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This is sort of a weird phrasing that I think is worth talking about: are few users "significantly concerned about their privacy"? What does that mean? CaseyNewton/1557881681092026370Permalink On twitter.com
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I think the first thing worth engaging on is: does it matter to privacy efforts if users care about their privacy? The answer here is resoundingly a NO. Like on ethical reasons alone, this is irrelevant.Permalink On twitter.com
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Example: if you surveyed buzzsaw owners they wouldn't say buzzsaw safety is top of mind, but that is no reason to stop building a blade guard on buzzsaws. Tech is in a unique frame because while it can be quite harmful to users, users have a harder time perceiving these harms...Permalink On twitter.com
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Then there's the fact that this is a enormous double standard. None of the big tech companies frame their product development of other features in this way. Instagram didn't switch to focus on videos b/c it surveyed users and users were like 'ya feed me insta videos all day'...Permalink On twitter.com
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This is one of the really useful thought models from Surveillance Capitalism - big tech systems use surveillance in the form of analytics and tracking to understand how users use a system and improve it towards specific internal-to-company goals. BUT...Permalink On twitter.com
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If your platform is specifically designed around user surveillance and increasing user input into the system for anti-privacy purposes you can't A/B test privacy. Another simple example: a water park cannot effectively show what people want in a car driving experience...Permalink On twitter.com
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It's very hard to say if users actually care about privacy or not when they are in a framework designed to eliminate privacy. They can't distinguish the harms nor can they tell you what privacy is inside a system that is fundamentally anti-privacy...Permalink On twitter.com
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That brings us to the framing problem - are users actually apathetic about privacy? Hmmmm if we can't use 'user metrics in a anti-privacy system' and we can't use 'user understanding of an invisible harm' what can we use?...On twitter.com
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Well there are a bunch of things! Users in their roles as *citizens* are clearly engaged in the regulatory and lawmaking questions about privacy. They are voting for people who are prioritizing it. They are asking their representatives to prioritize it...Permalink On twitter.com
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Now the usual response here is: 'no it is privacy advocates and lobbyists who are actually doing the push to get lawmakers to prioritize privacy' To which I respond... I too Live In A Society. Like really people... this is How Shit Gets Done. Why would privacy be different?...Permalink On twitter.com
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And the fact that privacy regulation and lawmaking is moving forward worldwide DESPITE enormous companies and their expensive lobbyists absolutely pushing against it is an indication that politicians see privacy as something citizens absolutely want, and in significant numbers...Permalink On twitter.com
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I think that, despite the silly bullshit about 'privacy activists' and 'privacy absolutists', there is no way that privacy politics would be moving forward against the tide of anti-privacy money if there wasn't significant citizen interest...Permalink On twitter.com
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And there's another way to see that users are absolutely interested in privacy and that's Privacy Marketing. I heard you like talking about ads, so I'm going to put some ads inside this discussion about ads...Permalink On twitter.com
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You have absolutely seen SOMETHING selling itself on its privacy promise in the last year. My office has two enormous Apple billboards selling iPhones on the basis of their privacy right outside its windows. And Apple is *hardly* the only one...Permalink On twitter.com
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Almost EVERY big tech co out there saying 'users don't seem to care about privacy' ALSO has a marketing budget that says 'people who spend money on us DO care about privacy'. Apple, Google, Facebook, all have run campaigns that talk about their privacy capabilities or activity...Permalink On twitter.com
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It turns out that while Engineering & Product are saying 'users are apathetic about privacy' Marketing & PR has some VERY different opinions inside the walls of big tech cos about if users care about privacy. This has been going on long enough that it must be seeing returns...Permalink On twitter.com
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So ARE users apathetic about privacy? Have they been? The millions of dollars in ad spend Facebook has put towards talking *to its own customers* about how it supports privacy regulations *would say otherwise*...Permalink On twitter.com
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To review: 1. Users can' ID privacy concerns to tech cos because the harms are concealed. 2. Ethically we should be addressing privacy no matter how vocal users. 3. Metrics are a poor indicator of privacy interest. 4. Ad $$$ say users are interested in privacy...Permalink On twitter.com
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*can't IDPermalink On twitter.com
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Are users *actually* apathetic about privacy? I don't fking think so.Permalink On twitter.com
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