Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by danprime 4301 days ago
I noticed that Google has updated their privacy policy on using analytics https://developer.chrome.com/apps/analytics#privacy

It USED to read that you had to ask for opt-in permission BEFORE you began tracking (which is the current pattern my app follows, but how many other apps/extensions have I seen do this?.... 0).

In my app, upon install/launch it prompts the user with a popup asking if they would like to help the developer out by sending anonymous data. I made it opt-in (the user had to explicitly check the box). Out of a daily 4500 Active Users, I only have 4 people who opted in (it's less than 0.1% for those who don't want to do the math).

With the old policy of requiring user's permission to opt-in, it makes it really difficult for any developer (who follows the rules) to get any valid feedback. I've posted on the Google Group and Stack Overflow and the question is basically ignored because it's an open secret that most people simply treat it like any website analytics as in they embed the code to track and move on.

I currently follow the Firefox pattern/language choice:

[ ] Share performance, usage, hardware and customization data anonymously with the developer to help make ___ better. <<Learn More About Data Collected>>

TLDR; You'll get 0.1% compliance if you make data collection opt-in and you're upfront about data collection... it sucks because it makes the whole "Collect/Analyze Data" part of Development very difficult.

1 comments

> I currently follow the Firefox pattern/language choice:

> [ ] Share performance, usage, hardware and customization data anonymously with the developer to help make ___ better. <<Learn More About Data Collected>>

IMO the wording is really important here. If I were to write this section of user preferences, I'd go for something like:

▸ Help improve X

Click on which expands the panel:

□ Allow collecting anonymized information about the usage of the application. It will be used for <reasons>. Only the following data will be sent to us over encrypted connection: <easy-to-understand list>. <<Learn more>>

(I know it's easy to give advice, though, and I don't have my own product on which to test copy ideas yet.)