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Sheryl Sandberg: Users Would Have To Pay To Opt Out of Facebook Ads (fastcompany.com)

Posted by msmash on from the captain-obvious dept.

An anonymous reader shares a report: In an interview with Today airing Friday morning, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg insisted that Facebook does not sell or give away user information, but made clear that Facebook's entire model is based on being able to share user data with advertisers. If Facebook users don't like its ad-based model, the only other option would be to have users pay for the service so they could keep their data to themselves. As Sandberg told Today: "Our service depends on your data, [so] we don't have an opt-out at the highest level. That would be a paid product."

5 of 223 comments (clear)

  1. Arrogant much? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Kill it with fire.

  2. Payment by b0s0z0ku · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Payment would actually be worse, since it would allow FB accounts to be tied to a real identity via a credit card or Paypal account.

  3. Re:Email STILL works with friends by SeaFox · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Facebook doesn't do anything a blog couldn't before. The difference is the mental barrier of entry for usage. Subscribing to an RSS feed is too hard for many people compared with just Liking someone, or doing whatever people do to start getting spammed with the other's updates.

  4. Re: that's correct by uncqual · · Score: 1, Interesting

    If your priority is your privacy and you take steps to retain that, how does that cause you to be in "a less desirable position" to someone who didn't care about their privacy as much. You are deriving benefit from being very private just as a hermit in the old days did and that benefit must be greater to you than whatever advantage you might gain by sacrificing your privacy (else, if you are rational, you would sacrifice your privacy). It's a bit like being a politician, they sacrifice their privacy so they can control other people around so they must feel the cost of sacrificing their privacy is less than the endorphin rush they get from controlling people.

    --
    Why is there an "insightful" mod and why isn't it "-1"? If I wanted insight, I wouldn't be reading /.
  5. A paid model is the sensible solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    For one Facebook puts things in correct terms and makes a reasonable statement. Sandberg is spot on here: Facebook is a business and users need to pay up.

    The PROBLEM is that Facebook doesn't give users this choice. If Facebook rolled out a legitimate, contractually-bound option for users to pay a set fee and in exchange undergo ABSOLUTELY NO data mining, that would be both fair and ethical.

    But users are not given that choice, and until hey are, users should #DeleteFacebook