Ah, so Patreon is the next company to implode. We’re on quite the roll with tech companies being massively dumb.
They already had one go at it when they tried splitting donations per channel - so most of the smaller donations would get eaten by credit card fees.
They rolled that one back when everyone cancelled their subs…
deleted by creator
Patreon: We already sell every minuscule scrap of data we can glean from our users, so preventing us from selling info about the videos they watch, like, violates our free speech, man.
policymakers on both sides of the aisle agreed that First Amendment protections ought to safeguard the privacy of people’s viewing habits, or else risk chilling their speech by altering their viewing habits.
Oh, that’s a clever take.
They aren’t wrong that this law isn’t fit for modern times, but not in the way they mean. It needs to be e expanded into a GDPR type thing.
The neoliberal ideology that the GDPR is based on is catastrophic. There’s some necessary stuff in there, but the whole general approach to the problem is disastrous.
To me, it’s evidence that the demise of the traditional left isn’t just bad for workers but everyone.
neoliberal ideology that the GDPR is based on is catastrophic
Could you expand on that?
I’ve learned that a fancy term for the problem is “neoliberal responsibilization”. When someone wants to track you, they need to your informed consent. It’s your individual responsibility to make a good choice. That may seem like a nice idea, at first. But it’s not how we do most other things. EG food safety. You can’t use just anything as a food additive as long as you just write it on the label for “informed consent”. No ordinary person has the time, knowledge, or wits to make such decisions. For the ordinary person, this is just needless bureaucracy, like clicking away cookie banners.
Knowledge about yourself is made into something almost like private property. And then - seems to be the idea - when people make their own choices without pesky government interference, great things happen. That doesn’t work with property either.
There’s no concern for society or progress. I am worried about tracking data being used to manipulate people. They consented, so no problem? If you are gathering anonymous data you don’t even need to ask anyone. If the data pertains to a whole group of people, there is not supposed to be a problem?
Say, you belong to a vulnerable group; ethnic minority, women who have aborted, gay, trans, … One wouldn’t want a list of people who belong to such a group. But, say you want to open a shop with special foodstuffs or clothes that caters to such a group, how are you going to reach them? Not having such lists would imply a disadvantage for any minority. Saying that everyone can make their own choice in the matter is not a solution. It’s just pretending the problem does not exist.
There’s a certain irony in the fact that complaints about the GDPR come mostly from businesses. Usually, “neoliberal responsibilization” is to the benefit of the powerful. Foisting the lone individual with responsibility is a divide and conquer tactic. One shouldn’t dismiss their criticism because of the hypocrisy. The revenue of a business becomes income for most of us, and we wouldn’t want to do without their products either.
Eventually, I favor the food safety model of regulation. The focus should be on a strong regulatory body, staffed with professionals, who actually have a chance of uncovering or foreseeing harm. It should be tasked with taking a big picture view, not only with enabling individuals to guard their (mostly) petty secrets. (This does exist to some degree in the GDPR).
Yeah, I understand and I actually agree. The GDPR is not doing enough, yet it’s the best effort we have made. I usually see criticism from the other side, eg. “regulation bad”.
If it were up to me, I’d just say that the surveillance capitalism industry should be outlawed completely, treated the same as slave and arms trading. It’s actively making the world worse for most people.
surveillance capitalism industry should be outlawed completely
Can I ask what you hope to achieve with that?
It would fail to address many of the problems I see with the whole industry. EG you could still do AB testing because that’s not surveillance. At the same time, it would have negative consequences. That data can be used for good or evil. I think the potential for good is greater, even as it stands now.
It is already being used for evil. I just don’t see a reality where you can trust the government or companies with data like that. I would love if that reality existed though.
Thinking about it, I would say that for answering “does this demographic at large like or need this” shaped questions can be answered by using relatively small samples without identifying every single individual in the group. If you want to help a group, that’s enough, since people in the group really want your thing to happen, they will come forward. If you want to do something to everyone in the group against their will, that becomes harder.
I think I just value being able to hide my affiliations to certain groups, I want to be able to get out of my bubble and not have a label everywhere I go.
Neoliberalism has always been conservatism with more tact. Neoliberals pretend to be a bit progressive to attract support, but neoliberalism is not progressive at all. It is profit-driven and nothing else. Neoliberalism serves corporations, not people.
Not sure we are talking about the same thing? https://gdpr-info.eu/
