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One way I’ve approached this is that I’ve stopped being an unpaid worker for the mega corps… so rather than submitting corrections to Google/Waze/Apple maps I t

by lode 3y ago

One way I’ve approached this is that I’ve stopped being an unpaid worker for the mega corps… so rather than submitting corrections to Google/Waze/Apple maps I try to use OpenStreetMap consistently and provide as much data as I can. (Such as opening hours of nearby shops.) I know that companies use this data as the basis for commercial offerings and I am completely fine with that, but I know that the data will always be available for free as well. As a side note, in general I’ve found the local OSM community to be much nicer than the local Waze admins.

nyokodo 3y ago
> I’ve stopped being an unpaid worker for the mega corps… I try to use OpenStreetMap consistently and provide as much data as I can That’s a good thing and I like your framing. By contrast, the article frames this as you being tricked into it by the commercial companies to which you previously directly provided data but that’s just nonsense. You weren’t tricked, and you aren’t a victim. I’m glad OpenStreetMap is there to provide the same value with open data but the closed systems still provided value and did not coerce or trick anyone.
- globular-toast 3y ago
  > but the closed systems still provided value and did not coerce or trick anyone. I disagree. Google et al very much trick people into thinking they are helping "the community" by contributing to their databases. They even tell people how "popular" they are because their reviews were included in searches. Do you think as many people would contribute if they were honest about it and said "help make our ads more valuable"?
  - harkinian 3y ago
    It's possible to be popular and also profited from at the same time.
  - thfuran 3y ago
    That's manipulative but not really deceptive.
  - nyokodo 3y ago
    > trick people into thinking they are helping "the community" by contributing to their databases The only way that would be a trick is if they were helping the app owner while not making the app more valuable to the community which is obviously not the case. Clearly the voluntary contributors are adding value to the app and are therefore helping the community who uses the app. > Do you think as many people would contribute if they were honest about it and said "help make our ads more valuable" Their business models have been public this whole time, hence our discussion, none of this has been a secret. The mere fact that companies tend to paint everything about their operations in the best light possible instead of the opposite is not evidence of trickery or even morally culpable deception.
    - wkat4242 3y ago
      > The mere fact that companies tend to paint everything about their operations in the best light possible instead of the opposite is not evidence of trickery or even morally culpable deception. We definitely differ in opinion there. I don't know why people think companies can get away with things that humans never would. I just don't get the mindset of 'companies are evil, it's how it has to be'. Because it doesn't.
- johnnyanmac 3y ago
  They didn't trick you anymore than Facebook didn't trick people into being a free social media service. People elect to post data and never took away explicit permissions to use that data in other ways. FB isn't the government so 4th amendment rights would not apply. But that's an edge case tbh. Hearing of scrapers ignoring Robots.txt and going after copyright show that they couldn't care less about ethical scraping. They more than overstepped their bounds in some places.
- wkat4242 3y ago
  They did trick us a bit in my opinion. The pervasiveness of their tracking networks was never made clear.
  - harkinian 3y ago
    That part was a trick. Was... at this point, people assume even worse things but by-and-large don't seem to care. But the above comment was about user-submitted feedback used for improving Google Maps, which doesn't seem like a trick at all.
- barrysteve 3y ago
  They didn't need to trick anyone. They withheld knowledge. Every tech company agreed they could do whatever they wanted with user created data and the user had no rights over that data. No user was informed of the full extent of the consequences of agreeing to use new tech... or allowed to alter the 'agreement' tech companies offered the user. The 'trick' was hiding sales tactics that were illegal in traditional businesses, behind TOS, EULAs and unregulated internet space. We all know deep down inside that no man would agree to what big tech did, so the deal was made unintelligble to the user.
globular-toast 3y ago
This is the way. Just make sure the project is using a copyleft licence such as ODbL (as used by OSM) or GPL (as used by GNU/Linux and other software projects). Corporations will take as much as they can and give back as little as they can, as a rule. Someone in the OSM community coined the term "crowd serfing" to describe stuff like contributing to Google Maps for free.
- harkinian 3y ago
  Seems Microsoft got away with training Copilot on a lot of GPL'd code, though.
  - johnnyanmac 3y ago
    Lawsuits incoming then? If they aren't already happening. That France ruling from not too long ago should deter many companies from ignoring such licenses.
    - harkinian 3y ago
      They're happening, but it's not as clear cut as Microsoft ignoring the license. GPL doesn't say anything about AI explicitly. Personally I think Microsoft is in the wrong anyway.
      - rchaud 3y ago
        > GPL doesn't say anything about AI explicitly. The tech industry is just a regulatory arbitrage play these days.
  - walterbell 3y ago
    The better to contaminate your code with, my dear.
EasyMark 3y ago
I think you have convinced me to use OSM more for local stuff. I have added notes and updates here and there, but I've never really used it nearly as much as I have apple maps (and used to use google maps/waze). I do know the area quite well so there's not much to lose by using OSM apps instead. I'm still a little mehhhh on longer road trips though, but I'm a pretty conservative user of apps if my current apps are working well for me.
fddrdplktrew 3y ago
> I’ve stopped being an unpaid worker for the mega corps I wouldnt be so sure about that... do you receive emails from gmail addresses?
- aendruk 3y ago
  Read it as a resolution.
downWidOutaFite 3y ago
But you're contributing to HN which is owned by VCs with increasingly aggressive political postures (which we are not allowed to discuss on here) who could pull the rug on us whenever they want to. The problem is that the n^2 stickiness of social graphs makes competition impossible when they scale into the millions. All the value is created by the users but accrues to the network owners, and then the owners are able to abuse and manipulate the networks as they see fit without repercussion. I think the ideal model for social networks is that they would be owned by benevolent nonprofits, but besides wikipedia VCs were able to capture every important social network of the Web 2.0 era.
- beej71 3y ago
  HN isn't making any money off me, last I checked. And, as owners, the First Amendment gives them the right to publish or not on their own platform for any reason or for no reason. The alternative to this is too horrible to contemplate. Re paragraph 2, yes. Mastodon largely fits your description of the ideal model, I think.

by lode 3y ago

nyokodo 3y ago

> I’ve stopped being an unpaid worker for the mega corps… I try to use OpenStreetMap consistently and provide as much data as I can That’s a good thing and I like your framing. By contrast, the article frames this as you being tricked into it by the commercial companies to which you previously directly provided data but that’s just nonsense. You weren’t tricked, and you aren’t a victim. I’m glad OpenStreetMap is there to provide the same value with open data but the closed systems still provided value and did not coerce or trick anyone.

globular-toast 3y ago
> but the closed systems still provided value and did not coerce or trick anyone. I disagree. Google et al very much trick people into thinking they are helping "the community" by contributing to their databases. They even tell people how "popular" they are because their reviews were included in searches. Do you think as many people would contribute if they were honest about it and said "help make our ads more valuable"?
- harkinian 3y ago
  It's possible to be popular and also profited from at the same time.
- thfuran 3y ago
  That's manipulative but not really deceptive.
- nyokodo 3y ago
  > trick people into thinking they are helping "the community" by contributing to their databases The only way that would be a trick is if they were helping the app owner while not making the app more valuable to the community which is obviously not the case. Clearly the voluntary contributors are adding value to the app and are therefore helping the community who uses the app. > Do you think as many people would contribute if they were honest about it and said "help make our ads more valuable" Their business models have been public this whole time, hence our discussion, none of this has been a secret. The mere fact that companies tend to paint everything about their operations in the best light possible instead of the opposite is not evidence of trickery or even morally culpable deception.
  - wkat4242 3y ago
    > The mere fact that companies tend to paint everything about their operations in the best light possible instead of the opposite is not evidence of trickery or even morally culpable deception. We definitely differ in opinion there. I don't know why people think companies can get away with things that humans never would. I just don't get the mindset of 'companies are evil, it's how it has to be'. Because it doesn't.
johnnyanmac 3y ago
They didn't trick you anymore than Facebook didn't trick people into being a free social media service. People elect to post data and never took away explicit permissions to use that data in other ways. FB isn't the government so 4th amendment rights would not apply. But that's an edge case tbh. Hearing of scrapers ignoring Robots.txt and going after copyright show that they couldn't care less about ethical scraping. They more than overstepped their bounds in some places.
wkat4242 3y ago
They did trick us a bit in my opinion. The pervasiveness of their tracking networks was never made clear.
- harkinian 3y ago
  That part was a trick. Was... at this point, people assume even worse things but by-and-large don't seem to care. But the above comment was about user-submitted feedback used for improving Google Maps, which doesn't seem like a trick at all.
barrysteve 3y ago
They didn't need to trick anyone. They withheld knowledge. Every tech company agreed they could do whatever they wanted with user created data and the user had no rights over that data. No user was informed of the full extent of the consequences of agreeing to use new tech... or allowed to alter the 'agreement' tech companies offered the user. The 'trick' was hiding sales tactics that were illegal in traditional businesses, behind TOS, EULAs and unregulated internet space. We all know deep down inside that no man would agree to what big tech did, so the deal was made unintelligble to the user.

globular-toast 3y ago

This is the way. Just make sure the project is using a copyleft licence such as ODbL (as used by OSM) or GPL (as used by GNU/Linux and other software projects). Corporations will take as much as they can and give back as little as they can, as a rule. Someone in the OSM community coined the term "crowd serfing" to describe stuff like contributing to Google Maps for free.

harkinian 3y ago
Seems Microsoft got away with training Copilot on a lot of GPL'd code, though.
- johnnyanmac 3y ago
  Lawsuits incoming then? If they aren't already happening. That France ruling from not too long ago should deter many companies from ignoring such licenses.
  - harkinian 3y ago
    They're happening, but it's not as clear cut as Microsoft ignoring the license. GPL doesn't say anything about AI explicitly. Personally I think Microsoft is in the wrong anyway.
    - rchaud 3y ago
      > GPL doesn't say anything about AI explicitly. The tech industry is just a regulatory arbitrage play these days.
- walterbell 3y ago
  The better to contaminate your code with, my dear.

EasyMark 3y ago

I think you have convinced me to use OSM more for local stuff. I have added notes and updates here and there, but I've never really used it nearly as much as I have apple maps (and used to use google maps/waze). I do know the area quite well so there's not much to lose by using OSM apps instead. I'm still a little mehhhh on longer road trips though, but I'm a pretty conservative user of apps if my current apps are working well for me.

fddrdplktrew 3y ago

> I’ve stopped being an unpaid worker for the mega corps I wouldnt be so sure about that... do you receive emails from gmail addresses?

aendruk 3y ago
Read it as a resolution.

downWidOutaFite 3y ago

But you're contributing to HN which is owned by VCs with increasingly aggressive political postures (which we are not allowed to discuss on here) who could pull the rug on us whenever they want to. The problem is that the n^2 stickiness of social graphs makes competition impossible when they scale into the millions. All the value is created by the users but accrues to the network owners, and then the owners are able to abuse and manipulate the networks as they see fit without repercussion. I think the ideal model for social networks is that they would be owned by benevolent nonprofits, but besides wikipedia VCs were able to capture every important social network of the Web 2.0 era.

beej71 3y ago
HN isn't making any money off me, last I checked. And, as owners, the First Amendment gives them the right to publish or not on their own platform for any reason or for no reason. The alternative to this is too horrible to contemplate. Re paragraph 2, yes. Mastodon largely fits your description of the ideal model, I think.