Hang on. You're GIVING it the data. People want "free" services, so I'm genuinely curious what people actually expect is going to happen when they use WhatsApp. Is it just something provided benevolently? How does WhatsApp make money? Are people really so ignorant to think that they can get a free lunch?
There's an implied quid pro quo -- you use a free service in exchange for providing data used to sell you products from advertisers.
You want to protect your privacy? Stop using so-called "free" services where you are the product.
Why should this even need regulation? People are making a choice to use Facebook/WA when they could be using conventional SMS or iMessage. But they get mad about paying for SMS -- so they trade privacy for "free." That's on the user. Who's supposed to pay for WhatsApp to run? Other than the early days when people paid $1/€1, it's free to users. Who pays for it?
> having employees in our countries
So providing jobs is a bad thing? What's the unemployment rate in France? It's over 10%. It seems like FB/etc. are actually providing a benefit to the country. Those employees also pay taxes, and buy stuff, thus benefiting the economy. You should be glad they have employees in those countries. I'm sure the employees are glad to have a job!
> owning property in our countries
And paying property tax. And making improvements. And attracting further economic development.
> owning critical infrastructure in our countries
?? They don't own the phone companies -- it's people's choice to not use conventional SMS, but conventional SMS and phone lines still exist. WhatsApp is hardly 'critical'. Any nontrivial use of WhatsApp (i.e. by emergency services) is just stupid. That's on the population, not the fault of Facebook and friends.
It's not like the concept is very complicated. As soon as stuff like this goes open source/distributed, the model falls apart. The Linuxification of everything will destroy the world as we know it
Hang on. You're GIVING it the data. People want "free" services, so I'm genuinely curious what people actually expect is going to happen when they use WhatsApp. Is it just something provided benevolently? How does WhatsApp make money? Are people really so ignorant to think that they can get a free lunch?
There's an implied quid pro quo -- you use a free service in exchange for providing data used to sell you products from advertisers.
You want to protect your privacy? Stop using so-called "free" services where you are the product.
Why should this even need regulation? People are making a choice to use Facebook/WA when they could be using conventional SMS or iMessage. But they get mad about paying for SMS -- so they trade privacy for "free." That's on the user. Who's supposed to pay for WhatsApp to run? Other than the early days when people paid $1/€1, it's free to users. Who pays for it?
> having employees in our countries
So providing jobs is a bad thing? What's the unemployment rate in France? It's over 10%. It seems like FB/etc. are actually providing a benefit to the country. Those employees also pay taxes, and buy stuff, thus benefiting the economy. You should be glad they have employees in those countries. I'm sure the employees are glad to have a job!
> owning property in our countries
And paying property tax. And making improvements. And attracting further economic development.
> owning critical infrastructure in our countries
?? They don't own the phone companies -- it's people's choice to not use conventional SMS, but conventional SMS and phone lines still exist. WhatsApp is hardly 'critical'. Any nontrivial use of WhatsApp (i.e. by emergency services) is just stupid. That's on the population, not the fault of Facebook and friends.