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This is good, but "nobody reads the privacy policies" is the wrong reason. "Due to market pressures, consumers have little meaningful choice of service provide

This is good, but "nobody reads the privacy policies" is the wrong reason. "Due to market pressures, consumers have little meaningful choice of service providers without onerous policies, and invasion of consumer privacy on a nationwide scale is a net social negative" is a better reason.

whatshisface 6y ago
If people read privacy policies, then why don't we start clones of every major online service, but with good privacy policies?
- notatoad 6y ago
  because most people don't actually care what's in the privacy policy. "X but with better privacy" is not a selling feature outside of a very small group of people.
  - kleiba 6y ago
    How do you know that?
    - ihumanable 6y ago
      Name one company that has dominated a market by creating a similar product but with better privacy. Plenty have tried. Protonmail is Gmail with better privacy, Gmail dominates the market. Telegram / Signal is messaging with better privacy, Slack dominates the market. Zoom dominated the video conferencing market with poor privacy, although they seem to maybe be trying to make it better. Ultimately, "better privacy" does not seem to be a differentiator the market cares about. I would welcome some counter examples though, where a competitor was launched with the differentiator being better privacy and won the market segment.
- nerdponx 6y ago
  You all downvoted because you saw a stupid comment. I upvoted because I saw a hilarious economics joke.
WealthVsSurvive 6y ago
Both are good. But, even better is an enforced US GDPR.
- marcus_holmes 6y ago
  no idea why you're getting downvoted. This is the answer. Since most online businesses already have to comply with the Euro GDPR it should be simple.
glitchc 6y ago
Furthermore, a user typically does not have access to the privacy policy until after they have purchased a product. If they disagree with a policy, they have limited recourse towards obtaining a refund. Products that do offer a refund have policies that take almost 30 days to get one. In this fully connected world, it's almost criminal that a purchase is processed in seconds whereas a refund takes 30 days. It's time that WAS criminal. It's a contract right? Well, all contracts are required to comply with a cooling off period (by law), ranging anywhere from 3 days to two weeks depending on type of contract and jurisdiction. It's time for the legal system to enforce these laws for software contracts. If I don't like an app within 3 days after purchase, I should have access to a prominently visible button to return it. If I click on it, the app should promptly issue a refund to my credit card (there's no reason why this can't be immediate) and delete the app from my device. Such a button should be mandated by law regardless of platform or application. But of course, the lawyers and lawmakers work for the rich, not the middle-class or poor.
throwaway_USD 6y ago
>...is the wrong reason.... is a better reason. I will suggest another reason, already built into contract law, these agreements/contracts are unconscionable. Generally where a contract would otherwise be enforceable, having met all the legal elements of a legally enforceable contract, the Court does not enforce the contract finding is would be unconscionable. There are all sorts of reasons a court would find it unconscionable to enforce an otherwise legally binding agreement/contract, so these cases really get into the nitty gritty facts. However, a typical example of an unconscionable contract is where one party is an experienced dealer in a type of business, while the other party is an average consumer. I know this basically sounds like every agreement between a business and consumer, but in practice its not (again you would have to begin reading tons of case law to get an idea). However, consider every single social media platform that builds into their agreements they have the right to modify the terms with or without actual notice to the users of said modification...that is about as unconscionable as it gets. Back in the decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) days, where proponents always claimed "the code is the law" and if the code allowed investor money to be stolen, that wasn't a hack or breach of contract, rather it was a contractual right the investor agreed to (even in light of plain English marketing contrary to the actual code, even though the marketing materials disclaimed: "the code is the law")...I always explained, and was often down voted into oblivion, a court would never enforce such a agreement/smart contract as it would be unconscionable.
- nshepperd 6y ago
  IMO they're not even contracts. The idea that there is a 'meeting of the minds' when I click through an installation dialog or website privacy policy, without even reading it, while screaming at my computer "I do not agree!" is ridiculous.
  - throwaway_USD 6y ago
    >The idea that there is a 'meeting of the minds' when I click through an installation dialog or website privacy policy This is a fantastic point with respect to these online agreements because of analytics. Just as you say, someone clicks through these installation/website signup screens, click agree, etc... It is very easy to prove an agreement would take a minimum of x minutes to read through, yet these tech companies would have knowledge the user spent 1-2 seconds on the contract page/dialog box before clicking agree, therefore, they had knowledge the user did not and could not have read the same before agreeing.
oezi 6y ago
Privacy and other ToCs cannot efficiently be optimized by markets because markets can only optimize efficiently for primary and a limited number of secondary attributes. Think how hard it is for consumers to beyond GHz to pick a processor. EULA, service terms etc are the last thing that is optimized for. My suggestion: we should only allow privacy policies to contain standardized sections which are based on industry standards such as ISO, IETF, DIN terms. This would ensure that terms can be better compared and remove the possibility for companies to cheat consumers by hiding predatory terms.
- satyrnein 6y ago
  I think privacy and ToCs could be optimized if there were an (probably regulatory) incentive. Imagine users had to take a quiz on the privacy policy before they were legally allowed to sign up, to prove informed consent. I imagine they would get optimized pretty quickly!

whatshisface 6y ago

If people read privacy policies, then why don't we start clones of every major online service, but with good privacy policies?

notatoad 6y ago
because most people don't actually care what's in the privacy policy. "X but with better privacy" is not a selling feature outside of a very small group of people.
- kleiba 6y ago
  How do you know that?
  - ihumanable 6y ago
    Name one company that has dominated a market by creating a similar product but with better privacy. Plenty have tried. Protonmail is Gmail with better privacy, Gmail dominates the market. Telegram / Signal is messaging with better privacy, Slack dominates the market. Zoom dominated the video conferencing market with poor privacy, although they seem to maybe be trying to make it better. Ultimately, "better privacy" does not seem to be a differentiator the market cares about. I would welcome some counter examples though, where a competitor was launched with the differentiator being better privacy and won the market segment.
nerdponx 6y ago
You all downvoted because you saw a stupid comment. I upvoted because I saw a hilarious economics joke.

WealthVsSurvive 6y ago

Both are good. But, even better is an enforced US GDPR.

marcus_holmes 6y ago
no idea why you're getting downvoted. This is the answer. Since most online businesses already have to comply with the Euro GDPR it should be simple.

glitchc 6y ago

Furthermore, a user typically does not have access to the privacy policy until after they have purchased a product. If they disagree with a policy, they have limited recourse towards obtaining a refund. Products that do offer a refund have policies that take almost 30 days to get one. In this fully connected world, it's almost criminal that a purchase is processed in seconds whereas a refund takes 30 days. It's time that WAS criminal. It's a contract right? Well, all contracts are required to comply with a cooling off period (by law), ranging anywhere from 3 days to two weeks depending on type of contract and jurisdiction. It's time for the legal system to enforce these laws for software contracts. If I don't like an app within 3 days after purchase, I should have access to a prominently visible button to return it. If I click on it, the app should promptly issue a refund to my credit card (there's no reason why this can't be immediate) and delete the app from my device. Such a button should be mandated by law regardless of platform or application. But of course, the lawyers and lawmakers work for the rich, not the middle-class or poor.

throwaway_USD 6y ago

>...is the wrong reason.... is a better reason. I will suggest another reason, already built into contract law, these agreements/contracts are unconscionable. Generally where a contract would otherwise be enforceable, having met all the legal elements of a legally enforceable contract, the Court does not enforce the contract finding is would be unconscionable. There are all sorts of reasons a court would find it unconscionable to enforce an otherwise legally binding agreement/contract, so these cases really get into the nitty gritty facts. However, a typical example of an unconscionable contract is where one party is an experienced dealer in a type of business, while the other party is an average consumer. I know this basically sounds like every agreement between a business and consumer, but in practice its not (again you would have to begin reading tons of case law to get an idea). However, consider every single social media platform that builds into their agreements they have the right to modify the terms with or without actual notice to the users of said modification...that is about as unconscionable as it gets. Back in the decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) days, where proponents always claimed "the code is the law" and if the code allowed investor money to be stolen, that wasn't a hack or breach of contract, rather it was a contractual right the investor agreed to (even in light of plain English marketing contrary to the actual code, even though the marketing materials disclaimed: "the code is the law")...I always explained, and was often down voted into oblivion, a court would never enforce such a agreement/smart contract as it would be unconscionable.

nshepperd 6y ago
IMO they're not even contracts. The idea that there is a 'meeting of the minds' when I click through an installation dialog or website privacy policy, without even reading it, while screaming at my computer "I do not agree!" is ridiculous.
- throwaway_USD 6y ago
  >The idea that there is a 'meeting of the minds' when I click through an installation dialog or website privacy policy This is a fantastic point with respect to these online agreements because of analytics. Just as you say, someone clicks through these installation/website signup screens, click agree, etc... It is very easy to prove an agreement would take a minimum of x minutes to read through, yet these tech companies would have knowledge the user spent 1-2 seconds on the contract page/dialog box before clicking agree, therefore, they had knowledge the user did not and could not have read the same before agreeing.

oezi 6y ago

Privacy and other ToCs cannot efficiently be optimized by markets because markets can only optimize efficiently for primary and a limited number of secondary attributes. Think how hard it is for consumers to beyond GHz to pick a processor. EULA, service terms etc are the last thing that is optimized for. My suggestion: we should only allow privacy policies to contain standardized sections which are based on industry standards such as ISO, IETF, DIN terms. This would ensure that terms can be better compared and remove the possibility for companies to cheat consumers by hiding predatory terms.

satyrnein 6y ago
I think privacy and ToCs could be optimized if there were an (probably regulatory) incentive. Imagine users had to take a quiz on the privacy policy before they were legally allowed to sign up, to prove informed consent. I imagine they would get optimized pretty quickly!