To online companies: Don’t be evil

Illustration by Marleigh Culver

Colin Hannifin
Columnist

Illustration by Marleigh Culver

Excuse the clichés, but we truly live in a time that is completely unlike any other in history, and we are a generation that is equally unique. The cause is completely obvious and wholly unsurprising: the Internet.

The Internet has completely changed the game – the basics remain the same, but how we play has shifted significantly. Every little bit of our world has been touched by the Internet. It has defined us. We grew up updating our Facebook statuses and liking YouTube videos. We’re more comfortable texting than calling, and we prefer sending emails than meeting in person. We grew up on the Internet, and we’re completely hooked. We couldn’t imagine life without it (and please don’t make us).

But these statements are obvious. There is not a single person reading this who has not heard the same sentiment.

My goal is not to point out the glaringly obvious. I want to point out the overarching problem with the Internet – the companies that factor so largely into our lives.

The basic rules of the game of life have not changed, only the means by which we must play them. For instance, as everyone should know, there are some aspects of our personal lives we should keep separate from our professional lives, but instead of merely watching our actions or words around an employer, we also have to monitor where our name is online, what’s on our Facebook profile and what our blogs say about us.

But this is where issues creep in. As humans, we have an almost innate desire to share photos, music we love, updates about our lives – but at the same time, we want things to stay private. We only want to share them with those we care, love and trust – usually not the whole world. Companies like Google, Facebook and so many others that exist solely on the online world, however, subsist purely on sharing the things we do and other things about us to other corporations.

Facebook’s privacy issues are nothing new, and they’ve resolved to come up with a solution. Again. The issue at hand is that the interest of consumers is directly at odds with Facebook’s best method of revenue generation. The consumers (us) want to decide how and with whom we share our information. Facebook wants to be slightly less discreet, selling our information to the highest bidder, typically so that they can advertise to us. Privacy issues came to a head recently, when reports came out six weeks ago accusing Facebook of tracking our every Internet-based move after login. Facebook, of course, denied it and has since fixed the issue, but the point behind the outrage remains the same. We are trusting Facebook with this information, and we expect them, perhaps foolishly, to perform responsibly.

While Facebook’s privacy issues are rather well-known, I think there’s an even larger elephant in the room: Google. While Google doesn’t have the same privacy concerns, it knows a lot more about you. The issue is that Google offers so much more – maps, videos, email, business solutions, data analysis – along with their web search than any other site, really. And we take advantage of it. Google immediately turns that into smart ads that know it’s us looking, and knows just what to sell us.

These privacy concerns really mean one thing to the companies: big bucks. Billions in revenue, millions in profit – a sound business model. But is it an ethical one? The claim that they’re doing us a favor by selling our information has a grain of truth to it. The ads may help us find something we’re truly looking for, but the fact remains that they’re preying on our thirst for information and desire to share to drive up their profits.

Google has long driven its public image with its informal motto “Don’t be evil.” I don’t think they’ve yet to cross into super-villain status, but it’s a fuzzy line that Google, Facebook and all the big online companies are toeing. The great Internet innovators behind Google, Facebook and others could exist without us consumers, but they wouldn’t be worth having without us. It’s an important point that they would do well not to forget.

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