

Facebook plots first steps into healthcare - testrun
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/10/03/us-facebook-health-idUSKCN0HS09720141003

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comrade1
The privacy push by Apple will benefit their healthkit and related apps.

Apple has always been a hardware company and this gives them some competitive
advantages over google and facebook who can only make money by ultimately
selling your information. Realistically, Google/FB probably won't monetize
your health information and instead try to use it to attract you to their
other services. But I trust Goog/FB less than Apple to keep my information
private.

I hope Apple continues to push the privacy angle. I've seen people here on hn
state that young people don't care about privacy, but that isn't what I've
witnessed. My youngest relatives (grade school to early college) are privacy
conscious and use services that they at least think have privacy (snapchat,
for instance).

Also, friends and relatives older at retired age are also privacy conscious.
The only people I know that don't seem to worry about their privacy are in
their 30s and 40s.

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jmspring
As someone in the mid-30s and up range, many of us were shaking our heads at
the over sharing and privacy implications of those younger - at least here in
the states.

Not sure where you feel 30-40s care less about privacy than others.

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comrade1
I know it's anecdotal. It's just based on personal observation of my relatives
whenever I travel back to the u.s. The oldest and the youngest seem to be the
most paranoid about making information public and I think for different
reasons. The youngest probably don't want their parents and relatives to know
what's happening in their private lives and the oldest are just paranoid of
technology.

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kitd
I wonder how this would fit in in countries with universal healthcare?

This is a natural fit for the US, where the _business_ of healthcare happens
much closer to (and often involves) the end consumer.

In countries with universal healthcare, I think this would only work if
Facebook/Google/Apple made the state provider the first choice to receive
healthcare data. The state normally has programs in place already to
centralise and analyse health data and what Facebook are proposing is
essentially setting up equivalent functions in parallel.

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jhales
There seem to be a lot of private enterprise that competes and prospers even
when there is a large state presence. FedEx is an example that comes to mind.

"This is a natural fit for the US, where the business of healthcare happens
much closer to (and often involves) the end consumer."

Seems true, but would add that it could go a whole lot closer. The typical
consumer is generally insulated by insurance being packaged into employment
deals and a near universal culture of prepay masquerading as 'insurance.'

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stevengg
Great now facebook can monetize more of my private data, just what I have been
waiting for.

