zlacker

>>segfau+(OP)
Why do people use obvious spyware when free software exists?

>>isatty+xi
Telemetry isn't the same thing as spying on the user. People use it because it's not actually spying on them.

>>charci+Zj
Anonymized or not, opt-out telemetry is plain spying. Go was about to find out, and they backed out the last millisecond and converted to opt-in, for example.

>>bayind+5n
Unfortunately opt-in telemetry is like no telemetry at all. Defaults matter.

>>nicce+Eq
No telemetry at all is a good thing to some (most?) people.

>>inetkn+Yq
Telemetry can be implemented well. The software you use gets bugs fixed much faster since you get statistics that some bugs have higher impact than others. The more users software has, less skills they have in average to accurately report any issues.

>>nicce+qs
> The software you use gets bugs fixed much faster since you get statistics that some bugs have higher impact than others.

Try talking to your users instead.

> The more users software has, less skills they have in average to accurately report any issues.

No amount of telemetry will solve that.

>>inetkn+3t
The PowerShell team at Microsoft added opt-out telemetry to track when it was launched so they could make the case internally that they should get more funding, and have more internal clout.

It’s easy to argue that if you are a PowerShell user or developer you benefit from no telemetry, but it’s hard to argue that you benefit from the tool you use being sidelined or defunded because corporate thinks nobody uses it. “Talk to your users” doesn’t solve this because there are millions of computers running scripts and no way to know who they are or contact them even if you could contact that many people, and they would not remember how often they launched it.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/microsof...

>>jodrel+WP
To take that logic to its extreme: I'm sure we could have amazing medical breakthroughs if we just gave up that pesky 'don't experiment on non-consenting humans' hang-up we have.

>>Eisens+MT
The parent said "talk to your users instead of telemetry" and I said "there are scenarios where telemetry can get information that you cannot get by talking to users". How did you go from that to "experimenting on non-consenting humans"?

To take your logic to its extreme, you have a disease and are prescribed pills, and the pharmaceutical company says "we will track when you take the pills - unless you don't want us to?" and you would prefer the researchers get shut down for not knowing whether anyone actually takes the pills, and an unlimited number of people die from treatable diseases that don't get cured.

>>jodrel+Lx2
Medical research and consent doesn't work like this. If you track your patients without their consent, or you share their data without their explicit consent, you'll land in very hot water, which will cook you even before you can scream.

Similarly, a medical trial will take a very detailed consent before you can start.

Your opt-out telemetry is akin to your insurance sending you powered and Bluetooth enabled toothbrushes out of the blue to track you and threaten to cancel your insurance if you don't use that toothbrush and send data to them.

Or as a more extreme example, going through an important procedure not with the known and proven method but with an experimental one, because you didn't opt-out and nobody bothered to tell you this. In reality, you need to sign consent and waiver forms to accept experimental methods.

>>bayind+8d3
> "Medical research and consent doesn't work like this."

Yes, I agree that person's comparison to non-consensual medical research is stupid.

> "Your opt-out telemetry is akin to your insurance sending you powered and Bluetooth enabled toothbrushes out of the blue to track you and threaten to cancel your insurance if you don't use that toothbrush and send data to them."

More akin to your insurance company making a public RFC where you can discuss the coming telemetry, then you choosing to ask your insurance for an optional toothbrush, being able to opt out of telemetry if you want to, the insurance company documenting how to opt out[1], you being able to edit the toothbrush source code to remove the telemetry entirely with the insurance company's approval because it's MIT licensed, and absolutely nothing happening to you if you opt out.