this post was submitted on 14 Sep 2024
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Microblog Memes

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[–] [email protected] 35 points 1 month ago (3 children)

If the product is free, the user is the product

[–] [email protected] 48 points 1 month ago (3 children)

No, the adverts are the product.

This whole notion that nothing can be free needs to get in the bin.

Linux is free. Who's selling the user data for that?

Lemmy is free, who's the product there?

Yes, Facebook/Meta is a shady fucking company and they are indeed selling your data on top of the ads they sell, but don't lump everything free into the same bucket.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Well, Linux really is just like a traditional product were the user pays to get their get their use cases supported. Except they've short-circuited the whole paying thing to where users directly hire people for the work (for the most part).

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yeah, NGL, couldn't follow what they were trying to say in that one.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

The users in this case are big companies. Companies pay developers directly to get features or hardware supported, developers which then send patches to the kernel team, or are a part of the kernel team (very short version).

The rest of us are just freeloaders. Hope that clears it up.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago
[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 month ago

Neither Linux nor Lemmy are a multi-billion dollar company.

If the advertisements were the product, then the exchange would be give ad, receive money. The advertisers are both giving the ad and the money to Meta. The thing the advertisers receive for giving the money are the potential customers. Meta is exchanging money for users. You are the product.

Meta’s entire model is categorizing the users so effectively and giving the advertisers the tools to target the users who are most likely to spend money once they see the ad. The advertisers pay Meta for access to users as well as the data about all of the different ways that groups of users are categorized. Then the advertiser can make a new ad or new product that will appeal to either a wider audience, an audience that is willing to pay a far larger amount of money than something costs to produce, or both.

The users and their data are the product of nearly every profitable business that provides something free to users. It’s up to you to decide how you feel about that. Maybe you see an ad for something and think “That’s exactly what I’ve been looking for!” and happily pay for it. That’s not necessarily a bad thing.

[–] [email protected] 42 points 1 month ago (6 children)

Wait... I'm not paying for Lemmy...

[–] [email protected] 43 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Then who tf have I been paying $3.50 a month to for Lemmy Prime+?

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago

Goddamn Loch Ness Monster. Stop asking people for money for lemmy+, folks came here to look at nature, not get pestered with your subscription model!

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

Also not paying for LibreOffice, Linux and Gimp.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

You're not paying but someone is. The servers aren't running for free.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I don't think this applies to non-profit stuff

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago
[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

It's taking your milk for dairy product replacements

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

If y'all still have gmails, take a look at proton mail.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago (1 children)

only if you're into LLM features and crypto wallets (it's a recent change)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

No idea how this is related to my comment