Missing the point: it's about privacy

Posted Aug 10, 2009 19:39 UTC (Mon) by jspaleta (subscriber, #50639)
In reply to: Missing the point: it's about privacy by nix
Parent article: Ubuntu's multisearch surprise

I'll make it a point to read up on the UK privacy protection situation. But this underlines the point I'm trying to make. There's much more serious issues already associated with data privacy with existing network services activity, especially business-to-business and business-to-government services that we aren't direct participants that involves the sharing of data about us. Actively regulated consumer protection laws are probably the only serious way to balance the explosion of data sharing that is underpinning the digital services economy.

-jef

they are not selling user data

Posted Aug 10, 2009 22:27 UTC (Mon) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

they are not collecting user data on ubuntu servers and selling it.

they are selling page impressions (advertising)

yes, the act of rendering the page tells the servers that are being queried what you are looking for, and your IP address because that's the way the Internet works (it may also send a cookie if you leave them enabled, which may let them correlate your queries more precisely than they could just with the IP). it's not clear at this point that your IP address can/should be considered private information.

selling access to your eyeballs is something _very_ different from gathering your personal info and selling that.