[shadowgovt]

On the internet, it started as the user's responsibility.

For netizens, the idea that the use should be able to opt out of logs about their interaction with the service the operator owns is novel (because they always had the option of not using the service if they found the pattern distasteful).

[blooalien]

There's a bit of a difference between normal logging of access to services to protect your devices / network (and to understand your users' access to your services), and using every nasty trick in the book to build extensive detailed profiles of everyone's browsing footprint across the entire web, often without their knowledge or consent (hence the laws, because it's the only way to convince some folks to not do bad things). The first should be expected behavior, whereas the second should be considered unacceptable and abusive, but has somehow been "normalized" in modern society.

[shadowgovt]

It's a difference of degree, not kind, which is how it became normalized.

[hedora]

The internet started with decentralized protocols like NNTP, so you could just choose a different news server if the one you were using started tracking + selling your download logs.

Centralizing the serving of third party (or even first party) content is already way outside the original norms of the internet.

Heck, back in the day, HTTP caching would be enough to block tracking. (No javascript, and only the ISP sees which users pulled the document from cache.)

[Aloisius]

The internet/arpanet started largely with centralized protocols like various file transfer protocols, telnet, finger, various networked filesystem protocols, network printer protocols, network graphics protocols, echo, QOTD, etc.