Online Privacy Worth Less Than Marshmallow Fluff Six Pack

nonprofiteer writes "With a program called Screenwise, Google is offering a total of $25 in Amazon gift cards to anyone willing to install a Chrome browser extension that will let the search giant track every website the user visits and what they do there over a year-long period. Google says it will study this in order to improve its products and services. Forbes points out that $25 in Amazon credits isn't quite enough to buy a six pack of Marshmallow Fluff ($26.75)." The money isn't much as a pure trade for privacy, but I suspect that many people would like to have their preferences be among those that shape how Google — and other companies, too — actually organize their interfaces. (Note that the tracking can be selectively turned off by the user.)

Comments

Yes

[Anrego]

This is one of those statements we need to hear from time to time to shock is into realizing that the vast majority of people out there do not value online privacy to the degree that the Slashdot crowd generally does.

The vast majority of people out there probably rank "letting a company mine my browsing history" somewhere around "filling out a survey".

Re:Yes

[Anrego]

I don’t equate it to stupidity. It’s not that people don’t understand the implications of this. It’s made fairly clear.. “every site you visit will be known to us”. It comes down to having different priorities.

The Slashdot crowd is privacy sensitive. It’s important to us. The fact that it’s not important to others is something we have to learn to accept. We can’t always write it off as “well, they are just stupid.. if only we could explain it to them in the right way..” because they have a valid opinion. They’ve chosen to live a certain way, and privacy is not a priority to them.

Great idea

[Megahard]

I'm installing it on the wife's computer.

I hate this trend!

[governorx]

Dear Google,

I am not the average user. I am a technical user that is intelligent and values privacy. Please make me a google that gives relevant technical results for my queries instead of the hodge-podge that the average illiterate user can understand and click-through. xxx-answer or some similar should never be a result.

The results from the 25$ incentive will most likely be skewed in an unfavourable direction when compared to the search results I am looking for - due to the demographic (which I foresee) partaking in this research experiment. Please reconsider.

Signed: The guy that is always finding google harder and harder to use.

PS - Give me the option to search using an older algorithm.

Re:Maybe Google can get my age and gender right

[Oswald McWeany]

Sorry, I trust google more than some random person on the web. How do you know you're not wrong about your age and gender?

I think you should accept the fact that you're not what you think you are.