Look, let's try an analogy. I run a shop, you want to come into my shop, you want to physically bring yourself into my shop, with your personal items, including your wallet and let's say a bag to help you purchasing items, or perhaps just to browse.
I'm going to keep an eye on you as I see fit whilst you are in my shop. Surely you can see that as fair?
You are an agent entering my property. This is what your computer does when you access my site.
I can extend this further. You have your wallet, you make a purchase, I have a till I record the purchase and even give you a receipt of the purchase, so that you can come back and we can both agree that you've been here before. So you come on to my site and you click on a download, I record the event through Google Tag Manager, which shoots it across to Google Analytics, and I even give you a cookie, useful for both of us. Next time you come to the site perhaps that cookie will mean I hide the download button from you, or it shows another related download to you.
Feel free to rip up the receipt, or delete the cookie, you're messing with the accepted way of doing things and harming yourself as well as me, but please go ahead you're free to. But please try to understand that not everyone is out to get you, I'm not trying to 'spy' on you, I couldn't care less about you as an individual. I'm trying to optimise for the whole, for my business, for my clients. I have no evil agenda, and if I did you wouldn't be able to stop me because evil finds a way.
The social contract exists, it is established, and it is incredibly close to how physical suppliers of products and services work. You live your life allowing businesses to track your movements within their physical domains, so why have a double standard for virtual domains?
Don't pretend for a moment that because my 'shop' is rendering at your physical location that you aren't in fact virtually visiting me. You want something from my 'shop'? I want to know how you interact with my 'shop' It's really as simple as that.
Your logic damages good, honest people, instead of cutting to the actual problems. Things like Do Not Track and whining about tracking being invasive is simply attacking the symptom and not the root cause. It's like demanding a ban on horses because the cowboys harassing your town all ride them. It does bugger all but damage everyone else whilst the cowboys/evil people just ignore your ban or find another way. Please see logic.
>> You are an agent entering my property. This is what your computer does when you access my site.
No, no it does not. I'm not in your shop. I'm in my house. I requested some data from you, your server provided it. I'm under no obligation to do anything with that data at all, let alone allow you to execute arbitrary code on my computer because you feel like it's your right to.
It's closer to mail order, both in fact and in statute (remote selling regulations etc). You know I've ordered the catalog, you don't get to know it lay open at page 23 for half an hour or that I spent 15 minutes staring at the underwear models.
>> You want something from my 'shop'? I want to know how you interact with my 'shop' It's really as simple as that.
Cool, turns out I don't want it that badly that I'll allow my machine to tell you everything about what I'm doing, so if purchasing from your shop is conditional on you getting to run this code, do us both a favour and block my access.
>> Your logic damages good, honest people, instead of cutting to the actual problems. Things like Do Not Track and whining about tracking being invasive is simply attacking the symptom and not the root cause. It's like demanding a ban on horses because the cowboys harassing your town all ride them. It does bugger all but damage everyone else whilst the cowboys/evil people just ignore your ban or find another way. Please see logic.
You make the sweeping assumption here that it's ok to collect as much data as you like for purposes you think are good.
I disagree.
--edit-- let me make this very clear: I don't care in the slightest why you want to collect analytics data, I'm not interested in taking part and I won't allow my computer to leak information constantly.
That mail order business keeps a record of your transaction and uses transaction records in aggregate to figure out what to stock, when, in what quantity, and how to position products in its catalog. You don't have a right to opt out of that, nor do you have a right to opt out of a website owner recording the HTTP requests you send to it.
>> I'm going to keep an eye on you as I see fit whilst you are in my shop. Surely you can see that as fair?
Unless something about my behavior stands out to you I can make a reasonable assumption that 1) you are not going to watch me the entire time and 2) the only record you are going to keep of my visit is the transaction receipt, and perhaps a note that one more person came into your shop today.
Every web server platform I am familiar with already logs access requests, which I don't think anyone is arguing against and you are free to monitor and analyze as you wish.
If you must monitor individual visitor's behavior it seems most stores have already worked that one out too, for example membership programs. A new analogy may read
> I'm going to give you the option of signing up for a membership program. If you sign up I will offer you services tailored to your habits whilst you are in my shop.
Even if you require membership for your services the terms of the relationship (e.g. you will be tracked) are, usually, available prior to the socially-questionable activity (e.g. tracking).
But for your analytic package the analogy would be more like
> I'm going to install live cameras throughout the shop to record you whilst you are in my shop. I'm going to review the recordings, or send them to a third party, so I may identify you and analyze your behavior at my own discretion.
Even if a shop has a camera the only social contract I am aware of is that the tape may be reviewed in the event of criminal or suspicious behavior.
I'm going to keep an eye on you as I see fit whilst you are in my shop. Surely you can see that as fair?
You are an agent entering my property. This is what your computer does when you access my site.
I can extend this further. You have your wallet, you make a purchase, I have a till I record the purchase and even give you a receipt of the purchase, so that you can come back and we can both agree that you've been here before. So you come on to my site and you click on a download, I record the event through Google Tag Manager, which shoots it across to Google Analytics, and I even give you a cookie, useful for both of us. Next time you come to the site perhaps that cookie will mean I hide the download button from you, or it shows another related download to you.
Feel free to rip up the receipt, or delete the cookie, you're messing with the accepted way of doing things and harming yourself as well as me, but please go ahead you're free to. But please try to understand that not everyone is out to get you, I'm not trying to 'spy' on you, I couldn't care less about you as an individual. I'm trying to optimise for the whole, for my business, for my clients. I have no evil agenda, and if I did you wouldn't be able to stop me because evil finds a way.
The social contract exists, it is established, and it is incredibly close to how physical suppliers of products and services work. You live your life allowing businesses to track your movements within their physical domains, so why have a double standard for virtual domains?
Don't pretend for a moment that because my 'shop' is rendering at your physical location that you aren't in fact virtually visiting me. You want something from my 'shop'? I want to know how you interact with my 'shop' It's really as simple as that.
Your logic damages good, honest people, instead of cutting to the actual problems. Things like Do Not Track and whining about tracking being invasive is simply attacking the symptom and not the root cause. It's like demanding a ban on horses because the cowboys harassing your town all ride them. It does bugger all but damage everyone else whilst the cowboys/evil people just ignore your ban or find another way. Please see logic.