Woz/USA TODAY:
“Users provide every detail of their life to Facebook and … Facebook makes a lot of advertising money off this,” he said in an email to USA TODAY. “The profits are all based on the user’s info, but the users get none of the profits back.”
Wozniak said he’d rather pay for Facebook than have his personal information exploited for advertising. And he heaped praise on Apple for respecting people’s privacy.
“Apple makes its money off of good products, not off of you,” Wozniak said. “As they say, with Facebook, you are the product.”
More shots fired. Is this a temporary tempest in a teapot, or will this wave of controversy cause real change?
#deleteFacebook
I don’t think it’s true that users get “nothing” in return. They get all the services that Facebook provides, for no legal tender in exchange. But there is an exchange going on: you’re giving your privacy in exchange for those services. Whether this is a conscious action or not, what is happening right now is people reevaluating that exchange.
This movement is either to “deleteFacebook” or it’s to begin to place a higher value on our personal data. If the latter, then a lot more companies than Facebook should see pushback.
I don’t think it’s true that users get “nothing” in return. They get all the services that Facebook provides, for no legal tender in exchange. But there is an exchange going on: you’re giving your privacy in exchange for those services. Whether this is a conscious action or not, what is happening right now is people reevaluating that exchange.
This movement is either to “deleteFacebook” or it’s to begin to place a higher value on our personal data. If the latter, then a lot more companies than Facebook should see pushback.
I agree with your analysis. I’m just restating it economically (that is, economics-focused and not efficiently): we’ve just learned that the price of participating in Facebook is the sharing of this data whether we opt to or not. Just being on the service, even if we never interact with a quiz or give anyone permission to see anything, we’re likely to have our stuff seen. At that level there are STILL some people that are not going to care. “I haven’t done anything wrong, I don’t care who sees what I do.” Not a position I agree with, but a position.
Just like if someone buys an inexpensive used car and doesn’t anticipate the costs of poorer fuel economy or increased maintenance. Hidden costs. Maybe even very well-hidden if you don’t know what to look for or what questions to ask. That’s sort of what has happened: the CA affair shows us all this hidden cost. And many will still say, “it’s worth it to me, Facebook is central to my life.”
#WozNeverMatters.
I think that people have assumed that FB knows everything they put up and are generally OK with that.
What’s different here are two important things:
First, almost none of the 87m people whose data was given to Cambridge Analytica knowingly did that. Their data was hosed up when 790,000 people took a quiz and Facebook then allowed the quiz app to hose up not just the data from those 790k but from every one of their friends too.
It feels very different if I take an action knowing that I’m sharing data with someone vs having my data shared completely out of my control and because of nothing I did. That highlights that Facebook doesn’t take care of our data like many thought.
Second, the way CA got that data is shady and that again highlights that the control over our data isn’t good. I also think that a lot of people assumed that FB kept hold of data and only allowed advertisers to use it to target ads which is one thing…. giving our data to shady firms feels very different to many.
I have deleted both my personal account and my business’s account from Facebook. Good riddance.
I quit Facebook because I’m sick of wasting my time scrolling through pictures of people’s dinner and meme’s every day.