[pwdisswordfish5]

It's partially related the webmail-vs-IMAP problem: direct access and control over your data.

An example: There is a pending suit that will ultimately be settled with an insurance company by the courts. Crucial to the case is data collected by a mobile app that helps establish some relevant facts. The incident in question was >1 year ago, and we're going to move forward with the case this week (originally planned for last spring but put off due to COVID). Yesterday, I logged in to the site associated with the app, and it threw up a screen that cannot be dismissed, in the style of "please take care of <these issues with your account> before you can proceed". This is an account which is nowadays dormant, and there is in fact no way to take care of these issues. I dug out my old phone in an attempt to access the records in-app and take screenshots for the benefit of the court. The app itself had had an update released, and the records are now inaccessible, because the old version of the app is treated as an obsolete client. Fortunately, I'd already earlier exported all the data I could readily get my hands on—so the only thing I'm giving up are those screenshots that I determined in a last-minute decision would be helpful as supplemental resources—but this could have been a problem for someone who's never heard the phrase "move fast and break things" and who took it on faith that all this stuff wouldn't just disappear underneath their nose for seemingly no good reason.

If we transition to a world where apps are always writing to (and pulling from) data stores that are under your control, then this would be a total non-issue, even for people less paranoid/guarded than I was. The truth is that there are social hurdles, but there are technological hurdles, too, and dealing with the technological part is a precondition to society being able to be effective in doing its part. People can't solve problems with solutions that don't exist.