Comments on: Privacy Trade-offs and the Importance of Experimentation http://timothyblee.com/2009/09/09/privacy-trade-offs-and-the-importance-of-experimentation/ A Blog by Timothy B. Lee Sat, 12 May 2012 17:19:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 By: Rhayader http://timothyblee.com/2009/09/09/privacy-trade-offs-and-the-importance-of-experimentation/comment-page-1/#comment-1774 Rhayader Thu, 10 Sep 2009 12:58:55 +0000 http://timothyblee.com/?p=871#comment-1774 Yeah privacy regulations don't seem all that necessary to me. If individual privacy is something customers prefer, then services or advertisers that are perceived to have violated that privacy will suffer some harm to their reputations and, presumably, their bottom lines. It reminds me of public smoking bans; I live in North Carolina, which just jumped on the indoor smoking ban bandwagon (ban-wagon??). Before the law was passed, businesses all over town were putting up no-smoking signs because it reflected customer preference. The law merely codified -- and, to at least some degree, calcified -- a natural response to customer preference. Same thing here. We've already seen plenty of examples of user backlash against this or that EULA clause, or targeted ad practice, or whatever. In every case I can think of -- please point out anything I am forgetting -- the company being criticized eventually acquiesced and altered their practices to suit customer preference. I don't see what's wrong with allowing a business to experiment and find a model that satisfies the most customers. Yeah privacy regulations don’t seem all that necessary to me. If individual privacy is something customers prefer, then services or advertisers that are perceived to have violated that privacy will suffer some harm to their reputations and, presumably, their bottom lines.

It reminds me of public smoking bans; I live in North Carolina, which just jumped on the indoor smoking ban bandwagon (ban-wagon??). Before the law was passed, businesses all over town were putting up no-smoking signs because it reflected customer preference. The law merely codified — and, to at least some degree, calcified — a natural response to customer preference.

Same thing here. We’ve already seen plenty of examples of user backlash against this or that EULA clause, or targeted ad practice, or whatever. In every case I can think of — please point out anything I am forgetting — the company being criticized eventually acquiesced and altered their practices to suit customer preference. I don’t see what’s wrong with allowing a business to experiment and find a model that satisfies the most customers.

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