[throwawaymath]

Look at Brian's comment history: https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=bthdonohue.

He's not active on HN, but he jumps in for quick damage control and "clarification" when people have vaguely privacy-related or operational questions about Instapaper. When followup questions are posed, particularly more difficult ones, he never responds. So I find it very unlikely you're going to get an answer here, because this account is clearly designed to do low-touch public reassurance without much commitment or transparency.

Now take a look at Instapaper's privacy policy: https://www.instapaper.com/privacy. In particular, direct your attention to the following, under "The Way We Use Information":

(P1) We use the information you provide to operate Instapaper's features. We do not share this information with outside parties except to the extent necessary to accomplish Instapaper's functionality.

(P3) We use non-identifying and aggregate information to better design Instapaper, to suggest popular content to users, and to share with advertisers and publishers. For example: ...

(P6) In the future, we may sell, buy, merge, or partner with other companies or businesses. In such transactions, user information may be among the transferred assets.

The "License Grant" section of the Terms of Service is also good reading, because it indicates that they can use user data in perpetuity, even after closing your Instapaper account (presumably until you explicitly request your information being deleted). What do you suppose that is used for? Maybe Brian can enlighten us.

My hypothesis is that Instapaper, either from the outset or somewhere prior to being acquired by Pinterest, developed a monetization model dependent upon selling user data (or derivative analysis/features of user data) to third parties. Most likely this is provided for market research or advertising optimization. Note that in their Privacy Policy Instapaper also states they use cookies "and other tracking technology" (and they specifically do not enumerate the full number of reasons which they do so, aside from normal login and session maintenance) in their Privacy Policy.

Further, I'm going to go ahead and assume this can be explained through basic cynicism. This monetization model was probably never terribly significant for Pinterest, except insofar as it was useful for internal discussions and inspirations for ways Pinterest could improve upon their own user data analysis. When GDPR came along, this probably tipped the scales to make Instapaper a net liability for the company (and not one in line with its financial or brand goals). Thus we have Instapaper being cut lose, yet again.

[bthdonohue]

I read HN regularly, but I'm pretty much a lurker on all social channels. When there's a conversation relevant to me or the products I work on, I like to jump in to represent the relevant company or products.

With respect to follow ups, I usually respond and move on to other things. I do my best to be open and transparent in online communities like these.

Moving onto your privacy concerns there are two things I'd like to say...

* Instapaper has always done hard deletes of user data when you delete articles or your account, it's been done that way since the Marco days.

* We have never monetized using user data, or developed any type of special targeted advertising for Instapaper.

[thinkingemote]

"We have never" does not mean "we will never" does it? The legal terms doesn't seem to preclude it from happening. Most companies don't have agreements with data orgs until they have the juicy data. It's easy to say "we probably won't sell it" until the board sees the value of the accrued data in a couple of years. instapaper could make it more explicit that it's not going to happen in the terms rather than social media posts by an employee.

[throwawaymath]

1. If Instapaper "hard deletes" user data when a user deletes their account, what precisely does the License Grant language mean when it states Instapaper has a "worldwide, non-exclusive, perpetual, royalty-free, fully paid, sublicensable and transferable license" to the User Content "including after your termination of your Account or the Services."? This is from "Instapaper Application License", section (a) of the Instapaper Terms of Service [1].

2. You've just said, "We have never monetized using user data, or developed any type of special targeted advertising for Instapaper." How is this statement congruent with paragraph 3 of "The Way We Use Information" in the Instapaper Privacy Policy [2]? Quoting:

- We may tell an advertiser or publisher that X number of people visited a certain area on our website

- We may tell an advertiser or publisher that X number of people bookmarked Z stories from a particular site or topic.

I'm going to be blunt with you, Brian: I don't believe what you're saying to me right now. At best I believe you're stating things which are superficially true but skating around the spirit of people's intent when they ask about privacy policies and how user data is being used.

Unless you have a fantastic answer for these two questions, I don't see how what you've just said is reconcilable with your privacy policy or terms of service. Literally "selling" user data is not the only way in which user data is monetized. Monetizing user data by providing derivative or curated analytics pertaining to that data is also substantial monetization of that user data. If advertisers developed their own special targeting for Instapaper users on or off the Instapaper platform based on the data you shared with them, then as a matter of fact yes, you did help in developing specialized targeting for advertisements.

To summarize thus far: you have effectively given me a non-answer, in consideration of the statements on Instapaper's TOS and Privacy Policy. And despite taking the time to respond to my comment (presumably because I challenged you directly), you have not responded to the parent commenter who originally asked you the question that started this thread.

EDIT: I'm not sure what's triggering these downvotes, but if someone downvoting has a substantial refutation or insight, it would be nice if you shared with the class instead of just pressing a button. As it stands Brian has not responded to the substance of my point, and it seems virtually self-evident according to the Privacy Policy that Instapaper monetizes user data. It's not much of a leap from there to assume that this revenue was no longer worth it for Pinterest after GDPR came into effect.

__________________________

1. https://www.instapaper.com/terms

2. https://www.instapaper.com/privacy

[comex]

Your quotes from the privacy policy do not describe “targeted advertising”. Indeed, the section you quoted from has this preamble:

> We use non-identifying and aggregate information to better design Instapaper, to suggest popular content to users, and to share with advertisers and publishers.

and this afterwards:

> When information is used in this or a similar manner, we do not disclose anything that could be used to identify the individuals on whom the information is based.

I suppose using aggregate data in that manner could technically be described as “monetiz[ing] using user data”, but it’s not the type of activity most people are worried about (nor, incidentally, something that would implicate the GDPR).

As for the ToS license grant, it’s presumably the type of cover-your-ass wording lawyers always put into those agreements. I’m not a fan of the practice myself, but it’s not really evidence that Instapaper does, or intends to, use user data after deletion. Also, it might be intended to address backups, though I’m just speculating.

[kristofferR]

Yeah, if Instapaper didn't do shady things with user data GDPR wouldn't take more than a couple of days to add support for, instead of the 2+ years it's been.

[m_fayer]

Great analysis, thanks.

Your points make me wonder... If you're running a small successful and independent sass, that respects its users, and you want to move on. What do you do, if your only options are selling to a large company that won't respect your users, or shutting down? Is it plausible to find a buyer that will honestly maintain a user-respecting ethos? If not, then it seems that there are no good choices for a founder in this position.

[troydavis]

I know of one company which explicitly has this approach: http://tiny.website/

> We won't try to flip your business in 3-5 years. We won't mess with your team and culture. We won't lock you into golden handcuffs or push complex deal terms. We won't ruin your life with months of unnecessary due diligence. We won't renegotiate and grind you on terms.

> …

> We started Tiny to create the buyer we wish we could have sold to.

Background: https://medium.com/@awilkinson/the-berkshire-hathaway-of-the...

To my knowledge, no one else makes similar commitments to both keep good things as-is and also to buy and hold indefinitely. At least from the outside, Tiny's model is unique.

[ergothus]

I started reading your comment assuming you were stating a small business that was making a pre-commitment not to "sell out". I was pleasantly surprised to see you were highlighting a company that is "safe" to "sell out" TO.

Even though I hate the fallout that impacts me as a user, I'm generally happy to see financial success come to those that made something cool (if you didn't make promises to the contrary). Committing to NOT selling out tends to just tie the hands (and wallets) of those that are giving me what I want, so that doesn't seem to be a good option. But this is a good option, at least as advertised: Sell out to someone that will try to make sure your customers don't resent the results.

Looking over their list of companies I don't believe I've worked with any of them - does anyone have actual experiences to share?

[blairbeckwith]

I’ve know the CEO of a Tiny-affiliated company for a few years and consider him a friend. In a previous role, we had a very close partnership with the company. I also worked at the company, albeit only for a few months in a leadership role.

Andrew and the rest of the Tiny crew seem to do a great job of standing behind what they say, from my limited experience.

[GrumpyNl]

Cant look at it, cause of Instapaper is temporarily unavailable for users in Europe

[ghostly_s]

And how does that factor in to the acquisition or spinoff?

[throwawaymath]

See the last paragraph of my comment. That's my hypothesis.