alt Hacker NewsIf something is free (en masse), you are probably a product. If you don't want to be a product you need to give something out instead, like ads.
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> If something is free (en masse), you are probably a product.
If something being free ever mattered to your privacy, it hasn't for a long time. Today no matter how expensive something is you are probably a product anyway. Unethical and greedy companies don't care how much money you paid them, they'll want the additional cash they'll get from selling you out at every opportunity. Much of my favorite software is free and doesn't compromise my privacy.
Fine, but don't make my machine do work as part of the agreement between host and advertiser (the only reason I can utilize an ad blocker in the first place). And definitely don't try to make it so my machine can't object to you trying. On top of all that, most places want to take my money, AND force ads, AND make my machine part of the process.
That's not correct. Linux is free, almost all open source is, many projects, websites are done out of passion.
I contribute to open source projects and nobody "gave me something", as I did it because I wanted to make it better. Like me, there are many others. Nobody is "the product" there.
What the saying you are misrepresenting means is "carefully check free things as you may be the product". Not "free things cannot exist, you either are the product or you pay".