Banking On Your Personal Online Data 106
snydeq writes "While privacy groups are working to lock away your personal data, a better — or perhaps supplementary — option may be to let you sell it for what it's really worth. 'Whether it's Facebook, Twitter, Google Drive, or Pinterest, the truth is the product is you — all that data about you used to target ads and sales pitches. It's hardly a new business model — it's how trade publications have made their money for decades — but in the online world all that information is easily stolen, traded, and spread. ... If the data has value — and we know it does — its creators (you and me) should be paid for it. And if we take over the selling of our data, all those companies using it now have to respect us and abide by our standards.'"
um, no (Score:5, Insightful)
And if we take over the selling of our data, all those companies using it now have to respect us and abide by our standards.
Uh, no they don't. This isn't magicalhippieland.
You already do sell it. (Score:5, Insightful)
When you sign up for these services, you're already tendering your personal information. The agreement is "you let me use this service, and I'll provide you with X information." Yes, it isn't an explicit agreement, but we all know how this works now.
Like any commodity, your price is set by demand. Saying you want to sell your information for cash is fine, but when the price is already set by the fact there are millions of others signing up to the service for free then your bargaining posture is pretty weak.
We are being paid already. (Score:4, Insightful)
But we are being paid for it. With google's services, for instance. Our product is our information and I think Google pays us handsomely for it with their search engine alone.
Be careful what you wish for (Score:4, Insightful)
snydeq's proposal seems to open the way to a world where the money flow takes on a life of its own (huge departments keeping track of who gets what), with an inevitable regulatory tidal wave sweeping in soon after the first agreement is signed.
What would be scary is how little I may be valued. I'm not buying a car soon, I can't drink alcohol, and I am socially inept with zero spending on Cialis. It seems like the MLB should stop me watching the World Series for free.
Re:You already do sell it. (Score:4, Insightful)
When you sign up for these services, you're already tendering your personal information. The agreement is "you let me use this service, and I'll provide you with X information." Yes, it isn't an explicit agreement, but we all know how this works now.
You missed the point of the article. We are selling it now, but the market is ridiculously primitive. It is all take-it-or-leave-it, no options for negotiation and basically no transparency. For all intents and purposes we've replaced cash with personal information as the currency of online services.
But where everybody pretty much knows the value of a dollar, few, if any, people have much of a grip on the value of their personal information. We know what it is, but we have no idea of what it can be used for in the hands of the people we trade it to. So essentially we are writing blank checks to pay for things like facebook and google.
Stop repeating that !! (Score:4, Insightful)
The guy's intention is to get as many mention of "mcpc" as possible to push it in front of SEO listing
Do not repeat that "mcpc" !!
Do not fall for his game !!!
Cha-ching (Score:4, Insightful)
And if we take over the selling of our data, all those companies using it now have to respect us and abide by our standards.
That's adorable. You think corporations respect you. Nothing could be further from the truth. You are a means to an end, nothing more. Specifically, money. They'll do anything for money, and since they have way more of it than you, it's you that will be going to them for everything, not the other way around. You want that cell phone? Surrender your personal data. Car? Personal data, please. Internet access? Groceries? Housing? Furniture?
Capitalism without restraint leads to depotism.