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The modern problem of having your data locked up is a much bigger one than the old arguments about Free Software. Data portability would be a good solution to a

The modern problem of having your data locked up is a much bigger one than the old arguments about Free Software. Data portability would be a good solution to a lot of the problems with user-hostile technologies. The trouble is, given the vast range of things we do with technology, it may be unreasonable or impractical to create a universal obligation for software developers to provide export facilities that allow transfer of the data in a standard format. For example, what if there is no standard format, perhaps because your software genuinely does something new or in a different way? Going after hardware developers who try to contain data within their walled gardens isn't a bad idea, though. For example, the GDPR imposes certain requirements on data controllers to provide for data portability, and imposing similar measures on the makers of devices could both solve immediate problems for some users and provide for much more competition in the marketplace.

swiley 6y ago
Is it so hard to just give the user a sql dump of all of their data? (or a json blob if it’s some nosql thing.) If it’s not in a db then just give them the files. None of that seems complicated.
- Silhouette 6y ago
  Surely this will depend on what your software does and the data it works with. Huge amounts of software, particularly embedded software, doesn't have any sort of single structured database or a simple set of data files that you could just dump. Even where you do have these things, the dump won't be worth much unless the DB schema or file structure can be successfully interpreted in order to reconstruct the meaning of the underlying data within some other system. That might or might not be easy, depending on how complicated the original data formats were. If it's something common and widely understood, perhaps some text a user wrote or a photo they saved, that's one thing. But what about something more specialised? Suppose you're moving to a new home. How do you export the training data from the AI in your old smart front door lock, which now recognises your friends and family's faces, so you can set up the smart locks on your new home to recognise the same people? Unless there are industry standards for representing whatever data you're working with, providing portability between applications or devices that offer similar functionality from different manufacturers/developers is always going to be a problem. Encouraging standardisation is certainly beneficial here, but imposing some sort of blanket obligation on the manufacturers/developers to provide import/export functionality in the absence of any relevant format probably isn't.
  - swiley 6y ago
    Yeah, for embedded devices I think most people would be happy with an eeprom/flash image.
- perpetualpatzer 6y ago
  I'd imagine it could be hard if a company folds. No money to pay to keep servers running. No money to pay employees who know SQL to keep working. Possibly, you could mandate that all software include a working self service data retrieval feature and fine the trust if they shut it off before a certain point in bankruptcy, but that seems heavy- handed and still won't work if there's no money in the accounts.
  - swiley 6y ago
    This is why the export mechanism should be available before hand.

swiley 6y ago

Is it so hard to just give the user a sql dump of all of their data? (or a json blob if it’s some nosql thing.) If it’s not in a db then just give them the files. None of that seems complicated.

Silhouette 6y ago
Surely this will depend on what your software does and the data it works with. Huge amounts of software, particularly embedded software, doesn't have any sort of single structured database or a simple set of data files that you could just dump. Even where you do have these things, the dump won't be worth much unless the DB schema or file structure can be successfully interpreted in order to reconstruct the meaning of the underlying data within some other system. That might or might not be easy, depending on how complicated the original data formats were. If it's something common and widely understood, perhaps some text a user wrote or a photo they saved, that's one thing. But what about something more specialised? Suppose you're moving to a new home. How do you export the training data from the AI in your old smart front door lock, which now recognises your friends and family's faces, so you can set up the smart locks on your new home to recognise the same people? Unless there are industry standards for representing whatever data you're working with, providing portability between applications or devices that offer similar functionality from different manufacturers/developers is always going to be a problem. Encouraging standardisation is certainly beneficial here, but imposing some sort of blanket obligation on the manufacturers/developers to provide import/export functionality in the absence of any relevant format probably isn't.
- swiley 6y ago
  Yeah, for embedded devices I think most people would be happy with an eeprom/flash image.
perpetualpatzer 6y ago
I'd imagine it could be hard if a company folds. No money to pay to keep servers running. No money to pay employees who know SQL to keep working. Possibly, you could mandate that all software include a working self service data retrieval feature and fine the trust if they shut it off before a certain point in bankruptcy, but that seems heavy- handed and still won't work if there's no money in the accounts.
- swiley 6y ago
  This is why the export mechanism should be available before hand.