As Apple draws a battle line between themselves and Google over privacy, I’ve heard more than a few people in tech circles spout the same refrain about Google’s monetization of our data. “Google’s not selling your individual data,” they say, “they’re aggregating your data and selling that!” That’s not as reassuring as I think they mean it to be. They’re still collecting my data, and they’re still selling ads to target me—they’re just packaging it all up with other people’s data, and selling it in bulk. The advertisers who buy the targeted info can’t identify me individually, but they have a group of people who are similar enough to me for advertising purposes that it’s saleable.
That’s, at least, what I understand of how Google’s data collection and ad tracking works. Facebook’s system works in a similar way, but they have a more clever way of identifying the specific things I’m interested in. The problem is, I don’t know the extent of both what they’re collecting on me, and I don’t know the extent of what they’re selling to advertisers. Google’s Ads Settings page lets you see the profile Google has on you, including your gender, age, languages, and “interests.” If you haven’t explicitly provided them, it shows you Google’s algorithmic guess. My page comes up empty, because I thought it smart to opt-out of Google’s interest-based ads. If only I trusted it.
At least Google provides something, even if I doubt it’s a complete picture of what they’re packaging and sending. Facebook doesn’t even offer me the courtesy of showing me what it thinks it’s determined about me. I’ve stripped my Facebook profile down to the bare minimum I feel I can get away with and still use the service: my name, my birthdate, my relationship status, and the bands I like. [1] That’s it. Both Google and Facebook, however, track my move online—at least when I’m not using Disconnect. Hell, Facebook even tracks the status updates and messages I choose to not send. They have more data on me than they let on, even after opting-out of everything I can find.
I want to see that data.
Loathe as I am to use the “if you’re not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to hide” argument that these companies—and the US Government alike—use on us, that’s what I’m reduced to. If I shouldn’t worry about the data I feed to Google, Facebook, and a whole holy host of similar companies and services out there, why not be more transparent about what data is being collected, how, and what they know about me? I want to see a simple, clean, human readable page on every service I feed my personal data to that tells me every last piece of information that they know, everything they sell to advertisers, how, and a way to opt-out. If I can’t opt-out, at least show me a way to delete my account—and my data—should I become spooked.
This is fair. This is right. This is my data that I am creating, and I have no way of knowing what is being collected, or how it’s being used, without reading a massive dose of legalese called the Terms of Service. If, as Natasha Lomas claims on TechCrunch, “The online privacy lie is unraveling,” then it is to the benefit of Google, Facebook, et al. to pull back the curtain and reassure us that we, and our data, are not being exploited as much as we’ve feared. That is, unless the truth is even worse than the none-too-comfortable fiction that these companies have created for us. Only one way to find out.
Facebook’s one coup… it’s the only reasonable way to keep up with bands and artists, though I hope iTunes Music will put a nail in that coffin. ↩
So, my Apple Watch arrived last week, and it’s been on my wrist almost constantly since then. I’m liking the device a lot, and the watchOS 2 announcement has me even more excited to be in on the ground floor for the Bronze Age of wearable tech. There’s so much potential in a simple computing device that sits right on the human body, and I can’t wait to see what’s going to happen with it—and see it from the front row.
But, since the Apple Watch started being delivered and strapped on to techie wrists over a month ago, though, there’s been a steady stream of people writing up their thoughts on the device after a day, a week, a month. We even have an Apple Watch breakup letter already. It’s a bit much. Even after using a smartwatch for a month, I had trouble articulating what I found so valuable about the experience. Most of the writeups on Apple Watch, even by better technology writers, are similarly empty. So many words, so few of them adding anything—save for Molly Watt’s piece.
Not only have we not had enough time to see how Apple Watch fits into our lives—even you early adopters who got yours on Day One. My friend Zac Cichy has gushed about how the Watch’s fitness features are going to be a complete game changer for people, or at least himself. I felt the same way about my Jawbone and FitBit, though the research is mixed about their effectiveness. The Watch could change that, but a two months is not enough time to say with any certainty, especially since the Watch is going to change drastically in a few months with native apps.
So, I’m going to take a nice, deep soak in with this thing before writing up how I feel about Apple Watch and its role in my life. I’m thinking somewhere between six months and a year would be enough time. I want to get to know the Watch as it exists now, and then as it will come to be when it has stand-alone apps that define a new experience. I want to see if I’m going to turn off the regular reminders to stand up and move around if I’m sitting too long, or see if the activity rings help me to drop a few pounds. I want to wait until the novelty wears off, both now and when the native apps come, and look back with the perspective of time.
It’s the only fair way to evaluate something with this much potential. Not like I have page view metrics to juice up by jumping on the bandwagon here. The next year is going to be an interesting one, at least in the technology space, but we’ll only be able to see how the landscape has changed if we step back and look behind us. In the meantime, I’m going to ride it out. See you on the other side.
I’m on my iOS device 10+ hours a day. I like to be able to, at a glance, get a sense for where certain things are, and badges help me do that; I like to know what my various “queues†look like (e.g., RSS, Instapaper, Slack, messages, etc.). I don’t look at this device 1000 times a day because I have a pretty background (I do) or because I’ve rearranged my icons into a “fun†pattern (I haven’t). I look at it 1000 times a day to get stuff done and manage my time.
And this is exactly why I don’t have badges turned on for most apps. I don’t think of most apps as a queue that I need to process and empty. I think of them as repositories I can dip into and deal with at my leisure. My task manager and the app I use to message my significant other can have the blinding red badge because they’re important. My email, and the stuff in my Instapaper queue, not so much.
I don’t want all the information when I look at a device, I just want relevant information. It’s why, unlike Justin, I don’t use the Modular face on my watch—in fact, right now I’m using X-Large, simply because it’s the weekend and there’s nothing important I really need to see beyond the time. Tomorrow, I’ll switch to my Utility face and see my next calendar appointment, the weather, and my activity rings, because that’s all I need worry about. But that’s just me. You set up your device just how you want it.
“What seems to be lost in this discussion of free speech is that, like it or not, Reddit — or any discussion platform on the Internet — is well within its rights to censor or ban anything they see fit. Whether it’s for the prospect of monetary gain, to create a more welcoming space for new users or to soften their image in the public eye is utterly immaterial. Although some banned communities have, in the past, been able to regroup on Reddit and continue doing whatever odious thing it is they initially set out to do, the amount of attention the FPH bans caused is likely to make regrouping impossible. As Baldwin put it, ‘If Reddit can’t keep a community off their site, they look incompetent.’â€
“We all want a purpose, a meaning that governs our lives. The internet is a web of meanings, a dense thicket of purposes. It doesn’t explain anything, really, just lets your alleged meanings fly out there and slam into someone else’s alleged meanings. There is no central meaning on the internet; the internet doesn’t actually exist to be honest. It simply resides in some collective imagination that we like to conjure up as we type in an eviscerating comment about a stranger. Strangers are almost always immoral heathens that like the opposite political party as you and seem to always say covertly offensive things.
