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I think opt-in telemetry is useful. Many users don't have the technical ability, or simply don't care enough, to report issues. Also maybe they use one feature
by est31 5y ago
I think opt-in telemetry is useful. Many users don't have the technical ability, or simply don't care enough, to report issues. Also maybe they use one feature really often while using another one less often. Maybe the UI should thus show the often used feature.
The question is though whether to send data to Google and Yandex out of all analytics providers. I think this is a culture clash issue. IIRC Google analytics is quite the standard when it comes to telemetry, so some product owner who previously worked on proprietary software might have used the Google product throughout their entire career, might be very familiar with it, etc. For them it's a no-brainer to choose it again. The FLOSS community of course has an alleric reaction especially to Google tracking. Had they self-hosted the analytics, the reaction would have been way less negative I think. FTR I side with the FOSS community here.
- sofixa 5y agoIt's because people confuse Google's tracking of people to serve them better ads in order to get more money from advertisers and their product, Google Analytics, aimed at advertisers to see statistics about people visiting their sites, and the effectiveness of the Google Ad Network. Google Analytics, without the ad-related features enabled ( they aren't by default), is anonymous and only collects and stores generic data like http request, times, location, language, browser, OS, etc. Neither Google nor the Analytics user "track" or "spy" on the website user. With the extra ad features enabled, it's more complicated because it allows creating user groups and retargering via DoubleClick cookies, so it's a lot less acceptable from a privacy standpoint, since Google identify the site user ( with a pseudonymous identifier) for retargeting with ads later on another site. The advertiser still knows very little about the site user, and Google are just the intermediary. Google Analytics without the ad stuff is just a good, easy to use site analytics solution. It's easily blocked, but so are all the others in a similar vein. It bothers me a bit that I can't just block the ad part without the rest, because people who run websites need to know what happens with them (access.log is very cumbersome to parse, and lacks a lot of very useful information like screen size, time spent on page to know if it's just a misclick or a legitimate visit, etc.) https://developers.google.com/analytics/resources/concepts/gaConceptsTrackingOverview https://developers.google.com/analytics/resources/concepts/g...
- Lammy 5y agoIt’s not about any one approach to analytics or any one company but about the concept in general. The network itself is listening and never ever forgets.
- gumby 5y agoI always opt in to telemetry when I believe I know the app vendor. This can be individuals I know personally; indie devs whom, for whatever reason, I trust (e.g. Omnigroup); or even some big vendors (Microsoft, Apple, definitely not Google). Why? I think it has a chance of helping them improve their product in ways that will matter to me. That being said, I mostly refuse, and always look for a way to switch it off when using an application or distro for the first time. The problem isn’t that I think particular companies are evil (that’s a different problem) , it’s just that I know some companies aren’t careful. I worry about this in other areas, like automobiles, where no choice is available.
- pmoriarty 5y agoI always turn off telemetry, no matter where the app comes from. If I find a bug and I'm in the mood, I'll report it (anonymously if possible). Improving the app is not worth giving up my privacy.
- gumby 5y agoDespite my comment that I sometimes enable it. I agree with you as the baseline.