[482794793792894]

This is a notion that sounds great at first, but it's entirely shallow.

- There are tons of information pieces that functionally need to be private, for example passwords, and tons of information pieces that better just should be kept private for your own benefit, like medical records.

- You're not helping us customers. If every company knows everything about us, then every company can exploit our mental vulnerabilities to get us to buy more things we don't need.

- Privacy is a basic human need. Lack of privacy can lead to severe mental issues, as illustrated by Panopticons.

[conanbatt]

> There are tons of information pieces that functionally need to be private, for example passwords, and tons of information pieces that better just should be kept private for your own benefit, like medical records.

Passwords are a solution of authorization , not authentication. Your face is not private but it can also be used as a password.

Medical record information is valuable only because it is private. If it were public, it wouldn't be considered as important. Much like wage data.

> You're not helping us customers. If every company knows everything about us, then every company can exploit our mental vulnerabilities to get us to buy more things we don't need.

The opposite on two accounts: today, the company that holds that data uses it against you without you knowing, precisely the requirement of privacy makes it impossible to understand how a company is using that information the way you describe. And secondly, nothing better than to erode a company's benefit of using that information than competing with others that do the same.

> Privacy is a basic human need. Lack of privacy can lead to severe mental issues, as illustrated by Panopticons.

Im not a psychology expert, but I'm willing to argue that privacy is a defense against other injustices, not valuable in itself.

[stale2002]

> Medical record information is valuable only because it is private. If it were public, it wouldn't be considered as important. Much like wage data.

Ummm, thats not true at all. A whole lot of people would not want all their friends knowning every little detail about their medical history. There are lots of embarrassing issues that people have that nobody would want to be made public.

Think STDs or mental health issues.

[conanbatt]

The information is valuable only in so far as it helps making decisions about it: someone should know if the other person has AIDS, or Terminal cancer, for making lots of decisions. Hiding that information might help the sick person, but it doesn't give good results in the end to the system.

Another reason to defend privacy in this regard is to use it as a tool against discrimination. But its as good as thinking that the way to prevent robberies is to have no assets. It might be useful today,but its not a goal, it is a compromise.

Embarrassment is not something to indulge. It is a feeling that springs only out of society.