It removes a huge incentive for usage tracking.

But there is a huge difference between usage tracking and usage tracking for ads. Usage tracking of the kind Microsoft engages in (outside of Bing and their ad focused usage tracking that is), is largely telemetry used to change their product.

Usage tracking for ads, however, is used to change your behavior both within the product and outside the product.

Usage tracking for ads is significantly more damaging to humans as individuals as well as societies.

Perhaps tracking ought to be opt-in only. I don’t remember ever installing Debian and not opting in to the popularity contest (popcorn). Angular CLI also asks if it may do some telemetry. I don’t buy that opt in means we are stuck with bad data.

An exception is for testing.

I use Firefox nightly and developer edition where I can. I think by installing a pre release version of Firefox I opted into telemetry. I’m volunteering for telemetry. However, I don’t consent to opt out tracking in the production version of Firefox or running nonsense marketing-driven “experiments”.

This is the basis of the GDPR, which requires explicit, freely-given, revocable, and opt-in consent before any tracking can be done. I wish the US would get its act together and pass something similar for us in the US.

As an american web dev living in asia.

GDPR is the best thing to happen to the web since javascript.

If you ever get that in US, I sure hope your people are more competent than ours and they come up with something that actually works. Because in EU, GDPR didn't actually solve anything. It's a pain in the ass both for businesses and consumers, and it only had one real (good) effect: it made (some) people aware of the fact that software tracks their lives. Nothing more than that.

The problem with GDPR is the EU member states' cowardly lack of enforcement. You'd think that as soon as they had a stick as big and powerful as GDPR, they'd immediately start beating the big, worst offenders with it. Yet, how often have we seen headlines about "BigScummyCorp fined 4% of annual global turnover" in the news?

EDIT: Corrected, thanks, colejohnson66

Does GDPR even allow the 4% fine at first? I thought the point was to start “small” and ramp up if they don’t improve. Because, while GDPR applies to Facebook, it also applies to everyone. So that small business down the street may not be able to handle a 4% fine while FAANG could. If a 0.5% fine fixes the problem, then going to 4% is unnecessary and would only serve to satisfy vengeance (which laws are not supposed to do[a]).

There’s also the fact that GDPR is a directive. Each state (nation) has to implement it in their own laws. So the EU itself can’t enforce it, only the member states.

[a]: The purpose of laws are not to be an “eye for an eye”, but to curb bad behavior (theoretically)

> There’s also the fact that GDPR is a directive. Each state (nation) has to implement it in their own laws. So the EU itself can’t enforce it, only the member states.

It's not. It's a "Regulation", a similar kind of legal act to a Directive, but comes into effect all on their own, across the whole of the EU. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regulation_(European_Union)

Theres no reason that paid apps can't also profit from add placements

> This is wrong. Paying for a service does not automatically mean the service doesn't take your personal information.

No, but it does mean the developer has a lot of incentive to write software for you as opposed to catering to the advertising companies who are paying their bills.

The advertisers only pay the bills as long as users are using the software. But yes, with a "free" software users probably are quite a bit more tolerant to issues.

No-one is so entitled as the person who just got something for free

I prefer "we don't track you around the entire internet, just our site" to "we track you around the whole internet." That's frequently the ad tracking tradeoff. Plus ad tracking is just so egregiously one sided in the loss of privacy for the user for minuscule user benefit and large tracker benefit.

And furthermore an ad-supported product doesn't necessarily misuse your personal information either. Whether the user pays in dollars or ad impressions doesn't change the need to build a product that people actually want to use, otherwise there is no market for ads to begin with.

> And furthermore an ad-supported product doesn't necessarily misuse your personal information either.

What you mean is they don't necessarily intend to misuse my personal information. The reality is many companies with the best intentions end up spilling that information in a variety of ways.

- They get acquired and their new parent abuses that information.

- They get breeched.

- Employees abuse the information they have access to.

- Employees leak your information to a third party.

- Government employees get access to that information and abuse it.

All of these things have happened to companies where people thought their information was being safely held. Many of these things have happened at the biggest, supposedly secure workplaces. The best way to avoid this is to not put your information out there.

Sure, but these risks aren't specific to businesses that use advertising as a monetization strategy.

The poster I replied to suggested advertising supported companies won't mis-use your data. My point is anyone—advertising company or not—who has my data is a risk.

You're absolutely right, non-advertising companies are a risk too. The difference is most developers who collect $2.99 for their app usually don't ask me for personal information unless they have a need which benefits me.

Ad supported products may not, but the ads themselves most likely do.

A man paying a prostitute doesn't necessarily misuse the prostitute.

Incentives matter, and not all "tracking" is created equal.

You are right that paying for a service doesn't guarantee you won't be tracked. What is important is that that business model makes it possible for you to not be tracked. This is critically important, because it is extremely improbable to win a fight against tracking when billions of dollars are stacked against you.

These are not mutually exclusive concepts.

You can pay for what you use and have sound regularly bodies policing user privacy.

How many times have you written code because nobody told you to?

Exactly I don't understand this idea that paying mean they won't track you. IMHO unless strong legislation and its enforcement comes into effect, nothing will change.

Legislation is the entire point.