Comment by greentiger
14 years ago
This is the wave of the future; sharing data. Unfortunately, the way the model currently works is that our data is collected by others and used by others. We need to define a framework where can establish sovereignty over our data, decide how and with whom we wish to share it, and finally, be able to capture some of the income derived from the use of this data.
I might be OK with OnStar selling my data, if I get a piece of the action. Otherwise, what's the point? My job is not to further enrich these companies after I've purchased their product/service; they are making use of what is currently a free resource, my/yours/our data, and it's high time we started charging them for this privilege. They are essentially capturing economic rent, and it's really my income that they are capturing.
Well, I'm sure they will gladly pay you the few cents that your contributions is worth, after substracting expenses, profit, and dividing between all customers.
It's a free resource only for _them_, because they've already invested what they've invested. For you to get the same "free" resource, you'd have to pretty much make the same investment.
I'm not sure what the data retention laws are in US, but what I'd personally find reasonable would be a mandatory "opt-out" option for all such services. Not opt-in, mind you - there is a host of innovation waiting to happen once such data becomes available, and by far most of it will be positive.