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You don’t want your privacy: Disney and the meat space data race


You don t want your privacy Disney and the meat space data race Tech News and Analysis

Source: http://gigaom.com/2014/01/18/you-dont-wa...

The future of big data is in meat space“Meat space” (coined by William Gibson in Neuromancer) is a term for the physical world where our bodies (meat) move around and do meat-like things (for example, eat, jog or go clubbin’). The interesting thing about the term is it’s a play on “cyber space” — meat space is an internet-first way of viewing the world.

And that internet-first way of seeing the world is what’s driving these changes at Disney, casinosinsurance companies, etc. We’ve been “cookie-ing” people online and tracking their browsing habits for years, and in that contained environment, businesses have seen the value of acting on personal transactional data. But now businesses are taking this approach and applying it to meat space.

Why? Because cyber space is small, it starts and stops at internet-connected devices. Think of the transactions and interactions that are carried out each day in meat space. Think of the money spent in meat space (on your caramel macchiato, for instance).

....

We now know this is Google’s end game. Self-driving cars, Google Glass and the purchase of Nest — Google is dying to get out of your computer and all up in your life. With Nest, Google won’t just know how you like your air to feel. It’ll know when you’re at work and when you’re at home. It gets pieces in a data puzzle that is your entire observable life.

Stashed in: Facebook!, Disney!, Privacy does not exist., Google FAIL, Virtual Reality!, @om, Nest, Self-driving Cars, Internet of Things

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It's fascinating that this article focuses on Disney, not Facebook and Google.

Facebook collects a lot of information about us. Not just what we input and upload ourselves, but when others "tag" us -- and also whenever we go anywhere on the Web with LIKE buttons.

Google collects even more information about us. When you combine what they know from our smartphones, search history, calendar, and emails, with what they know from us watching YouTube, with that location data of when we're at work, home, or neither -- wow.

As the Internet of Things grows, so does the ability to monitor us.

This monitoring can be used for good (concierge anticipating our needs).

And this monitoring can be used for bad (influence our decisions in ways we don't realize).

It's unclear how consumers can protect ourselves from these futures.

This is what makes me want to pull back from the internet, and particularly from Facebook.  I cleared a ton of stuff (likes, books, music, sports, travel) out on Facebook, because they started putting tons of ads in my newsfeed, don't know if that's what helped, but the ads dropped to almost nothing after. 

I abhor advertising, and tell every company that sends me catalogs, or email to take me off the list, and don't share my info with others.

Google is really getting scary with how much they own that I use: Calender, Search, YouTube, Picasa.  They pester me constantly on Youtube, trying to get me to change to my real name, and I'm even signed in under my real name when I visit, and I have to switch to the other account, I'm sure it's because I've signed in to some other product of theirs. 

It's really really hard to clear stuff from Facebook. That must have taken you a while!

Yep, it didn't want me to get rid of likes, I had to go in different ways, sometimes just go to the page and unlike, I still have about 40 likes that I can't get rid of, some of which I have unliked, but they still stay.  it's too bad, because I had all my personal stuff easy to find in one spot, but they made me mad with those ads, and other behavior, like not making it easy to delete stuff, keeping my stuff forever, I'm still on Facebook, but one more significant bad move from them...or a competitor that doesn't own my information, and I'm gone, I would even pay a yearly fee to not have the invasiveness, but of course none of this works, unless your friends and family come over to the new site too.

The worst is when Facebook uses you in ads to your friends:

"Janill likes ------ so you should like it too. Click here to like!"

Ugh, Facebook. Really?

So yeah, I'd much rather pay with money than pay with being used.

Exactly!  Now if we can just talk a couple million into moving to another social media ;)

One question I've had is:  Can a social media site similar to Facebook be successful and competitive if it had no advertisers, but charged it's users $20-$25/year?  I think realistically that is what you could charge, that the most people would accept.

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