Comment by ApolloFortyNine
3 years ago
It's possible for a company, which is seemingly providing you a service since you visited the site, to make money off a targeted ad in exchange for free video streaming/content/entertainment.
The whole thing has always seemed overblown to me. Websites make much more money off targeted ads, allowing them to do things like allow anyone to upload a video of any length and quality for free. And view other videos people upload. In most cases it seemed to me like a fair trade to make. Yet as people point out all the time, technically a website isn't allowed to deny access to someone who refuses targeted ads (through the cookie pop-up), so they're essentially being forced to provide that user content at a loss. Untargeted ads are often worth 90% less or more than their targeted equivalent.
Privacy privacy privacy though, as if someone at Google is manually looking through your history laughing at you.
> Privacy privacy privacy though, as if someone at Google is manually looking through your history laughing at you.
Part of the problem is that it seems more or less impossible to get large companies to keep their data secure. In fact Google stands out as maybe the only big tech company that has not been involved in a major breach.
Notwithstanding the legal and political issues that arise when (not if, but when) this data gets into the hands of law enforcement agencies.
And yes, there have been individual instances of employees misusing sensitive user data.
Privacy is security.
Generally I agree that content providers should be allowed to make money somehow, but this way has proven to be untenable and something needs to change.
Give me the option to pay more if it lets me get more privacy. Otherwise I keep using fake accounts, VPN, antifingerprinting methods, ad blockers, etc.
Some places do. Many German news sites have a "Pur" version you can subscribe to and not get ads.