[arter4]

Sure but it's something more for barely any actual advantage.

I accept that when I Google something Google and maybe other companies know what I searched, because Googling things is useful. I cannot bring an encyclopaedia and a detailed map of the whole world with me all the time, so it's a tradeoff I can accept.

I accept that, on the rare occasions I turn geolocation, someone will know where I am, because if I do turn it on, it's probably because I got lost. Then I turn it off and off we go.

Divulging food preferences for... an AI that suggests me what I should buy doesn't look like it's worth it. And it's not just food preferences. Remember people store medications in their fridge. A fridge so advanced it can recognize any food is probably capable of reading labels and knowing I bought medication for X,Y and Z. Which is definitely something I'm not explicitly telling people (or things) without a reason.

And don't forget the power of correlating data. Correlating food preferences with other data you could easily understand if someone is ill, pregnant, whether they follow a certain religion (think Ramadan, or not eating meat on Friday,...), whether they are living with someone else (buying twice the amount of stuff they usually buy?) and so on.

This is all stuff I try to avoid telling everyone. Yes, my doctor could be hacked and people could know I'm on medication anyway (hypothetically), but why divulge that voluntarily for essentially no reason?

[mewpmewp2]

Honestly you are just describing to me more exciting features. The correlations with potential illnesses, etc. Have all of your data piped into single location to use AI to improve your health.

[rpxio]

you’re continuing to look at everything from a perspective of an altruistic product to consumer relationship and not the reality the other commenter is trying to describe.

yes it’s an “exciting feature” if your AI fridge can know that you’re pregnant and not recommend recipes that contain certain ingredients. what the other person is alluding to is that the data it has about you specifically will not stay contained between you and your fridge. what if you’re not married and your employer is like dave ramsey and fires women for being pregnant out of wedlock? or you live in a state with much more grim conditions currently around women and miscarriages? what if the meds in your fridge are related to HRT and there are orgs actively buying data to find these people to target them for bullying online (or worse)?

all of your data will inevitably end up in the hands of people that aren’t at all interested in improving your health. they’re interested in extracting value from you and your data or they have ill will towards you.

what starts as “exciting features” leads to your fridge tracking what groceries you purchase and what you consume. then it (or a third party that gets this data) makes determinations about your religion, your lifestyle, if you’re pregnant or not, etc without you knowing.

when every device in your house is collecting and selling off your data as a business model, there’s a significant mental overhead that needs to be expelled to ensure that you are able to keep your life private if you choose to. you may say: “don’t buy the appliances with the feature, then!” once a company can integrate these features effectively and subsidize hardware costs by selling the data, they’ll have other companies competing to offer the same so they can hit those target features and prices. eventually the market is flooded with appliances with these “exciting features” that are just gathering and selling data. in the end, we’ve traded our option to _choose_ privacy for a solution to a problem that doesn’t really exist. personally, i don’t believe the public is currently aware enough to understand the consequences.

[mewpmewp2]

I should be able to decide that I don't care about this type of privacy. Sure there are people out there that could be harmed by this. I don't believe in the argument that you can't have a market with both ways, one where you can't opt in and other where you can. I should be able to choose to give my medical data to companies if there are ways to improve my lifestyle and quality from that. And to me that is exciting. I have been lucky to be born in a place where religion and other things like that don't matter. I see a lot of problems and ways life could be optimised. I notice daily how I spend so much time constantly on things that could just be automated away. And it is horrible knowing I am spending so much time on that.

We live in this World for a very limited time. If things can be automated, they should so we can choose exactly what we want to do with this time.

[rpxio]

> I don't believe in the argument that you can't have a market with both ways, one where you can't opt in and other where you can.

the problem is that “the market” doesn’t care what you believe in or what you “opt out” of.

there are devices that have programmed in alternate ways to phone home even if you choose to intentionally not connect it to wifi.

> If things can be automated, they should so we can choose exactly what we want to do with this time.

there’s very likely a CSA in your area that you can pay to deliver you fresh meats, eggs, fruits, and vegetables. some also provide recipes alongside.

it’s a much simpler solution in lieu of shoehorning tech into an appliance that will likely stop receiving bug fixes or security updates in 3-5 years when the company releases a new version.

like most of the tech industry, this is a “solution” looking for a problem.

[thfuran]

>an appliance that will likely stop receiving bug fixes or security updates in 3-5 years when the company releases a new version

Do current smart fridges even get security updates at all?

[mewpmewp2]

Yeah, I do order food home and I am actually never using a fridge myself, so you are right in that sense.

[arter4]

FWIW, that's exactly what I meant.

The thing about data, unlike many common objects (ignoring 3d printers), is that you can easily copy data you control. So the fact that the fridge tells you "as an additional comfort in your pregnancy, I would add X" (if it even says that clearly) does not mean it also don't send data to other people.

Again, this is not a science fiction example. Many companies have successfully sent personal data to other companies or leaked that somehow to the Internet.

Personally this still makes me uncomfortable, even if I know this cannot be 100% avoided in today's world. So if I can avoid volunteering additional data to some company in exchange for voice activated lights, I'm happier. Maybe it's just me, though... but probably not.