Actually, no. I find this whole "they're selling your data" trope to be trite and just annoying at this point.
I actually expect this more a reaction to Apple's pivot into health with the Apple Watch (people seem to forget the ex-Burberry CEO positioned the Apple Watch 1 as a luxury product--anyone remember the Apple Watch Edition for $10k?--health came later).
Google’s core business is ad targeting, the cornerstone of which is personal data used to target better. While it is (hopefully) untrue that they literally sell your data, they do profit from it indirectly (and massively, it’s 85% of revenue). Google has many great products and some bad ones, but almost all have vacuum hoses up against your personal data... Now, Fitbit makes a really mediocre and pedestrian tech product that captures a wealth of deeply personal data. I’ll go ahead and connect the dots on this one.
> Do you believe it to be mistaken?
Yes, Google doesn't sell personal data.
Its core business is selling products whose entire value would be negated if it sold the data behind them, so it really wouldn't sell the data.
On top of that, I think it's a mistake to say that they are buying Fitbit for data anyway. They are buying Fitbit for a toehold in the wearables market; while this probably has some data value, it's pretty clearly part of their effort to build up direct sales of consumer products as a revenue stream.
It's hard to believe that the data in my exercise tracker has real, fundamental worth when I see so much targeted advertising that fails to leverage the data they already have. I suppose it doesn't matter to Google if someone buys a location-specific ad for a place I used to live in despite them knowing where my phone, purchases, and electoral record say I live but then why would them knowing my heart rate help them if they already know I bought a bicycle, search about bicycle parts, frequently use bicycle maps, and travel at about 15 mph?
The problem isn't just their sharing the data (although you'd be naive to assume that the data they collect isn't being turned over to at least the US government) it's the collecting and storing of that data itself that is problematic. The fact that they're using that data to manipulate us via advertising isn't much better.
Except that statement is just wrong and misleading. Your personal identifying information is all the metadata that can be aggregated and intersected to directly identify you, your name just is a number in the database but it's directly identifying and tracking _you_. Google doesn't care about selling your name or email, that's not valuable to them or advertisers.
And "unless you ask us to" is the default behavior of almost all google products. You have to ask them not to, sometimes under penalty of law (GDPR), before they actually change their behavior.
While I sort of agree, I think the problem is that "they're selling your data" misstates what actually happens.
Facebook and Google want to collect your data and keep it. What they're selling is indirect access to you: the more information they have on you, the more precisely they can theoretically target advertising and content to you. Keeping the data they have on you to themselves is literally their business model.
Two points, though. First, of course, that's still essentially what's been dubbed "surveillance capitalism"; it's still something someone may be uncomfortable with for a variety of reasons. Your data is being indirectly monetized, but it's still being monetized, and you still have very limited insight into the extent of that data and how it's being used. Second, adtech isn't the business model of everyone who collects data -- and one could argue that the more businesses a data-collecting company is in, the more moral hazards pop up. How much data will Google give over to law enforcement when there's a warrant, for example? What if we see a Facebook Health initiative that allows medical providers and insurers selective access to what Facebook "knows" about you within the limits of regulations and the law? (Do you know what those limits are? I don't.)
I actually expect this more a reaction to Apple's pivot into health with the Apple Watch...
Expect what, privacy concerns? While I understand that, I'm not sure much health information collected by Apple devices ever leaves your "local ecosystem" (i.e., your personal set of devices). Also, the Apple Watch Edition notwithstanding, I'm not sure I'd say its original incarnation was positioned as a luxury product -- yes, you could pay $10,000+ for it if you wanted to, but it still started at $349. But it was certainly positioned as a fashion product at its introduction, which they've dialed way back on since.
Google also wants to meddle with the elections (Numerous quotes here, but the most relevant is certainly Youtube’s CEO). Anyway, you are right for the collect-and-keep-my-data part, but I think in their idea they want to use this data to build some sort of utopia. That is the most benevolent appreciation on it, because it is one that explains all of “Do no evil”, election “influence”, use of AI and exhaustive data collection.
A utopia was originally the exploration of what life would be like if a philosophy was taken to the extreme. In that sense, one man's utopia is another man's personal hell.
For example in the utopic vision of anarchy, there are no authorities and everyone must find their own path in the world. The flip side of having no decisions made for you is that you must make all of your own decisions. Or in democracy, since anyone and everyone has the exact same power over decisions, all the really important decisions are made in the most mediocre way possible. In Capitalism, we have the specter of individuals being ground into raw resources and then spit out when they reach their useful lifespan.
So if their intent is to build a utopia of their own making, that's definitionally evil because it admits no dissenting opinion in the matter of how we live our lives.
Right, but they’re not going to make money off the hardware, it’s going to be the services and ad targeting based off of the data. You think chromecast is to make a profit?
This is a continuation of the trite bit. What's missing is recognizing that Alphabet (not Google) is very focused on diversifying its revenue stream beyond search advertising, ideally in a way that takes advantage of the things it's already good at.
GCP is a good example. No search. No ads. No using of customer data. Just a desire for a really big potential revenue stream that builds on Google's expertise in managing huge numbers of servers and services.
That's not true. I think @ceejayoz below pointed out the situation well: they've made many attempts (waymo, for another still-unprofitable example). Just not many of them have turned into significant revenue -- particularly compared to the sustained ~24% YoY growth that Google managed for so long. That's a hard business to beat.
Waymo is an Alphabet company, not a Google business. What Google business other than Google Cloud do you consider not to not rely on data aggregation and profiling?
Google accelerated science, fiber before it was spun out into alphabet, the medical diagnostics part of Google Brain, the quantum computing group, Chromebooks, ATAP (the group that partnered with Levi's to make a jacket), ...
There are a lot. And there have been more that were cancelled. As I said: Google-the-search-and-advertising-company is one of the most successful companies of our time. It's astonishingly hard to replicate that success, which is probably why we don't see Google other units with equivalent revenue. But it's really not for lack of trying.
I actually expect this more a reaction to Apple's pivot into health with the Apple Watch (people seem to forget the ex-Burberry CEO positioned the Apple Watch 1 as a luxury product--anyone remember the Apple Watch Edition for $10k?--health came later).