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Reading this: https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/telemetry-should-you-allow.html https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/telemetry-should-you-all... I've stumbled

Reading this: https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/telemetry-should-you-allow.html https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/telemetry-should-you-all... I've stumbled on this: > Optional telemetry, of course, but again - this creates a selective and unpredictable reality. Ordinary people don't care either way, and nerds will always make deliberate choices that often have nothing to do with product or profit or anything else entirely. So, by that logic, users who opt out of telemetry are aware of why they are doing it. People who don't care share their chaotic usage patterns. This creates a false picture of usage reality, and makes software worse. In conclusion, there are only two remaining choices: 1. Make telemetry non-optional 2. Ditch telemetry and rely on QA studies

JohnFen 3y ago
> 1. Make telemetry non-optional But then users who care about this issue will just block the application's ability to phone home, or use a different one that doesn't spy (my definition of spying is any time data about me or my machines is collected without my informed consent).
- ElectricalUnion 3y ago
  You just need to make the application complex enough that phoning home is convenient and nice-to-have functionality is deeply intertwined with tracking. Like what Google Chrome does.
  - jjgreen 3y ago
    Interesting, any more details on this? (And have people worked around that?)
denton-scratch 3y ago
> So, by that logic, users who opt out of telemetry are aware of why they are doing it. Ambiguous: they're aware of why who is doing it? I opt out of telemetry because I don't know why they're doing it - the data collectors. I mean, I know why they say they're doing it, but I don't know if it's true. I also don't want my computing resources and network bandwidth used to further a goal that I might not support. Even if the only reason for collecting data really is to "improve the product", perhaps that'll result in them making the product dependent on systemd, which from my POV would be an adverse outcome.
- m463 3y ago
  > they This is the key actually. they could be a single engineer tracking down a pernicious segfault. or they could be marketing "they gave us the data, we can do anything we want"
- didntcheck 3y ago
  The reason they collect telemetry usually is why they say they do - to improve the product. If it's commercial software then, sure, the ulterior motive is to get more money out of you, but they're doing that by making you like the product more so, great? And if you're worried that your user case (e.g. not-systemd) will be deprecated then that's a good reason to keep it on and be represented. I bet people who used Firefox's RSS feature were more likely than usual to turn off telemetry, yet that didn't save their feature. If anything, it may have made Mozilla more confident in removing it
  - justinclift 3y ago
    > ... to improve the product. That phrase can be viewed in many different ways, depending upon who the decision makers setting the goals are. > If anything, it may have made Mozilla more confident in removing it ... Of course. People know this, that's a good part of why people are against metrics. It leads to dumbed down software, as there's always a 5% of features that can be cut (on every budget or dev iteration) to "focus more on the majority uses!".
    - denton-scratch 3y ago
      Exactly. It all depends on what you mean by "improve".
  - AlexandrB 3y ago
    > The reason they collect telemetry usually is why they say they do - to improve the product. Even if that's true, organizations like to keep this stuff for longer than they should and are not immune to hacks or changing business priorities (like AI). If there was serious liability attached to leaking or "off-label" use of this data then I'd feel better about it. Also, using telemetry to justify removing features is not about making the product better but about cutting costs. How is Firefox better without RSS support? The fact that only a small number of users use it tells you nothing about how passionate or influential those users are, nor how such a change will affect wider perception of your products. See also: how pissed off many on HN still are about the death of Google Reader even though it was a "niche" product.

JohnFen 3y ago

> 1. Make telemetry non-optional But then users who care about this issue will just block the application's ability to phone home, or use a different one that doesn't spy (my definition of spying is any time data about me or my machines is collected without my informed consent).

ElectricalUnion 3y ago
You just need to make the application complex enough that phoning home is convenient and nice-to-have functionality is deeply intertwined with tracking. Like what Google Chrome does.
- jjgreen 3y ago
  Interesting, any more details on this? (And have people worked around that?)

denton-scratch 3y ago

> So, by that logic, users who opt out of telemetry are aware of why they are doing it. Ambiguous: they're aware of why who is doing it? I opt out of telemetry because I don't know why they're doing it - the data collectors. I mean, I know why they say they're doing it, but I don't know if it's true. I also don't want my computing resources and network bandwidth used to further a goal that I might not support. Even if the only reason for collecting data really is to "improve the product", perhaps that'll result in them making the product dependent on systemd, which from my POV would be an adverse outcome.

m463 3y ago
> they This is the key actually. they could be a single engineer tracking down a pernicious segfault. or they could be marketing "they gave us the data, we can do anything we want"
didntcheck 3y ago
The reason they collect telemetry usually is why they say they do - to improve the product. If it's commercial software then, sure, the ulterior motive is to get more money out of you, but they're doing that by making you like the product more so, great? And if you're worried that your user case (e.g. not-systemd) will be deprecated then that's a good reason to keep it on and be represented. I bet people who used Firefox's RSS feature were more likely than usual to turn off telemetry, yet that didn't save their feature. If anything, it may have made Mozilla more confident in removing it
- justinclift 3y ago
  > ... to improve the product. That phrase can be viewed in many different ways, depending upon who the decision makers setting the goals are. > If anything, it may have made Mozilla more confident in removing it ... Of course. People know this, that's a good part of why people are against metrics. It leads to dumbed down software, as there's always a 5% of features that can be cut (on every budget or dev iteration) to "focus more on the majority uses!".
  - denton-scratch 3y ago
    Exactly. It all depends on what you mean by "improve".
- AlexandrB 3y ago
  > The reason they collect telemetry usually is why they say they do - to improve the product. Even if that's true, organizations like to keep this stuff for longer than they should and are not immune to hacks or changing business priorities (like AI). If there was serious liability attached to leaking or "off-label" use of this data then I'd feel better about it. Also, using telemetry to justify removing features is not about making the product better but about cutting costs. How is Firefox better without RSS support? The fact that only a small number of users use it tells you nothing about how passionate or influential those users are, nor how such a change will affect wider perception of your products. See also: how pissed off many on HN still are about the death of Google Reader even though it was a "niche" product.