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Imagine you go to a market notorious for haggling and the company that sold you your wallet monitors all your transactions and reports them to whomever of the m

Imagine you go to a market notorious for haggling and the company that sold you your wallet monitors all your transactions and reports them to whomever of the market sellers pays most. You are now the fat chicken, ready to be plucked: You just bought a hammer, now you need nails. From your social media trail sellers can also infer you are somewhat of a dimwit. Hurry, nails are in high demand in your area. But no worries, here is a great offer for you, valid for the next 0.3 hours. I just can't understand how people have come to accept such erosion of their privacy, ultimately their very own economic interests and agency under the hands of manipulative operators and captured regulators. What kind of collective inanity allows such social degeneration. Was it always like that? Is there any hope?

seanthemon 3y ago
Yes, it always was like this, all the way back to snake oil salesmen and probably even further back. Now we have 'legit' companies that know the exact snake oil you'd want. There will always be a battle between the wants and want nots.
- nologic01 3y ago
  I was always under the impression that despite ups and downs there was (on average) progress, improvement, in some broadly defined way. I am no longer sure. One could always think that we hit a local minimum. But the comatose, practically non-existent debate suggests there are no reacting forces, the malaise runs deep. Its puzzling and confusing because none of that phemomena seem pre-ordained. Its all self-inflicted through abysmally bad governance. Literally made up through behavior and choices.
- zelphirkalt 3y ago
  Now however, the consequences are on a truly global scale, so it becomes more important than ever before, while at the same time becoming less understandable than ever before for normal people. So instead of downtalking the issue, we should highlight it more than ever before and we should inform and educate people more than ever before. 'cept that education sector is struggling to even get financed in places. We even have people seriously thinking schools should finance themselves, because they are too short-sighted, to see the net benefit for a society, that a good education system brings with it. This in the face of ever more things to learn about the digital world. And I live in a country, where there isn't even an official school subject about interacting with this digital world.
barrysteve 3y ago
"always was" is such terrible rhetoric. hand-wavey and without substance. A thought terminating cliche. It honestly makes crypto look desirable, and buildings designed with sensor blocking materials. You can't passively surveil a data-center. Why should my home, office or shopping mall be any different? The powers-that-be never gave us a choice to opt-out. It's been a slow gradual decline. We have to incentivize haggling over our own data. My unseen/unknown data is my asset and I will protect it's financial value. We can't trust random joes to not sell out crypto exchanges and the like, so you have to build technology that functions as a manual crypto exchange - without a developer on it's back to pull the ripchord and destroy the technology whenever money shows up. Manual software is key, as soon as it becomes "automated", some developer has to be roped into hand-holding it through tech changes. Crypto software that only exists because a man put it together and went hands-off, is Key. Then you can build the normal philosophical/structural/relationship management ideas on top of that.
gleenn 3y ago
I think the answer is very simple: people don't understand and even if they do then they don't understand that what might seem minor "well whatever, it's just some nails this one time," and it doesn't cross over to the huge power this data yields in aggregate.
- amelius 3y ago
  Also, people like the discounts they get from their loyalty cards, and also the free stuff on the internet. What they don't know is that they pay twice, once with their data and once with money. And the prices they pay now include the cost of the adtech too.
squokko 3y ago
The average person simply has no hope of understanding the flows of modern global capital, data, weapons, etc. Back in the day, if the local leather tanner was polluting the town water supply... you'd just go tell him to stop, and if he didn't... Nowadays the only people who have any idea what's actually going on are the ones who are profiting the most from it and have no incentive to shut it down.
- anjel 3y ago
  If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers. -Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow
- SenAnder 3y ago
  > The average person simply has no hope of understanding If Mastercard used a private detective to follow you when shopping, and he wrote everything you bought and where you bought it into a notebook, which he later delivers to Mastercard, the average person would understand very quickly.
bArray 3y ago
Better yet, they now have those e-ink price labels. They could literally update as you walk towards them to show the price they will sell to you. If you walk off and don't pick something up, they could then change the offer a little. It's no longer '2 for 1', it's now '3 for 2 with a free X'. Disgusting. > I just can't understand how people have come to accept such erosion of their privacy, ultimately their very own economic interests and agency under the hands of manipulative operators and captured regulators. The frog born in boiling water doesn't realise it is hot, it's all he ever knew. The age bracket with the largest disposable income now doesn't know any different, it's how it always was. > What kind of collective inanity allows such social degeneration. Was it always like that? Is there any hope? No, technology made it far easier. It's now targeted and automated, it's as worse as it has ever been and continues to get worse. There is not a politician in any land willing to do anything about it - more product sold at higher prices means larger taxes. (And that's if the company doesn't lobby on top.)
- qwerty456127 3y ago
  Even better - criminals will get the data a way or another and find out your purchasing power, when and where you go leaving your house unattended and what they can tell you or your relatives to effortlessly manipulate into just giving them something valuable.
- s3p 3y ago
  Who has these labels? And if they did, how would they enforce it? How would a checkout counter know what price you were offered by some random computer sitting on a shelf?
  - autoexec 3y ago
    It's been being tested in retail already (see for example: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41272-019-00224-3 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41272-019-00224-3) and the main thing holding stores back from implementing it is that most people think discriminatory pricing is wrong. Companies are working very hard to convince us to let them do it though. Their foot in the door is offering "deals" to only certain people. You see this in things like store loyalty cards or Xbox's "just for you" prices (https://www.windowscentral.com/xbox-microsoft-store-just-for-you-discounts https://www.windowscentral.com/xbox-microsoft-store-just-for...). It's all just trying to condition us to accept that some people deserve different prices/treatment than other people. If I were building this type of system I'd do away with electronic labels and just force people to scan a QR code with their cell phones, then use that data collected from their device to find out their income level, past purchase history, etc. then use that data to display their "price" (subject to change at any moment) right on their device along with ingredients, nutritional data, product information, ads, etc. Then I'd either generate a QR code on their device for them to scan at self-checkout, use Bluetooth to detect the device when they stood at the checkout counter, or use facial recognition. Either way, knowing what price the computer offered would be dead simple and the price of whatever is being purchased could (and probably would) change from the time you picked it off of the shelf and when it got scanned at the register. I'd be your responsibility to accept the prices or not when you pay.
amelius 3y ago
> You just bought a hammer, now you need nails. The standard response from someone working in ad-tech: "But isn't it great that an advertisement informs you that you need nails too? Nothing would ever be built without the help from ad-tech!"
- hulitu 3y ago
  As someone said in another thread: the problem with ad-tech is that they think that you need another hamner.
  - amelius 3y ago
    Yes, adding insult to injury.
y42 3y ago
1. People did not accept this "erosion of privacy". They just don't understand. Mastercard is not going to the every customer and telling them, what exactly they do, what it means and so on. Sure, they ask for "explicit consent", they have contract and agreements and tons of legal documents describing every step. But that does not help people understanding what they do. That is the big misunderstanding of legal requirements like GDPR: It does not prevent erosion of privacy. 2. In general, this is not an erosion of privacy. Honestly? I really do not care what a company does with my transaction data. Why? Because I work in the field of data analytics, big data and I got a little idea of what happen: I'm just a small dot in a very huge picture. Sure, at some point in the very beginning of this process the company tracks my data. But this single data point is not of value. Only the aggregation of an massive amount of data point has a value. Saying "your data" is just framing the opinion into a direction "data collection hurts your privacy". Really no one cares about Mr A from B in C, born in 1900, having n kids and m wifes. 3. You may reply that my data is in danger, if a company is collecting it. That is right. And that's probably the main goal of legal stuff like the GDPR. Data breach can only happen to existing data. No data, no breach. Too easy. But if this is the argument, then you may stop using the internet or any other service. So, to sum it up: Let's blame the companies for 1 (misleading) and 3 (no security)... but 2? Yeah well. I think it's fine to collect data. I mean... it's a human thing! Information advantage is an evolutional advantage and information comes from data.

seanthemon 3y ago

Yes, it always was like this, all the way back to snake oil salesmen and probably even further back. Now we have 'legit' companies that know the exact snake oil you'd want. There will always be a battle between the wants and want nots.

nologic01 3y ago
I was always under the impression that despite ups and downs there was (on average) progress, improvement, in some broadly defined way. I am no longer sure. One could always think that we hit a local minimum. But the comatose, practically non-existent debate suggests there are no reacting forces, the malaise runs deep. Its puzzling and confusing because none of that phemomena seem pre-ordained. Its all self-inflicted through abysmally bad governance. Literally made up through behavior and choices.
zelphirkalt 3y ago
Now however, the consequences are on a truly global scale, so it becomes more important than ever before, while at the same time becoming less understandable than ever before for normal people. So instead of downtalking the issue, we should highlight it more than ever before and we should inform and educate people more than ever before. 'cept that education sector is struggling to even get financed in places. We even have people seriously thinking schools should finance themselves, because they are too short-sighted, to see the net benefit for a society, that a good education system brings with it. This in the face of ever more things to learn about the digital world. And I live in a country, where there isn't even an official school subject about interacting with this digital world.

barrysteve 3y ago

"always was" is such terrible rhetoric. hand-wavey and without substance. A thought terminating cliche. It honestly makes crypto look desirable, and buildings designed with sensor blocking materials. You can't passively surveil a data-center. Why should my home, office or shopping mall be any different? The powers-that-be never gave us a choice to opt-out. It's been a slow gradual decline. We have to incentivize haggling over our own data. My unseen/unknown data is my asset and I will protect it's financial value. We can't trust random joes to not sell out crypto exchanges and the like, so you have to build technology that functions as a manual crypto exchange - without a developer on it's back to pull the ripchord and destroy the technology whenever money shows up. Manual software is key, as soon as it becomes "automated", some developer has to be roped into hand-holding it through tech changes. Crypto software that only exists because a man put it together and went hands-off, is Key. Then you can build the normal philosophical/structural/relationship management ideas on top of that.

gleenn 3y ago

I think the answer is very simple: people don't understand and even if they do then they don't understand that what might seem minor "well whatever, it's just some nails this one time," and it doesn't cross over to the huge power this data yields in aggregate.

amelius 3y ago
Also, people like the discounts they get from their loyalty cards, and also the free stuff on the internet. What they don't know is that they pay twice, once with their data and once with money. And the prices they pay now include the cost of the adtech too.

squokko 3y ago

The average person simply has no hope of understanding the flows of modern global capital, data, weapons, etc. Back in the day, if the local leather tanner was polluting the town water supply... you'd just go tell him to stop, and if he didn't... Nowadays the only people who have any idea what's actually going on are the ones who are profiting the most from it and have no incentive to shut it down.

anjel 3y ago
If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers. -Pynchon, Gravity's Rainbow
SenAnder 3y ago
> The average person simply has no hope of understanding If Mastercard used a private detective to follow you when shopping, and he wrote everything you bought and where you bought it into a notebook, which he later delivers to Mastercard, the average person would understand very quickly.

bArray 3y ago

Better yet, they now have those e-ink price labels. They could literally update as you walk towards them to show the price they will sell to you. If you walk off and don't pick something up, they could then change the offer a little. It's no longer '2 for 1', it's now '3 for 2 with a free X'. Disgusting. > I just can't understand how people have come to accept such erosion of their privacy, ultimately their very own economic interests and agency under the hands of manipulative operators and captured regulators. The frog born in boiling water doesn't realise it is hot, it's all he ever knew. The age bracket with the largest disposable income now doesn't know any different, it's how it always was. > What kind of collective inanity allows such social degeneration. Was it always like that? Is there any hope? No, technology made it far easier. It's now targeted and automated, it's as worse as it has ever been and continues to get worse. There is not a politician in any land willing to do anything about it - more product sold at higher prices means larger taxes. (And that's if the company doesn't lobby on top.)

qwerty456127 3y ago
Even better - criminals will get the data a way or another and find out your purchasing power, when and where you go leaving your house unattended and what they can tell you or your relatives to effortlessly manipulate into just giving them something valuable.
s3p 3y ago
Who has these labels? And if they did, how would they enforce it? How would a checkout counter know what price you were offered by some random computer sitting on a shelf?
- autoexec 3y ago
  It's been being tested in retail already (see for example: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41272-019-00224-3 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/s41272-019-00224-3) and the main thing holding stores back from implementing it is that most people think discriminatory pricing is wrong. Companies are working very hard to convince us to let them do it though. Their foot in the door is offering "deals" to only certain people. You see this in things like store loyalty cards or Xbox's "just for you" prices (https://www.windowscentral.com/xbox-microsoft-store-just-for-you-discounts https://www.windowscentral.com/xbox-microsoft-store-just-for...). It's all just trying to condition us to accept that some people deserve different prices/treatment than other people. If I were building this type of system I'd do away with electronic labels and just force people to scan a QR code with their cell phones, then use that data collected from their device to find out their income level, past purchase history, etc. then use that data to display their "price" (subject to change at any moment) right on their device along with ingredients, nutritional data, product information, ads, etc. Then I'd either generate a QR code on their device for them to scan at self-checkout, use Bluetooth to detect the device when they stood at the checkout counter, or use facial recognition. Either way, knowing what price the computer offered would be dead simple and the price of whatever is being purchased could (and probably would) change from the time you picked it off of the shelf and when it got scanned at the register. I'd be your responsibility to accept the prices or not when you pay.

amelius 3y ago

> You just bought a hammer, now you need nails. The standard response from someone working in ad-tech: "But isn't it great that an advertisement informs you that you need nails too? Nothing would ever be built without the help from ad-tech!"

hulitu 3y ago
As someone said in another thread: the problem with ad-tech is that they think that you need another hamner.
- amelius 3y ago
  Yes, adding insult to injury.

y42 3y ago

1. People did not accept this "erosion of privacy". They just don't understand. Mastercard is not going to the every customer and telling them, what exactly they do, what it means and so on. Sure, they ask for "explicit consent", they have contract and agreements and tons of legal documents describing every step. But that does not help people understanding what they do. That is the big misunderstanding of legal requirements like GDPR: It does not prevent erosion of privacy. 2. In general, this is not an erosion of privacy. Honestly? I really do not care what a company does with my transaction data. Why? Because I work in the field of data analytics, big data and I got a little idea of what happen: I'm just a small dot in a very huge picture. Sure, at some point in the very beginning of this process the company tracks my data. But this single data point is not of value. Only the aggregation of an massive amount of data point has a value. Saying "your data" is just framing the opinion into a direction "data collection hurts your privacy". Really no one cares about Mr A from B in C, born in 1900, having n kids and m wifes. 3. You may reply that my data is in danger, if a company is collecting it. That is right. And that's probably the main goal of legal stuff like the GDPR. Data breach can only happen to existing data. No data, no breach. Too easy. But if this is the argument, then you may stop using the internet or any other service. So, to sum it up: Let's blame the companies for 1 (misleading) and 3 (no security)... but 2? Yeah well. I think it's fine to collect data. I mean... it's a human thing! Information advantage is an evolutional advantage and information comes from data.