@neil very much so. like the agree or agree later buttons. if they didn't have to perform consent theater, they really wouldn't

@neil it's like the tech industry has reinvented feudalism.

@neil But I have a legitimate interest in making money out of your data in ways you would never consent to!

@neil for for-profits, consent, like value, is just something that detracts from, if not actually inhibits, maximising wealth extraction.

Can we all at least stop pretending for-profits have any other goal than profit?

@neil If they even give you an option to opt out, rather than "see less", "later", "maybe tomorrow".

Any person responsible for one of those flows is probably unsafe to date too.

@neil the amount of times I've heard "but people will say no and then we won't have any data"

Yes, that's generally how it works. Why don't you use another lawful basis. Oh, you can't meet any of them? Maybe take the hint that you shouldn't be doing what you're doing then.

@neil
"We take consent very seriously" is just the same thing as "We take your data privacy very seriously".

You know, in '45, the Allies took Hitler very seriously, too..

@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk honestly managers, designers, and engineers need to be asked the question "if you used your ui to ask for sex, would it stand up to a rape trial?"

"Can you say no?"
"Can you withdraw consent at any time?"
"Are there other consequences for saying no?"

@neil I listen to a lot of tech men on podcasts, in all honesty they live in such a different reality to me, they’re genuinely gassed about their own sense of right and what’s cool.

I don’t think they’ve ever met the likes of me or others at the end of their products.

That said, they have employees who have close encounters with reality. Would be great if they said ‘oi boss, that idea you just had is actually quite shit y’no, when you think about it for a minute”.

@neil that's one of the main reasons why, personally, I think some activities should not be legislated at all.

Some legal frameworks legitimize abuse from activities that would otherwise be frowned upon ... in the best case scenario ..

It gives "them" the legal framework upon which they can calculate how much would "this" interpretation cost us?

Whereas it leaves us out of the game, with no chance (or the slimmest possible chance) to stand for our rights.

@neil That's exactly my experience with many of the organisations I've been asked to assess/advise.

It's not confusion. It's wilful ignorance. I know of at least one big name consultancy with an entire department dedicated to providing specific guidance on how to subvert the legislation by carefully and deliberately misinterpreting the wording.

I do enjoy seeing that defence torn to shreds in my other role, sitting on a couple of penalty/enforcement advisory panels :-)

@neil Imagine if a person used Big Tech-like tactics when engaging in sexual activity. Would excuses such as, “before our date she consented to my dating T&C—50 pages spread across multiple documents—which include authorization for sex with me and 300 other people who pay me to participate on my dates. I obtained her consent by showing her my phone with links to the full T&C docs and a big ‘I CONSENT’ button,” go over well?

@neil superb summary of a perspective I wholly agree with in general. ty for sharing!

@neil

Tech company: if we told you what we would like to do with your information, subject to your agreement, you would never agree. But of course ‘we value your privacy’.

Average Joe: you’re right. I would not agree.

Tech company: that’s why we aren’t asking you to agree. We get no value (= we don’t make money) from your privacy that way.

@neil absolutely you can they're blatant law breaking in Europe with cookie permissions which they are now starting to fix and we're now getting the same being done again over AI data selling.
Sadly the fines are just not enough to stop them and who knows what will happen if the US becomes a fascist state as seems likely

@neil A lion might understand the inner world of a gazelle to some degree, but it's only interested in that insofar as it's relevant to hunting.

@neil Agreed

@neil Totally. They understand consent as a tax, to be avoided if possible and evaded if necessary.

@neil Exactly.

ISTR Facebook/Meta complaining about Apple's changes to ad tracking consent where FB's complaint almost literally said "it's not fair that we can't just have it be opt out, if people are specifically asked about it then they'll all say no"!

@neil yes, it's malice, not ignorance

@neil :1000:​

@neil Once on a call at my remote job I pointed out that the efforts to lure us back to offices had the same creepiness as the guy at the bar who says "Want to come back to my place? I have an eight-track".

I think you've just clarified the reaction I got.

@neil they take consent as seriously as Hollywood.

@neil There’s a reason that terms like “fail fast” and “better to ask forgiveness than permission“ are so popular.

@neil they know what they're doing.

@neil Louis Rossmann calls it a "rapist's mentality"
They feel entitled to you, don't care about asking for consent, actively violate you for their benefit and blame and gaslight you for demanding basic respect and safety.

@neil @mirahimage 👆💯

@neil @aral i totally agree with the exception of "companies" or "big tech" .

This "problem" is more widespread, eg politics. It's driven by evil (think of dark patterns, willingly misunderstanding) and by stupid. Which one is worse or which one is more important to tackle i let others decide.

@neil

Almost no one doesn't understand consent.

@neil
As in 'The system isn't broke, it's working exaclty as it was designed'?

I would agree.

@neil ah, yes... I hate the "maybe they don't understand" apologists!
Mostly because there's no way anyone could think they don't understand! (This applies for a plethora of other issues too).

@neil this! 109% this!!

@neil crashlytics which used to be under twitter's fabric (now under google's firebase) used to have a page in their docs telling you how to set up a dialog asking the user whether they want metric collection or not. there was a warning saying most users would choose no, so it is advised to not show the dialog at all.