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by matsemann 1487 days ago
Yeah, I don't want to include trackers because of privacy. But it would be nice to see which pages are accessed, and from where the visitors are coming. I don't need more than that, and that can be gathered from the access logs.
1 comments
slimsag 1487 days ago
In my opinion, analytics should be minimal, 100% anonymous, aggregated, and open to the public - otherwise it’s spying.

I use a self-hosted Plausible analytics server to implement this[0] across all my websites, so it's all public and you get to see exactly what I see[1][2].

[0] https://hexops.com/privacy/

[1] https://opendata.hexops.com/devlog.hexops.com

[2] https://opendata.hexops.com/machengine.org

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jcheng 1487 days ago
I’m with you on minimal, 100% anonymous, and aggregated, but why does the data need to be open to the public to not be spying? Genuinely curious, you’ve clearly thought about this a lot.
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slimsag 1487 days ago
There are only two reasons it would need to be private:

(1) you're collecting data where if it was public, people would be outraged. That's spying.

(2) you believe the data is anonymous and valuable, but only you / your group should benefit from the insights it provides. You're afraid someone else is going to 'take your ideas' and execute them better than you can.

Point 1 is ethically wrong, in my view. Point 2 is not ethically wrong, but IMO means what you are just trying to run a monopoly on an idea. That's fine, people do it all the time, especially companies - but I think this is wrong for the progress of humanity overall and I dislike it.

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willcipriano 1487 days ago
Someone saving all the letters you have written them isn't spying on you, you have just been careless to write down so many private things.

The easier way is to assume all signals emitted by your computer are being consumed somewhere (Hey CIA friends!) and not emit anything you don't want detected.

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ocdtrekkie 1487 days ago
If the data is public, you're instantly able to be held accountable for the data you're collecting. Others can determine if you are doing something privacy invasive, intentionally or inadvertently.

Public analytics therefore help ensure and demonstrate your analytics are ethical.

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