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Imo incentives-based reasoning is the only way of thinking about corporate behavior that isn't naive. What's happened here is that the incentives changed, which

Imo incentives-based reasoning is the only way of thinking about corporate behavior that isn't naive. What's happened here is that the incentives changed, which- maybe you could call it naive to assume they wouldn't But there's also a bias, when presented with only two real options, of telling yourself that the less-bad option isn't just less-bad, it's actually good. Because it helps you sleep better at night and because there's nothing you could really do about it anyway. Same thing happens with two-party politics

kbenson 4y ago
> which- maybe you could call it naive to assume they wouldn't Definitely. I think the correct way to think about public corporate behavior is as if they're psychopaths. I don't mean that necessarily with the negative popular culture connotations, but just that they will always behave in what they see as the optimal personal benefit regardless of what it does to others. That's just what a large and for the most part anonymous ownership that expects growth coupled with a set of people to steer operations that is mandated to work in the best interest of those owners results in. So, think about your relationship with companies as you would with a friend you suspect is a psychopath but is amiable and somewhat beneficial to associate with at the moment. Just because they don't have an incentive to spread all your private info around at the moment doesn't mean they won't have reason to later, so be careful what you expose, and trust them only as far as it makes sense to. They aren't a real friend, you're just using each other for mutual benefit, and that doesn't generally last forever.