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> This decision, as I understand it, renders large swathes of tech service revenue models untenable. To be honest, good riddance. If it is no longer possible t

> This decision, as I understand it, renders large swathes of tech service revenue models untenable. To be honest, good riddance. If it is no longer possible to offer users a "free" service in exchange for extremely invasive spying and psychological manipulation (without explicit consent [0]), it forces companies to 1) innovate in order to offer such services for a sustainable price, and 2) encourages competition from new entrants. [0] By the way, one can imagine a scenario where users are somehow compensated for the permission to use their personal data. For example, let's say Facebook now costs 20€ per year. If you allow Facebook to use your personal data for ad targeting, now it costs 5€ per year.

whimsicalism 4y ago
If the standard becomes "make illegal business models that the media gets enough people upset about" (without even a vote where the alternatives [paying for service] are clearly explained), then -yeah- people are going to be left poorer. Europe already endured centuries of this when the majority Christian ethos was that usury & banking were an evil to be banned. This, among other things of course, helped sentence millions of people to poor and deprived lives for centuries.
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  > This, among other things of course, helped sentence millions of people to poor and deprived lives for centuries. Wealth inequality is much worse in the US than Europe, so relatively speaking, "poor" in EU is still much better than "poor" in the US.
  - monero-xmr 4y ago
    Europe is a museum at this point. Tourism is their future. What industrial sectors are left are protected by huge government subsidies and tariffs, but as energy goes up in price and their economic dynamism continues to fall, their future is keeping the capital cities pretty for US and Chinese to visit and take pictures. A friend of mine is a Norwegian in the US. He told me all the ambitious people in Norway scheme to come to the US to make their fortune then retire back in Norway. Seems to be a very common pattern in Europe - make your money someplace without the excessive taxes and regulations, then travel back for the social safety net. Somehow they see this as moral and just which is quite perplexing.
    - AdrianB1 4y ago
      No idea why you are downvoted other than downvoters having different political opinions that ignore facts.
      - thenaturalist 4y ago
        What is being ignored is basic macroeconomics such as the Theory of Comparative Advantage which states that the net benefit to countries is the specialization in the production of certain types of goods and subsequent trade with each other instead of each country trying to produce everything domestically. This is literally the system the US built since WWII and what globalization is all about after the Iron Curtain fell. Of course, the US being at the center of all this trade as the military guardian of naval trade routes and financier of specialized production capabilities all across the globe. It was and still is a smart as hell play. But that's exactly why anyone hitting on any one part of that web of trade as being irrelevant is so... unimaginative: The fact is that it's NOT a zero sum game, but a system where everyone benefits if trade happens. There are some EU companies that can produce tech in some domains without much or any competition in the US (or think of semiconductors of Taiwan) and the same is true for companies in the US. This is literally Econ 101.
    - spookie 4y ago
      Such derogatory commentary is not adding any value to the conversation. I would refrain from dismissing Europe's industry, and cities with such a tone. The most perplexing part in all of this is the stance that this thread seems to commend. Even more so, given the societal unrest seen in the USA. Just baffling.
      - Nextgrid 4y ago
        > Even more so, given the societal unrest seen in the USA. Just baffling. To be fair, the social unrest of the US fueled by social media & advertising is now exporting itself to other countries - starting with the English-speaking ones (since the content can be reused as-is) but it's just a matter of time before it consumes other countries too.
  - ThunderSizzle 4y ago
    Just because someone has more material items than you doesn't mean your life is worse or that you are poor. Poverty isn't about how little you have to others - its about being able to provide and sustain yourself and your family in society. As far as I understand it, poverty is much less now than 100 years ago.
    - OliverGilan 4y ago
      Don’t know why this is being downvoted when it’s objectively true. Parent says wealth inequality is less in Europe therefore being “poor” is more desirable which makes no sense. The US could have higher inequality but that could just mean the richest are richer and the poor have the same standard of living. It could mean the poor are poorer in the US and the richest are even. It could mean the poor AND the rich are richer and better off than their EU counterparts. Just looking at inequality numbers doesn’t tell you anything about quality of life between the two continents…
      - mpweiher 4y ago
        Your analysis is wrong. Wealth inequality by itself is a problem, even if absolute levels are higher. This has been shown in study after study. This obviously doesn't mean that any wealth inequality dominates any absolute level (quick: everyone gets nothing!), and getting the balance right is tricky. But looking at the world happiness index, it is obvious that European countries are doing a pretty good job. https://dmerharyana.org/world-happiness-index/ https://dmerharyana.org/world-happiness-index/ 1 Finland 7.842 7.809 5,554,960 2 Denmark 7.62 7.646 5,834,950 3 Switzerland 7.571 7.56 8,773,637 4 Iceland 7.554 7.504 345,393 5 Netherlands 7.464 7.449 17,211,447 6 Norway 7.392 7.488 5,511,370 7 Sweden 7.363 7.353 10,218,971 8 Luxembourg 7.324 7.238 642,371 9 New Zealand 7.277 7.3 4,898,203 10 Austria 7.268 7.294 9,066,710 11 Australia 7.183 7.223 26,068,792 12 Israel 7.157 7.129 8,922,892 13 Germany 7.155 7.076 83,883,596 14 Canada 7.103 7.232 38,388,419 15 Ireland 7.085 7.129 5,020,199 16 Costa Rica 7.069 7.121 5,182,354 17 United Kingdom 7.064 7.165 68,497,907 18 Czech Republic 6.965 6.911 10,736,784 19 United States 6.951 6.94 334,805,269 20 Belgium 6.834 6.864 11,668,278 21 France 6.69 6.664 65,584,518
    - 4y ago
  - whimsicalism 4y ago
    Well, only if the total amount of wealth in the US is equivalent to the EU does your second statement follow. Obviously this is not the end alm be all of how good life is, but there are numerous studies indicating the average of goods and services provided to the poorest 20% in the US is higher than the amount of goods and services provided to the median EU citizen.
    - cwkoss 4y ago
      Link those numerous studies, sounds like BS
      - whimsicalism 4y ago
        https://mises.org/wire/poor-us-are-richer-middle-class-much-europe https://mises.org/wire/poor-us-are-richer-middle-class-much-... Here's one analysis, but there are others. I would prefer a less conservative source.
        owlglass 4y ago
        When the Mises Institute publishes articles arguing that "drunk drivers cause accidents but so do sober drivers, and many drunk drivers cause no accidents at all," and therefore drunk driving should not be outlawed, it's hard to take this type of source seriously [1]. Note that the article above was published by the institute's founder. [1] https://mises.org/library/legalize-drunk-driving https://mises.org/library/legalize-drunk-driving
        whimsicalism 4y ago
        I hear what you are saying, although I would prefer an engagement on the merits of the specific points. That said, it is of course possible I overstated my case - the provenance of sources I am finding is not as strong as I would have expected.
        julianlam 4y ago
  - AdrianB1 4y ago
    I disagree with the previous comments, but wealth inequality is not a measure of wealth (or poor-ness). In a way the previous comment has some truth in it: equalitarianism and socialism in Europe is keeping us poor; you cannot make all equal and rich, but you can make all equal and poor and this is the trend that I see. Background: born and grew in Romania, poor and socialist.
  - andsoitis 4y ago
    > Wealth inequality is much worse in the US than Europe, so relatively speaking, "poor" in EU is still much better than "poor" in the US. Besides the questionable practice of lumping all of European countries into a single "Europe" block for debates like this, a single metric like wealth inequality, for instance, isn't useful to compare how countries or regimes are faring. For instance, by that metric, the following countries are better than Sweden: Belarus, Moldova, UAE, Algeria, Iraq. And places like Myanmar and Poland are better than Austria. source: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/wealth-inequality-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/wealth-in...
- quotemstr 4y ago
  > Europe already endured centuries of this when the majority Christian ethos was that usury & banking were an evil to be banned. This, among other things of course, helped sentence millions of people to poor and deprived lives for centuries. That's a great analogy.
- e_i_pi_2 4y ago
  > If the standard becomes "make illegal business models that the media gets enough people upset about" I think you're giving "the media" too much credit here, it's also very possible that the business models are actually unpopular and people are upset after learning about them. I think in general that's the basis for all the laws we have - a bunch of people thought there should be a law against something and made it. The only alternative to this is someone doing top-down laws based on what they personally think is right or wrong, and I'd argue that's much more what was happening in Christian-ruled Europe. The church was making laws - they weren't coming from a democratic government.
  - somedude895 4y ago
    I'll preface this by saying that I don't like Meta and am very privacy-conscious. > it's also very possible that the business models are actually unpopular and people are upset after learning about them. I am 100% convinced - from people around me - that those who use FB and IG don't give a damn about privacy and would rather it be free of charge. This is clearly a small group of "elite people in the know" (which in this case I consider myself and yourself a part of) deciding this.
    - jdiez17 4y ago
      Those people will be given a choice (assuming Meta doesn’t throw a tantrum and decide to leave the EU in Brexit fashion - which they are more than welcome to do!). “Do you want us to use [extensive list of all of the kinds of information we have meticulously gathered about you] to show you more relevant ads? Yes/no” I have a personal belief on what most people will answer to that question. You may disagree. But it doesn’t really matter - the key is that people will be given the chance to make an informed decision.
      - int_19h 4y ago
        I very much doubt that people will actually get that choice, because if Facebook does give it to them, the response numbers won't look good for the model. It's easier to remove the choice altogether and then spread FUD about how it's forced on them.
- bobbruno 4y ago
  > without even a vote I’m not sure I follow what kind of “vote” you mean here. The legal framework behind the decision has been in discussion since at least 10 years ago, and most EU countries and the EU parliaments are democratically elected. The lawmaking progress in the EU parliament also is very open to public scrutiny and feedback, and the privacy laws went through it. This all supports the idea that the right to privacy online is pretty much a core value supported by most of the EU population, one which they have been supporting through their votes and participation in the law-making for many years. And if your implied suggestion was that the business model of company X (and whatever benefit they may provide through this model) is a more important vote than the basic value of privacy, or that the issue of cost was not brought to the table enough times for people to understand the trade-offs, then I guess my understanding of how democracy works is different than yours.
quotemstr 4y ago
> To be honest, good riddance. If it is no longer possible to offer users a "free" service in exchange for extremely invasive spying and psychological manipulation Is it right that a tiny but loud minority be able to ban these ad-supported services for all of society? Going by revealed preferences, most people don't consider targeting advertising to be "spying and psychological manipulation". If they did, usage patters would differ.
- Arainach 4y ago
  Most people don't consider anything that would save them a buck to be a problem, even if the net impact on society is awful. Government exists to look at that bigger picture.
- transcriptase 4y ago
  The fact is that the vast majority people have no idea they’re giving companies vast amount of data that’s used to manipulate them. Thousands of A/B tests meant to trigger just the right psychological response to optimize impulse buying drop-shipped Aliexpress junk at 800% markup.
- dooglius 4y ago
  > most people don't consider targeting advertising to be "spying and psychological manipulation" A bit of a catch-22; if they did consider it that, then the manipulation wasn't very good, was it? The revealed preferences of companies to pay for advertising indicates that it is successful at manipulation, enough to justify its cost.
  - whimsicalism 4y ago
    It is manipulation in the same manner that you are trying to manipulate me by posting your comment. So much of this rhetoric involves assigning scary words "manipulation", "spying", etc. to everyday events.
- naravara 4y ago
  Most people have no idea how any of this works, so I wouldn't take observed behavior to be a "revealed preference."
crazygringo 4y ago
But why do you think legislation should be the one forcing that choice on everyone, rather than the market allowing consumers to choose? The issue isn't what we personally like or prefer for ourselves -- it's more about when we think it's legitimate to take away the right of businesses to experiment with business models, and of consumers to be free to enter into the tradeoffs they prefer. Why shouldn't a consumer be allowed to agree to what you call "extremely invasive spying" in exchange for a free product, if they want to? As long as you're not signing away rights (e.g. you can't agree to sell yourself into slavery) or engaging in physical harm (e.g. food and safety regulations), then what's the moral basis for taking away choice? After all, what you call "extremely invasive spying" other people might consider no big deal at all, in terms of their own personal data.
- robin_reala 4y ago
  And that’s fine: that consumer can choose to opt in.
  - jefftk 4y ago
    Except they can't. If a service is only profitable with personalized advertising they aren't allowed to say "if you want to use this service you need to allow us to do personalized advertising". Which means that in the future if there's a service I might want to use which is in this category and if I don't mind having my data used to personalize my advertising, I don't have a choice: the service won't exist.
    - CogitoCogito 4y ago
      Yes one of the purposes of the GDPR is to make it so such a service does not exist.
      - jefftk 4y ago
        If I want that service and someone wants to provide it to me, how is it the role of government to say we can't make that trade?
wintermutestwin 4y ago
>a "free" service in exchange for extremely invasive spying and psychological manipulation /agreed Trading trinkets to the natives for land is the most apt analogy I can think of. In a capitalist society, we should be able to set the price for something that we own. My data is worth way more than the cost to provide the trivial services that Facebook, Gmail, etc provide.
- 411111111111111 4y ago
  > In a capitalist society, we should be able to set the price for something that we own. Congrats, you just legalized slavery with that genius idea. There have to be limits on everything. You just disagree with the chosen line.
- whimsicalism 4y ago
  If you think that the price is not worth it, you are free to refuse the transaction. The EU govt here is requiring the counterparty to provide you with the service even if you refuse the transaction.
  - e_i_pi_2 4y ago
    I think this is like predatory lending laws - you can be forced to give someone a loan at a reasonable price, even if you can convince them to pay way more. The same argument also works for voluntary slavery - I think people have the right to say "even if it's initially consensual, it still seems like an abusive business model that we shouldn't allow"
    - whimsicalism 4y ago
      You aren't forced to give someone a loan at a capped price, you can simply refuse to loan out your money. The government does not compel you to loan, so it is not analogous. I get the logic of rendering certain voluntary transactions illegal. Child labor (questionably voluntary) & minimum wage laws come to mind. This is distinct because those laws don't require companies to hire people at minimum wage.
astrange 4y ago
I agree that if anytime anyone came up with a business model you banned it, that would produce more innovation in business models. But you also wouldn’t get any of the products because you’ve banned all of them. So it seems like a bad way to run an economic bloc. The EU in particular doesn’t even know what they’re doing and none of their poorly drafted “blue is green now because I said so” laws even work. You just get cookie banners everywhere. The value you get from Facebook is the ads are relevant, rather than all being for cars you’re not going to buy. They don’t “use your data” to “make money”. They show you ads and you click on them.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- Nextgrid 4y ago
  The cookie banners are a result of bad/non-existent enforcement. The GDPR actually makes 90% of them illegal. Enforcement appears to be slowly ramping up. > The value you get from Facebook is the ads are relevant If this was true, this ruling would be a nothingburger because everyone would voluntarily opt into the targeted advertising so they can get all that "value" you're speaking of. In reality though the value people get from Facebook is being able to keep in touch with their friends or content that interests them. The ads are just pollution. I think we used to call this "spam" in the past. The ruling now at least allows people to deny spammers usage of their personal data for the purposes of targeting said spam.
  - astrange 4y ago
    > The cookie banners are a result of bad/non-existent enforcement. Unintended results are part of writing the laws. So is writing a law that phone ports must be USBC and forgetting about wireless charging standards. When the DMA starts enforcement and makes it impossible to block messaging spam because all messengers have to trust each other, that’ll be part of it too. > If this was true, this ruling would be a nothingburger because everyone would voluntarily opt into the targeted advertising so they can get all that "value" you're speaking of. No, not all markets clear. If you get a smaller market because not everyone opts in there’s just going to be less stuff in it. (And I actually think Instagram’s ads are more interesting than, say, my family members who’ve decided to become influencers.)
salawat 4y ago
That's not compensating users, that's discounting. Compensating would be Facebook paying you for the use of your data.

whimsicalism 4y ago

If the standard becomes "make illegal business models that the media gets enough people upset about" (without even a vote where the alternatives [paying for service] are clearly explained), then -yeah- people are going to be left poorer. Europe already endured centuries of this when the majority Christian ethos was that usury & banking were an evil to be banned. This, among other things of course, helped sentence millions of people to poor and deprived lives for centuries.

Nextgrid 4y ago
> This, among other things of course, helped sentence millions of people to poor and deprived lives for centuries. Wealth inequality is much worse in the US than Europe, so relatively speaking, "poor" in EU is still much better than "poor" in the US.
- monero-xmr 4y ago
  Europe is a museum at this point. Tourism is their future. What industrial sectors are left are protected by huge government subsidies and tariffs, but as energy goes up in price and their economic dynamism continues to fall, their future is keeping the capital cities pretty for US and Chinese to visit and take pictures. A friend of mine is a Norwegian in the US. He told me all the ambitious people in Norway scheme to come to the US to make their fortune then retire back in Norway. Seems to be a very common pattern in Europe - make your money someplace without the excessive taxes and regulations, then travel back for the social safety net. Somehow they see this as moral and just which is quite perplexing.
  - AdrianB1 4y ago
    No idea why you are downvoted other than downvoters having different political opinions that ignore facts.
    - thenaturalist 4y ago
      What is being ignored is basic macroeconomics such as the Theory of Comparative Advantage which states that the net benefit to countries is the specialization in the production of certain types of goods and subsequent trade with each other instead of each country trying to produce everything domestically. This is literally the system the US built since WWII and what globalization is all about after the Iron Curtain fell. Of course, the US being at the center of all this trade as the military guardian of naval trade routes and financier of specialized production capabilities all across the globe. It was and still is a smart as hell play. But that's exactly why anyone hitting on any one part of that web of trade as being irrelevant is so... unimaginative: The fact is that it's NOT a zero sum game, but a system where everyone benefits if trade happens. There are some EU companies that can produce tech in some domains without much or any competition in the US (or think of semiconductors of Taiwan) and the same is true for companies in the US. This is literally Econ 101.
  - spookie 4y ago
    Such derogatory commentary is not adding any value to the conversation. I would refrain from dismissing Europe's industry, and cities with such a tone. The most perplexing part in all of this is the stance that this thread seems to commend. Even more so, given the societal unrest seen in the USA. Just baffling.
    - Nextgrid 4y ago
      > Even more so, given the societal unrest seen in the USA. Just baffling. To be fair, the social unrest of the US fueled by social media & advertising is now exporting itself to other countries - starting with the English-speaking ones (since the content can be reused as-is) but it's just a matter of time before it consumes other countries too.
- ThunderSizzle 4y ago
  Just because someone has more material items than you doesn't mean your life is worse or that you are poor. Poverty isn't about how little you have to others - its about being able to provide and sustain yourself and your family in society. As far as I understand it, poverty is much less now than 100 years ago.
  - OliverGilan 4y ago
    Don’t know why this is being downvoted when it’s objectively true. Parent says wealth inequality is less in Europe therefore being “poor” is more desirable which makes no sense. The US could have higher inequality but that could just mean the richest are richer and the poor have the same standard of living. It could mean the poor are poorer in the US and the richest are even. It could mean the poor AND the rich are richer and better off than their EU counterparts. Just looking at inequality numbers doesn’t tell you anything about quality of life between the two continents…
    - mpweiher 4y ago
      Your analysis is wrong. Wealth inequality by itself is a problem, even if absolute levels are higher. This has been shown in study after study. This obviously doesn't mean that any wealth inequality dominates any absolute level (quick: everyone gets nothing!), and getting the balance right is tricky. But looking at the world happiness index, it is obvious that European countries are doing a pretty good job. https://dmerharyana.org/world-happiness-index/ https://dmerharyana.org/world-happiness-index/ 1 Finland 7.842 7.809 5,554,960 2 Denmark 7.62 7.646 5,834,950 3 Switzerland 7.571 7.56 8,773,637 4 Iceland 7.554 7.504 345,393 5 Netherlands 7.464 7.449 17,211,447 6 Norway 7.392 7.488 5,511,370 7 Sweden 7.363 7.353 10,218,971 8 Luxembourg 7.324 7.238 642,371 9 New Zealand 7.277 7.3 4,898,203 10 Austria 7.268 7.294 9,066,710 11 Australia 7.183 7.223 26,068,792 12 Israel 7.157 7.129 8,922,892 13 Germany 7.155 7.076 83,883,596 14 Canada 7.103 7.232 38,388,419 15 Ireland 7.085 7.129 5,020,199 16 Costa Rica 7.069 7.121 5,182,354 17 United Kingdom 7.064 7.165 68,497,907 18 Czech Republic 6.965 6.911 10,736,784 19 United States 6.951 6.94 334,805,269 20 Belgium 6.834 6.864 11,668,278 21 France 6.69 6.664 65,584,518
  - 4y ago
- whimsicalism 4y ago
  Well, only if the total amount of wealth in the US is equivalent to the EU does your second statement follow. Obviously this is not the end alm be all of how good life is, but there are numerous studies indicating the average of goods and services provided to the poorest 20% in the US is higher than the amount of goods and services provided to the median EU citizen.
  - cwkoss 4y ago
    Link those numerous studies, sounds like BS
    - whimsicalism 4y ago
      https://mises.org/wire/poor-us-are-richer-middle-class-much-europe https://mises.org/wire/poor-us-are-richer-middle-class-much-... Here's one analysis, but there are others. I would prefer a less conservative source.
      - owlglass 4y ago
        When the Mises Institute publishes articles arguing that "drunk drivers cause accidents but so do sober drivers, and many drunk drivers cause no accidents at all," and therefore drunk driving should not be outlawed, it's hard to take this type of source seriously [1]. Note that the article above was published by the institute's founder. [1] https://mises.org/library/legalize-drunk-driving https://mises.org/library/legalize-drunk-driving
        whimsicalism 4y ago
        I hear what you are saying, although I would prefer an engagement on the merits of the specific points. That said, it is of course possible I overstated my case - the provenance of sources I am finding is not as strong as I would have expected.
        julianlam 4y ago
- AdrianB1 4y ago
  I disagree with the previous comments, but wealth inequality is not a measure of wealth (or poor-ness). In a way the previous comment has some truth in it: equalitarianism and socialism in Europe is keeping us poor; you cannot make all equal and rich, but you can make all equal and poor and this is the trend that I see. Background: born and grew in Romania, poor and socialist.
- andsoitis 4y ago
  > Wealth inequality is much worse in the US than Europe, so relatively speaking, "poor" in EU is still much better than "poor" in the US. Besides the questionable practice of lumping all of European countries into a single "Europe" block for debates like this, a single metric like wealth inequality, for instance, isn't useful to compare how countries or regimes are faring. For instance, by that metric, the following countries are better than Sweden: Belarus, Moldova, UAE, Algeria, Iraq. And places like Myanmar and Poland are better than Austria. source: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/wealth-inequality-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/wealth-in...
quotemstr 4y ago
> Europe already endured centuries of this when the majority Christian ethos was that usury & banking were an evil to be banned. This, among other things of course, helped sentence millions of people to poor and deprived lives for centuries. That's a great analogy.
e_i_pi_2 4y ago
> If the standard becomes "make illegal business models that the media gets enough people upset about" I think you're giving "the media" too much credit here, it's also very possible that the business models are actually unpopular and people are upset after learning about them. I think in general that's the basis for all the laws we have - a bunch of people thought there should be a law against something and made it. The only alternative to this is someone doing top-down laws based on what they personally think is right or wrong, and I'd argue that's much more what was happening in Christian-ruled Europe. The church was making laws - they weren't coming from a democratic government.
- somedude895 4y ago
  I'll preface this by saying that I don't like Meta and am very privacy-conscious. > it's also very possible that the business models are actually unpopular and people are upset after learning about them. I am 100% convinced - from people around me - that those who use FB and IG don't give a damn about privacy and would rather it be free of charge. This is clearly a small group of "elite people in the know" (which in this case I consider myself and yourself a part of) deciding this.
  - jdiez17 4y ago
    Those people will be given a choice (assuming Meta doesn’t throw a tantrum and decide to leave the EU in Brexit fashion - which they are more than welcome to do!). “Do you want us to use [extensive list of all of the kinds of information we have meticulously gathered about you] to show you more relevant ads? Yes/no” I have a personal belief on what most people will answer to that question. You may disagree. But it doesn’t really matter - the key is that people will be given the chance to make an informed decision.
    - int_19h 4y ago
      I very much doubt that people will actually get that choice, because if Facebook does give it to them, the response numbers won't look good for the model. It's easier to remove the choice altogether and then spread FUD about how it's forced on them.
bobbruno 4y ago
> without even a vote I’m not sure I follow what kind of “vote” you mean here. The legal framework behind the decision has been in discussion since at least 10 years ago, and most EU countries and the EU parliaments are democratically elected. The lawmaking progress in the EU parliament also is very open to public scrutiny and feedback, and the privacy laws went through it. This all supports the idea that the right to privacy online is pretty much a core value supported by most of the EU population, one which they have been supporting through their votes and participation in the law-making for many years. And if your implied suggestion was that the business model of company X (and whatever benefit they may provide through this model) is a more important vote than the basic value of privacy, or that the issue of cost was not brought to the table enough times for people to understand the trade-offs, then I guess my understanding of how democracy works is different than yours.

quotemstr 4y ago

> To be honest, good riddance. If it is no longer possible to offer users a "free" service in exchange for extremely invasive spying and psychological manipulation Is it right that a tiny but loud minority be able to ban these ad-supported services for all of society? Going by revealed preferences, most people don't consider targeting advertising to be "spying and psychological manipulation". If they did, usage patters would differ.

Arainach 4y ago
Most people don't consider anything that would save them a buck to be a problem, even if the net impact on society is awful. Government exists to look at that bigger picture.
transcriptase 4y ago
The fact is that the vast majority people have no idea they’re giving companies vast amount of data that’s used to manipulate them. Thousands of A/B tests meant to trigger just the right psychological response to optimize impulse buying drop-shipped Aliexpress junk at 800% markup.
dooglius 4y ago
> most people don't consider targeting advertising to be "spying and psychological manipulation" A bit of a catch-22; if they did consider it that, then the manipulation wasn't very good, was it? The revealed preferences of companies to pay for advertising indicates that it is successful at manipulation, enough to justify its cost.
- whimsicalism 4y ago
  It is manipulation in the same manner that you are trying to manipulate me by posting your comment. So much of this rhetoric involves assigning scary words "manipulation", "spying", etc. to everyday events.
naravara 4y ago
Most people have no idea how any of this works, so I wouldn't take observed behavior to be a "revealed preference."

crazygringo 4y ago

But why do you think legislation should be the one forcing that choice on everyone, rather than the market allowing consumers to choose? The issue isn't what we personally like or prefer for ourselves -- it's more about when we think it's legitimate to take away the right of businesses to experiment with business models, and of consumers to be free to enter into the tradeoffs they prefer. Why shouldn't a consumer be allowed to agree to what you call "extremely invasive spying" in exchange for a free product, if they want to? As long as you're not signing away rights (e.g. you can't agree to sell yourself into slavery) or engaging in physical harm (e.g. food and safety regulations), then what's the moral basis for taking away choice? After all, what you call "extremely invasive spying" other people might consider no big deal at all, in terms of their own personal data.

robin_reala 4y ago
And that’s fine: that consumer can choose to opt in.
- jefftk 4y ago
  Except they can't. If a service is only profitable with personalized advertising they aren't allowed to say "if you want to use this service you need to allow us to do personalized advertising". Which means that in the future if there's a service I might want to use which is in this category and if I don't mind having my data used to personalize my advertising, I don't have a choice: the service won't exist.
  - CogitoCogito 4y ago
    Yes one of the purposes of the GDPR is to make it so such a service does not exist.
    - jefftk 4y ago
      If I want that service and someone wants to provide it to me, how is it the role of government to say we can't make that trade?

wintermutestwin 4y ago

>a "free" service in exchange for extremely invasive spying and psychological manipulation /agreed Trading trinkets to the natives for land is the most apt analogy I can think of. In a capitalist society, we should be able to set the price for something that we own. My data is worth way more than the cost to provide the trivial services that Facebook, Gmail, etc provide.

411111111111111 4y ago
> In a capitalist society, we should be able to set the price for something that we own. Congrats, you just legalized slavery with that genius idea. There have to be limits on everything. You just disagree with the chosen line.
whimsicalism 4y ago
If you think that the price is not worth it, you are free to refuse the transaction. The EU govt here is requiring the counterparty to provide you with the service even if you refuse the transaction.
- e_i_pi_2 4y ago
  I think this is like predatory lending laws - you can be forced to give someone a loan at a reasonable price, even if you can convince them to pay way more. The same argument also works for voluntary slavery - I think people have the right to say "even if it's initially consensual, it still seems like an abusive business model that we shouldn't allow"
  - whimsicalism 4y ago
    You aren't forced to give someone a loan at a capped price, you can simply refuse to loan out your money. The government does not compel you to loan, so it is not analogous. I get the logic of rendering certain voluntary transactions illegal. Child labor (questionably voluntary) & minimum wage laws come to mind. This is distinct because those laws don't require companies to hire people at minimum wage.

astrange 4y ago

I agree that if anytime anyone came up with a business model you banned it, that would produce more innovation in business models. But you also wouldn’t get any of the products because you’ve banned all of them. So it seems like a bad way to run an economic bloc. The EU in particular doesn’t even know what they’re doing and none of their poorly drafted “blue is green now because I said so” laws even work. You just get cookie banners everywhere. The value you get from Facebook is the ads are relevant, rather than all being for cars you’re not going to buy. They don’t “use your data” to “make money”. They show you ads and you click on them.

deleted 4y ago
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Nextgrid 4y ago
The cookie banners are a result of bad/non-existent enforcement. The GDPR actually makes 90% of them illegal. Enforcement appears to be slowly ramping up. > The value you get from Facebook is the ads are relevant If this was true, this ruling would be a nothingburger because everyone would voluntarily opt into the targeted advertising so they can get all that "value" you're speaking of. In reality though the value people get from Facebook is being able to keep in touch with their friends or content that interests them. The ads are just pollution. I think we used to call this "spam" in the past. The ruling now at least allows people to deny spammers usage of their personal data for the purposes of targeting said spam.
- astrange 4y ago
  > The cookie banners are a result of bad/non-existent enforcement. Unintended results are part of writing the laws. So is writing a law that phone ports must be USBC and forgetting about wireless charging standards. When the DMA starts enforcement and makes it impossible to block messaging spam because all messengers have to trust each other, that’ll be part of it too. > If this was true, this ruling would be a nothingburger because everyone would voluntarily opt into the targeted advertising so they can get all that "value" you're speaking of. No, not all markets clear. If you get a smaller market because not everyone opts in there’s just going to be less stuff in it. (And I actually think Instagram’s ads are more interesting than, say, my family members who’ve decided to become influencers.)

salawat 4y ago

That's not compensating users, that's discounting. Compensating would be Facebook paying you for the use of your data.