5 ms·

The biggest takeaway should be to not collect and use dehumanizing and degrading data like this in the first place.

• jdietrich 13y ago
  This is not "dehumanizing and degrading data". Organisations collect this sort of data all the time, precisely because not knowing usually has far worse consequences. I used to work in telesales and we logged this sort of data all the time, because it helped us avoid horrible and embarrassing faux-pas - selling adventure holidays to someone with a tetraplegic child, selling life insurance to someone with a terminal illness etc. We logged it because the customer wanted us to log it. The obvious counter-argument is that nobody should ever use any form of outbound direct marketing under any circumstances, but that's just not going to happen. This is an unfortunate edge-case of a database error that would be merely annoying or amusing in 99.999% of circumstances, but it's not an argument for never collecting this sort of data. The alternative is a sort of institutional amnesia in which the organisation is simply incapable of behaving sensitively because they don't know that there is anything to be sensitive about.
  • BlackDeath3 13y ago
    So you collect peoples' personal data to avoid being embarrassed while talking to them? Christ. >We logged it because the customer wanted us to log it. So customers actually requested that you collect personal information on them?
    • DrewAllyn 13y ago
      > So customers actually requested that you collect personal information on them? "My kid can't walk, so I'm not interested. Please don't try to sell me this again."
      • BlackDeath3 13y ago
        Voluntarily-offered information is not the same thing as information scraped, bought and sold, and you (should) know it.