which users often believe Google developed in-house. Those "services" have value to users apart from being vehicles in which Google collects more data and otherwise strengthens their online ad services business. The aim of this legislation would be to force companies wishing to do business on the internet to sell, for money, something of value to users (cf. third parties) instead of simply operating as middlemen conducting surveillance for the benefit of third parties. No more "user is the product". Now let's hear about your solution. After all, you stated "Everyone wants things to change" and that must include you.