[anonyfuss]

Then ask the user first. I'm sure that if you can elucidate the value of tracking their every interaction, they'll be happy to agree.

I'll say no, because don't want my battery wasted, my bandwidth consume, my IP logged, my address book mined, etc, just because a PM can't decode where to spend development and design dollars without fudging almost uselessly ambiguous numbers.

[sjtgraham]

You are so incredibly misinformed. An address book cannot simply be mined. Those are extended permissions and access requires explicit opt in from the user at the OS level before the OS exposes any of that information.

Furthermore, do you have any data on how much battery, or bandwidth heap uses? No? Ok, please spare the FUD.

This is clearly about allowing developers to see how their users use their apps so they can improve the experience and make them more useful not about snooping on contacts/photos (which heap clearly does NOT facilitate). It goes without saying that the user has to be made aware that certain data is collected. I wonder, have you ever heard of a privacy policy?

[anonyfuss]

> You are so incredibly misinformed. An address book cannot simply be mined. Those are extended permissions and access requires explicit opt in from the user at the OS level before the OS exposes any of that information.

It used to be possible without requiring opt-in. What I've seen in some applications has been piggy-backing permissions -- that is, wait until you have a legitimate reason to request access to the user's address book, location, etc, and then also send that information to your analytics service.

> Furthermore, do you have any data on how much battery, or bandwidth heap uses? No? Ok, please spare the FUD.

Sure I do. They're uploading every 15 seconds, which keeps the WWAN and/or WiFi links up all the time. That can shave at least 25% off of battery runtime (exact numbers aren't easy, given that there are a lot of other factors at play. The basic battery device recommendation is simply: let unused hardware be powered down whenever you can).

There are very limited CPU and battery resources on a mobile device, and it's ridiculous to waste them without asking, specially if you're planning on pushing a massive torrent of mostly-useless data.

> It goes without saying that the user has to be made aware that certain data is collected. I wonder, have you ever heard of a privacy policy?

Ah, right. Put it in the huge document that no user ever reads (because it's huge and unreadable), and that excuses everything.

This is the same argument that sleazy people make in favor of opt-out mailing list spam.

[sjtgraham]

Please don't slight me by implicitly putting me in the class of "sleazy people" whom send "spam". It's been nice discussing this with you, but since you're resorting to ad hominem I'll wish you well and bow out of this discussion. Thanks.