The data of the call isn't important. That's the point. What you say matters less than what you do. And you do a lot more than you say.
To put it another way, Google doesn't know that I am interested in a new iPod because the I used Gmail to tell my friends, "I'm interested in a new iPod." They know it because I have been browsing pages offering iPods for sale. And that says a lot more about when I plan to purchase one than the statement sent via Gmail.
I didn't tell Kroger, "Hey, I've got a dog." I bought dogfood - and now that Witty is dead, they can tell from the change in my purchase habits that my big dog died - they don't print me coupons for Alpo anymore when I check out.
The content of the call indeed contains information beyond the meta-data about the call. But it's not just meta-data about voice calls that's being collected, it's meta-data about all modes of mobile and static communications - and geolocations when calls are not being made.
But even in your example the content of the pages is what's important, and that is data, not metadata. Metadata might be stuff like "the search for '$FOO' was done from IP address '$BAR' at time '$BAZ'". And you could even argue that $FOO itself is really data, not meta-data.
Likewise the contents of your receipt is data, not metadata. It's literally the bill of goods that authorizes you to take the named items from the store and (with your additional purchase creds) authorized Kroger to charge your credit card $X.XX. Kroger may have inferred more than you wished, but they did it with the data.
'Information' is also a meta-data of that "meta-data" above, which one is more useful? Can anyone tell what you did when given meta-data of "information"?
Can you derive back to what you did, given 'information' as meta-data?
If it's turtles all the way up then it's turtles all the way down.
The Supreme Court has already ruled that metadata is not warrant-protected, so I'd be highly leery of equating data with metadata. (edit: spelling fix)
That you can determine things in multiple ways is a given. You can often infer the information of the calls. Often with decent accuracy. If you have that information, there is no need to infer it.
Take your Kroger example. You could have just stopped buying dog food from them. We completely stopped buying dog food from a store because we had trouble getting the dogs to take to the food without skin problems. Is it valid for them to assume that our dog is dead? Or just stick with the safe assumption that we aren't buying dog food from them anymore? :)
Now, I completely agree with the idea that collecting just the meta data is already pretty far reaching. I struggle to see why collecting it all is not even more far reaching.
It may be more far reaching. But the reach is gratuitous and drawing the line at the content of calls doesn't meaningfully curb the invasion of privacy.
If I stop pissing in the ocean, I'm not going to prevent rising sea levels.
To put it another way, Google doesn't know that I am interested in a new iPod because the I used Gmail to tell my friends, "I'm interested in a new iPod." They know it because I have been browsing pages offering iPods for sale. And that says a lot more about when I plan to purchase one than the statement sent via Gmail.
I didn't tell Kroger, "Hey, I've got a dog." I bought dogfood - and now that Witty is dead, they can tell from the change in my purchase habits that my big dog died - they don't print me coupons for Alpo anymore when I check out.
The content of the call indeed contains information beyond the meta-data about the call. But it's not just meta-data about voice calls that's being collected, it's meta-data about all modes of mobile and static communications - and geolocations when calls are not being made.