[HN Gopher] A privacy war is raging inside the W3C
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A privacy war is raging inside the W3C
Author : bpierre
Score : 98 points
Date : 2021-07-13 19:54 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.protocol.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.protocol.com)
| tannhaeuser wrote:
| > _On the other side are companies that use cross-site tracking
| for things like website optimization and advertising, and are
| fighting for their industry 's very survival. That includes small
| firms like Rosewell's, but also giants of the industry, like
| Facebook._
|
| The Rosewell guy may not be a saint, but omitting Google from the
| list as the ones standing to win from privacy features, through
| ga and the usage they have over the Web via Chrome anyway is
| completely missing the point of a single party having
| monopolistic control over click data.
|
| Can't also agree with the characterization of the W3C in TFA.
| IX-103 wrote:
| How does Google win? Their business is search -- advertising on
| other sites is more of a side gig for them, and from their own
| description of their privacy sandbox, even they would not be
| able to track people across sites.
|
| The changes to the web platform necessary to protect user
| privacy will require reinventing the industry (which will
| naturally pick winners and losers).
|
| I expect that Google will come out in the end doing well, but
| that's not because they have a competitive advantage here, but
| instead because these changes don't really affect their core
| business (at least no where near as much as the proliferation
| of paywalls and app-ification have).
| rdsnsca wrote:
| Googles business is advertising.. take away their ad revenue
| and see what happens to them.
| otterley wrote:
| In this story: engineers can't come to a conclusion because they
| are trying to solve a political problem instead of an engineering
| problem.
| IX-103 wrote:
| Better summary: Browser companies try to implement X
| individually. Browser developers get together and try to
| standardize a way to do X. Other people come and complain why
| they aren't doing Y or Z instead. Eventually all the extra
| people are talking so loudly that no one can work on X.
| tenebrisalietum wrote:
| Want a Web run by human beings again? Want tracking methods
| impossible to implement in any meaningful fashion by design? Try
| Gemini. Gemini is here and can be used TODAY.
|
| https://gemini.circumlunar.space/
|
| The only thing standing between you and the next web is... a lot,
| but try it anyway, things have to start somewhere.
| cusenses wrote:
| What prevents Gemini from being taken over and utilized just
| like the current web has been?
| hkt wrote:
| Governance is the only thing that can. There are no technical
| measures that can prevent it.
| skymt wrote:
| The Gemini protocol is intended to exclude features that
| could be used for tracking. It has no cookies, user-agent,
| referer, etc and the protocol is not extensible enough that
| such features could be easily added.
|
| Also, frankly, the spartan design of native Gemini pages
| (very limited formatting, no scripts or even inline images!)
| means that the circle of nerds who use Gemini will almost
| certainly remain too small to catch the eye of ad-tech. It's
| hostile to commerce in a way I find kind of delightful.
|
| https://gemini.circumlunar.space/docs/faq.gmi
| cesarb wrote:
| > It has no cookies, user-agent, referer, etc and the
| protocol is not extensible enough that such features could
| be easily added.
|
| For now.
|
| The original HTTP (now retroactively called HTTP/0.9) also
| had none of these, and also wasn't extensible enough; it
| had no headers at all, just the verb (GET) and the path.
| Yet somehow, it was later extended to include all of these.
|
| > very limited formatting, no scripts or even inline
| images!
|
| The original HTML was also like that, even inline images
| came later.
| calvinmorrison wrote:
| my favorite client is Lagrange. The experience is nice and the
| codebase is sane
| DenseComet wrote:
| Do you have a list of sites on Gemini that are interesting or
| useful? I don't use the web because it uses HTML or because it
| has JS or really any particular technical feature. I use it
| because it has sites like HN and Google, and I think the same
| thing applies to Gemini. I love the ideas behind Gemini, but
| I'm not sure why I'd use Gemini if there are not interesting
| sites.
| pentagrama wrote:
| > One of Google's proposed standards -- Federated Learning of
| Cohorts, or FLoC for short -- would eliminate the ability for
| advertisers to track specific users' web behavior with cookies.
|
| No, Floc will not "eliminate the ability for advertisers to track
| specific users with cookies", the phase out of third party
| cookies on Chrome will do that, Google needs something to replace
| the current tracking method for his ad business and is trying to
| push Floc to do that. But this are two separate things that OP
| seems to mix up, Google needs something to keep tracking and is
| painting the notion that third party cookies can not be phased
| out without implement Floc before, and is not the case.
| coldtea wrote:
| W3C being basically Google and a couple of other 10000-pound
| gorilla companies at this point...
| IX-103 wrote:
| Is Mozilla also one of the 10000 pound Gorillas?
| baybal2 wrote:
| Another thing are all kinds of standard boards, and committees
| like IETF, W3C, IEEE becoming very secretive themselves.
|
| A decade, or more ago IEEE had a rule that anything said in a
| standard board meeting cannot be be expected to not be public, or
| be subject to any disclosure limit post-factum.
|
| In 2019, after years of relentless pressure from Google, Cisco,
| Amazon, the rule was effectively reversed, and now IEEE standard
| board meetings can be made super duper secret, so members can now
| conspire to break antitrust laws in every imaginable way in
| complete privacy, free of recordings, and stenography.
| marketingtech wrote:
| It's easy to mock the pettiness of all parties described here,
| and it's common for people on this forum to take absolutist
| stances with regards to privacy/advertising, but it's also
| important to recognize that these arguments will actually define
| the future of the internet for the average user.
|
| There are trillion dollar companies on both sides of the
| argument, and their eventual compromise will establish the
| defaults for billions of users.
|
| There are also two fundamental components of the Big Tech debate
| at odds with each other here - privacy and competition.
| Increasing privacy decreases competition by strengthening the Big
| Tech companies that engage with users at the
| platform/browser/OS/hardware level. See: Google's removal of
| third-party cookies from Chrome in the name of privacy was just
| blocked by EU competition regulators, because it would cripple
| competing advertising companies[1].
|
| [1] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/06/eu-antitrust-
| reg...
| api wrote:
| > Increasing privacy decreases competitions, strengthening the
| Big Tech companies that engage with users at the
| platform/browser/OS/hardware level.
|
| What about products that people actually pay for directly
| instead of products that are "free" but funded under the table
| through surveillance and manipulation? Why can't those compete
| just fine?
| ricopags wrote:
| A small side note in case anyone from protocol.com is reading: In
| chrome, with adblock disabled, unable to click the button to sign
| up for email list.
| the-dude wrote:
| This must be the most positive HN comment about sign up CTAs
| ever.
| MeteorMarc wrote:
| It seems only fair that big tech engineers also feel the pain of
| idyllic places on the internet being overrun by commercial
| interests.
| 1vuio0pswjnm7 wrote:
| Funny how there is no (meaningful) user representation at W3C.
| Perhaps Wendy Seltzer is the closest to a user representative. A
| lawyer who is a Perl programmer, according to her Wikipedia
| profile.
|
| The arguments against Big Tech the smaller ad tech folks are
| raising sound legit, but obviously they are not being made in
| good faith. Big Tech has no more respect for user privacy than
| companies like Rosewell's. They are all a threat to user privacy.
| Companies that make browsers should not also be taking in online
| ad services revenue. It is a clear conflict of interest.
|
| 51degrees provides the public with a CSV list of user-agents,
| e.g., for use in browser fingerprinting (or perhaps user defence
| against browser fingerprinting). What does Google provide. We
| know they are fingerpringing on a mass scale. There is zero
| transparency.
|
| https://raw.githubusercontent.com/51Degrees/Device-Detection...
|
| Just for fun, I periodically compile w3c-libwww. It still
| compiles and it still works today. I use it through a TLS-enabled
| proxy. It reminds me of all the potential for experimetation the
| www once had. Today the web just looks like a Big Tech-led
| surveillance dystopia slowly coming together. Unless someone
| stops it. Lina Khan, godspeed.
|
| The disputes described in the article with lawyers from W3C and
| IAPP looking on reminds me a little of the formation of ICANN
| back in the 1990's and the disputes over domain names versus
| trademarks.
| tomc1985 wrote:
| I don't care how big this man's business is, Rosewell is a
| parasite bent on preserving the established order of datamining
| the shit out of everyone for his own personal profit. He is
| gumming up the works with pointless philosophical bloviating,
| using the anti-big-tech argument as a cudgel of convenience for
| bludgeoning a nascent privacy movement that has taken decades to
| get off the ground.
|
| I've sat in a large audience hall listening to assholes like
| these guys talk about their businesses, and when they are called
| out publicly for not caring about individual privacy and desire
| not to be tracked, and they shrug their shoulders.
|
| He and the rest of this datamining gold rush needs to be stopped.
| mistrial9 wrote:
| agree with the sentiment but the vulgarity dilutes the weight
| of the message.. centuries of privacy rights are drained and
| drowning right now IMO
| tomc1985 wrote:
| My vulgarity is an expression of frustration in their overall
| apathy to the consequences of their actions. Forcing people
| to smother their feelings in the name of 'genteel' discussion
| does a disservice to those who feel oppressed or misheard.
| Some things in this world are quite ugly and it is important
| to portray them as such.
|
| Perhaps you should evaluate why you let mere words affect you
| so much.
| quesera wrote:
| > Perhaps you should evaluate why you let mere words affect
| you so much.
|
| Ironic. You just made it clear that you fully intended for
| these words to affect people strongly. The problem is that
| the second order effects are can vary and are out of your
| control.
|
| Vulgarity is often just a verbal tic for the inarticulate.
| If this doesn't apply in your case, then you and your
| message will be disadvantaged by association.
|
| It's all about knowing your audience. I'd like to think
| that HN readers don't need the carefully-placed emotion
| markers to get your message.
| tomc1985 wrote:
| > Vulgarity is often just a verbal tic for the
| inarticulate. If this doesn't apply in your case, then
| you and your message will be disadvantaged by
| association.
|
| This is incorrect. Vulgarity is the strongest possible
| choice when evaluating one's choice of words for
| emotional impact. I don't know what makes otherwise
| intelligent folk so damn afraid of them but that is not a
| part of the world I understand.
|
| Why would otherwise chaste people shout "FUCK!!" when
| they stub their toe? My mother, for example, is super
| conservative and would never cuss in polite company. But
| she has been known to let them slip in extreme
| circumstances, like stubbing her toe.
|
| There is an overall thread amongst "polite" circles of
| emotional suppression: don't show anger, don't be
| negative, couch all your words in disgustingly flowery
| language, etc etc etc. I don't understand why this
| particularly disgusting aspect of Victorian prudery and
| toxic positivity have managed to last so long, but it
| has. And I'm doing what I can to smash it.
| andrewzah wrote:
| I agree with you on vulgarity but life isn't really fair
| about this. Just like how wearing a suit unfairly makes a
| presentation more potent than casual wear. It is what it
| is.
|
| Being vulgar (even if technically justified) weakens the
| message for many people, especially when the other party is
| very polite and professional in return. edit: I would
| prefer if people weren't like that, but that's just one of
| the many flaws that humans have. Trying to change that
| instead of acknowledging it and adapting is an exercise in
| frustration.
|
| I'm not "affected by mere words", but I do prefer well
| worded arguments to mere expletives. And I'm not alone in
| that.
| [deleted]
| tomc1985 wrote:
| I understand your point but I think that emotional
| suppression is a much greater crime than failing to be
| polite. After all, politeness has quite a storied history
| in being used to suppress and control people that are
| used to being 'othered', many of which feel things that
| are much stronger than I am expressing here
| allturtles wrote:
| Great, politeness is racist now?
| tomc1985 wrote:
| I don't think that politeness is inherently racist, but
| it _has_ been used as a tool of racial suppression, and
| as a way of keeping itinerants in line
|
| https://www.ferris.edu/HTMLS/news/jimcrow/question/2006/s
| ept...
| reayn wrote:
| ...
| ozfive wrote:
| This was really important for me to read. Thanks for
| sharing!
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Agreed. If these folks are assholes, I want to hear the
| truth.
| andrewzah wrote:
| "politeness has quite a storied history in being used to
| suppress and control people"
|
| As I said, it's not fair. I agree with you that it
| shouldn't be that way. But I also accept the fact that
| that's how things are, unfortunately. Life isn't fair.
|
| Maybe someday humans will be better, but I think not. And
| this is getting off-tangent from dealing with the problem
| at hand.
| tomc1985 wrote:
| I can afford not to care. Sure in situations resembling
| servility I might have to revert to a more polite manner
| of speaking, but I make great effort to avoid them as
| they are debasing.
|
| A lot of the folks here on HN are responsible for the
| current reality of tech. A nice polite discussion is
| great but I want to express strong feelings and make
| people feel bad for their choices. And politely debating
| the merits of something does not do that.
| coldtea wrote:
| > _but the vulgarity dilutes the weight of the message_
|
| Actually vulgarity was invented (and has historically been
| used) to improve the weight of such messages. It works too:
|
| "Writing in the journal Social Psychological and Personality
| Science a team of researchers from the Netherlands, the UK,
| the USA and Hong Kong report that people who use profanity
| are less likely to be associated with lying and deception."
| [1]
|
| Can't argue with fucking science.
|
| [1] https://phys.org/news/2017-01-links-honesty.html
| [deleted]
| swiley wrote:
| I used to care about this, Apple and Google changed my mind.
|
| Fuck 'em.
| You-Are-Right wrote:
| The vulgarity of the choosen life path of some people can not
| be matched by any words.
| 3gg wrote:
| I thought Korean soap operas were good until I read this article.
| What a whole bunch of unnecessary drama. The W3C always appeared
| to be one of the most dysfunctional entities in existence, and
| now the article leaves no question as to why.
|
| Funny this Rosewell guy. "Should web browsers really become
| implementation mechanisms of specific government regulation?" --
| Isn't everything a mechanism of specific government regulation?
| We seem to have an autocrat in the making here who would prefer
| the Web existed in isolation of civilization and where he could
| squeeze out that ad cash unhindered by government regulations.
| Given that he likes to ask philosophical questions, perhaps he
| could ask himself why the Web is being regulated in the first
| place.
|
| It's also funny how in the article, the only people who seem to
| actually care about privacy are the non-profits advocating for it
| and the government regulators fighting antitrust.
| pdonis wrote:
| _> Isn 't everything a mechanism of specific government
| regulation?_
|
| Um, no?
| mcguire wrote:
| " _I thought Korean soap operas were good until I read this
| article. What a whole bunch of unnecessary drama. The W3C
| always appeared to be one of the most dysfunctional entities in
| existence, and now the article leaves no question as to why._ "
|
| Can I introduce you to the IETF (https://www.ietf.org/)? :-)
| TheTester wrote:
| "who would prefer the Web existed in isolation of civilization"
|
| Honestly the internet was a better place when THAT was the
| situation sorry if I sound like a deluded man but the internet
| being so close to the world, or at least as much as it is now,
| is part of the problem.
|
| And even if I do not agree with this guy and his pretensions,
| at least we would have better ways to combat guys like him in
| the old internet, but company owners like him at the end of the
| day have much more power thanks to the internet being so
| prevalescent and hyperreal, as the same authorities and
| entities that protect unbalanced power holders, can arrest you
| and fight you because of things that happen on the internet.
| syshum wrote:
| W3C surrendered to Google during the EME fight. So there is not
| war... it is Google way, or Google renders W3C irrelevant...
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(page generated 2021-07-13 23:01 UTC)