[evmar]

"You should not track your users. If you need anonymous data, you should ask your users first."

Now I'm imagining a website where when when you first visit it, you get a popup like "for capacity planning purposes, this website would like to record that you visited [yes] [no]". I wonder if this author would like such a website?

[chr4]

This sounds like the EU proposal for cookies :)

The article was targeting another scenario: An installed app that tracks users. Obviously, for websites this would rather translate to: Do not track your users, especially not using 3rd party services.

[chr4]

I hope you realize, that "opt-out" doesn't work without tracking the user either. Which kinda reduces the point of not wanting to be tracked to absurdity.

[fabrik42]

This is exactly how the EU cookie law works.

[dingaling]

Technically the EU cookie law does not require notification for cookies associated with the basic functions of the site.

All those annoying prompts are covering the use of nonfunctional aspects such as tracking.