[dhimes]

I think it's important to keep saying it so that the general population begins to understand it. Eventually it will trickle out. I don't think it has yet. So, while I agree with you that it's an old saying in our circles, your friend's sister may not realize it.

[takluyver]

I'd like to see people become more aware of this sort of risk, but I don't think that slogan will take off outside geeky circles, and I don't think we want it to.

There are companies which - by most people's standards - quite reasonably make money from free services. Telling people that they're all stupid sheep for using Google isn't going to get much traction. We need to highlight real problems, like this move by Instagram.

Lots of us also work on open source software, in which case telling people not to trust anything that's free is shooting ourselves in the foot. I don't pay for Linux, Libreoffice or Firefox, but I'm not 'the product' there.

[dhimes]

It's not really calling them stupid sheep, but rather a reminder that they are interacting with businesses and they should pause to think about the business model when they do that. It's really about educating, not name-calling.