I always understood "selling data" to be shorthand for the whole metrics-for-ads transaction, seems obviously that "selling" the data itself would be a one-time sale but being able to offer "updated insights" every time someone runs a new ad campaign is repeat business.
I think it's important to distinguish adtech companies from data brokers like LexisNexis who actually sell your data to 3rd parties. Lots of people read inaccurate statements like "Meta sells your data" and interpret that literally.
the ol' "hashed minutae" and "in aggregate" chestnut. Meta at one point allowed you to target ads to a specific person (nevermind the cambridge analytica stuff.) Google is in the business of selling time, eyeballs, and mindshare to advertisers.
Google and meta (et al) receive money in exchange for the info of their user base. That they're playing 3 card monte (shell game?) with the data to "hide PII" - which has been mathematically proven to be impossible (currently, perhaps forever) seems a hair not worth splitting, considering their market caps.
Put simply, if there wasn't a financial reason to do the data collection google would simply not do it. You don't get rich shareholders by writing a lot of checks to seagate.
And how do we classify special government and law enforcement access projects, grants, and the like?
I won't say it is selling, but it is for economic gains.
And when they "anonymize" data, basically selling derivative data products of various kinds, what do we call it when that is enough for another entity to identify many, despite the stated intent being otherwise?
I did not intend to talk anyone down.
I did intend to just state the truth because sometimes we need someone to do that.
If said truths feel/smell/appear somehow bad, I am not sure what to say. Bet lots of us have that problem.
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