If you are not paying for the product, you are the product being sold (Why I paid for Google Play Pass despite hating Silicon Valley companies)
"If you're not paying for the product, you are the product being sold". I don't know where that quote is from, but it's only becoming more and more obvious as time goes on, from social media to "free to play" games.
And if you played these games on mobile, you'll know what I'm talking about: microtransactions, battle passes, ads in games, blatantly misleading ads ABOUT the games, some even resorting to AI slop... and don't get me started on the YouTube channels promoting all this. (I swear, some of them have less soul left in them than the slop machines they use...)
And then I got an annual Google Play Pass, with the intention of using it to try some paid games and post about them weekly on Mastodon.
Eventually I got bored of this, and my posts didn't get any traction... but the pass was still worth the peace of mind of not seeing ads or microtransactions, and playing actually good mobile games once again.
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If you’re interacting with google you’re still VERY MUCH the product, even if you’re paying
They are a fascist spying / data center company who can not be trusted
Fair enough. In the long term, I'd like to switch to a FOSS alternative like F-Droid(?) and a FOSS store. This is more of a right-now thing.
And now you're a still a product, but Google knows you're naive beyond comprehension, and an easy mark for targeted advertisement.
It never said if you pay for the product, they won't sell your data. Although that was implied. When this statement was made most companies hadn't yet started selling your data, but I think that time has passed.
Virtually every company that collects data now sells it, regardless of whether you pay them. They claim their hands are tied, that they need to do it to stay competitive. The only way they'll stop is if their competitors do, and that will only happen by force of law. That's how they justify doing shitty things.