[dleslie]

> They don't consider it a problem or a violation because they don't mind targeted ads, they don't mind giving up their data in exchange for services, and they don't (want to) understand why people who aren't them might object.

And worse, they never thought to ask. Most users never really had the opportunity to provide informed consent.

[alleyshack]

Yep. "I think this way, therefore everyone else thinks this way," is an incredibly common human fallacy.

[dontblink]

Seems to equally apply here though. Many people are perfectly fine with targeted ads in exchange for free useful services. I would even propose the majority (otherwise these services wouldn't be popular in the first place!).

[oarsinsync]

> > > Most users never really had the opportunity to provide informed consent.

> Many people are perfectly fine with targeted ads in exchange for free useful services. I would even propose the majority

I feel like these two remarks should be taken together, and not in isolation. My straw poll of a few non-technical folk in a highly-technical firm is that they're broadly unaware of these kinds of things (but everyone has anecdotes...)

Speaking for my own perspective, I was perfectly fine with Gmail when it first launched (1GB of free email storage in exchange for a computer scanning my mail and showing me text adverts on the side? DEAL!), mostly because in 2003 I had no idea what my data was worth (individually, very little. in aggregate along with eevryone else's? $GOOG indicates it's in the ~trillion range). Facebook? For sure! Have my favourite books, albums, movies, tv shows, all my photos, why not?

It took many years before the implications of that decision that we (collectively) made came through. Not everyone has the bandwidth to focus on this, and so it just becomes background noise.