Tim Cook may get that US privacy legislation he's expecting in 2019

First, Facebook's Cambridge Analytica was not a data breach, Facebook allow Cambridge access to the data via the licensing agreement that was in place. People were just pissed their own information they freely shared with Facebook and Cambridge Analytica was used against them. 

Of course Apple likes the whole privacy idea since their business model does not rely on this model and Apple's competitors model solely rely on having access to people personal information. This goes into the realm of buyer beware and you do not get anything for free, it is people owe fault their information is not private.

This is no different than Bezos raising his starting wages to $15/hr for Amazon and turning around and supporting legislation requiring his competitors to also do the same thing. He knows Amazon is doing everything to automate its operations so they need less people making $15/hr verse his competitors who are heavily dependent on a low end labor force.

This is calling using regulations to keep competition suppressed. In these cases it means less competition controlled by government regulations. You think you have problem now wait to the see the solution the government comes up with.

Okay, I kinda see what Cook is getting at but I also know this proposed legislation will not affect Apple much if at all. Google and Amazon will take the brunt of this and with good reason I suppose. However, the cynic in me thinks Cook might also be doing this to damage Google and Amazon while portraying Apple as white as new driven snow, a bastion of privacy and goodness. At the end of the day business is business. As Don Michael Corleone said just before ordering Tessio, Barzini, Moe Green wacked, “It’s good business."

maestro64 said:

First, Facebook's Cambridge Analytica was not a data breach, Facebook allow Cambridge access to the data via the licensing agreement that was in place. People were just pissed their own information they freely shared with Facebook and Cambridge Analytica was used against them. 

Of course Apple likes the whole privacy idea since their business model does not rely on this model and Apple's competitors model solely rely on having access to people personal information. This goes into the realm of buyer beware and you do not get anything for free, it is people owe fault their information is not private.

This is no different than Bezos raising his starting wages to $15/hr for Amazon and turning around and supporting legislation requiring his competitors to also do the same thing. He knows Amazon is doing everything to automate its operations so they need less people making $15/hr verse his competitors who are heavily dependent on a low end labor force.

This is calling using regulations to keep competition suppressed. In these cases it means less competition controlled by government regulations. You think you have problem now wait to the see the solution the government comes up with.

What I found interesting in the discussion of the Cambridge/Facebook data sharing thing is something similar happened in the 2008 election where Obama had an app that skimmed very similar data about friends and friends of friends. The difference is, it was lauded by the press as being an astute way to help grow Obama's Grass Roots campaign. Personally, neither one bothered me in the slightest. If you choose to use Facebook, you get treated however they want to treat you. There are reasons I detest the platform and have for many years.

It will be interesting if Ajit Pai who believes that the market should solve all problems without interference will testify against it.

steven n. said:

maestro64 said:

First, Facebook's Cambridge Analytica was not a data breach, Facebook allow Cambridge access to the data via the licensing agreement that was in place. People were just pissed their own information they freely shared with Facebook and Cambridge Analytica was used against them. 

Of course Apple likes the whole privacy idea since their business model does not rely on this model and Apple's competitors model solely rely on having access to people personal information. This goes into the realm of buyer beware and you do not get anything for free, it is people owe fault their information is not private.

This is no different than Bezos raising his starting wages to $15/hr for Amazon and turning around and supporting legislation requiring his competitors to also do the same thing. He knows Amazon is doing everything to automate its operations so they need less people making $15/hr verse his competitors who are heavily dependent on a low end labor force.

This is calling using regulations to keep competition suppressed. In these cases it means less competition controlled by government regulations. You think you have problem now wait to the see the solution the government comes up with.

What I found interesting in the discussion of the Cambridge/Facebook data sharing thing is something similar happened in the 2008 election where Obama had an app that skimmed very similar data about friends and friends of friends. The difference is, it was lauded by the press as being an astute way to help grow Obama's Grass Roots campaign. Personally, neither one bothered me in the slightest. If you choose to use Facebook, you get treated however they want to treat you. There are reasons I detest the platform and have for many years.

Read something linked from Daring Fireball a few months ago.

The real genius of Cambridge Analytica was not the data they accessed, but what they did with it.

Once they analysed it, they decided that there was no way they could convince enough people to vote for Trump for him to win the election. So instead of attempting the much more difficult task of getting people to vote for Trump, they targeted folk who were likely to vote for Clinton and persuaded them not to vote at all.

That's what I call thinking outside the box.