There’s no privacy
Imagine the U.S. Census as conducted by direct marketers – that’s the social graph.
Social networks exist to sell you crap. The icky feeling you get when your friend starts to talk to you about Amway, or when you spot someone passing out business cards at a birthday party, is the entire driving force behind a site like Facebook. [source]
via the wonderful Making Light
And of course this all relates to this:
If you’re not paying for the product, you are the product.
But the level of evil involved has become crazy-high. I’m feeling not just indignant but sort of sore of ass and can’t remember getting home.
For example: Facebook “Like” buttons track your movement to any page containing one on the web, even if you’re logged out of FB. G+ “+1″ buttons do the same. Well, potentially, it’s up to the goodness of these organizations’ hearts to say the pinky promise not to.
For example: Use Google’s blindingly fast DNS servers on 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 and they have the capability to know every place you request an address for, which is, effectively, every place you visit on the web.
We’re not just being sold. They’ve installed cameras in the bedroom and they’re selling the tapes to that sketchy video store on the corner.