Electronic Tollbooths and the Myth of the Free Ride

The plethora of websites that provide services out there is an incredible resource for all of us, and there’s no question that many of them enrich our lives – or at the very least, allow us to establish and enrich connections with friends and family.

What is important to consider though is that the vast majority of them are not in business for altruistic reasons. Websites cost money to build, host, support and enhance. Not all websites are developed for monetary gain but it should be assumed that it is not offering their services and resources out of the goodness of their hearts.

Why does this matter?

It matters because this makes us an educated consumer and by understanding this principle, we can decide if we want to agree with the terms of service of the website and use whatever “currency” is required to avail ourselves of the service.

I have made mention of this in a previous article, but there are many websites that when you sign-up, you are giving them the rights to use your uploaded content as they desire. In this case, your consent to share your content is the currency.

In other cases, the website provides basic functionality for free in the hopes that you become dependent on the website and services at which point in time, you may decide to become a paid subscriber in order to receive additional functionality.

Sometimes, your list of contacts can also be a valuable resource to a third party. Many applications such as Linked In (in addition to some other sites such as dating sites) will present a screen when you sign up that offers to invite your friends. By providing your email address and password, you are giving explicit consent for the website to mine your address book which allows them to grow their potential subscribers exponentially. This is fine if that is what you wanted to do, but many times it’s not clear that’s what will be involved with the sign-up process.

In other cases, the currency is your personal profile and your web surfing habits. Advertisements can be specifically directed to you based on your surfing history. As an example, late last year, I was researching digital picture frames from Staples. Within an hour of looking at specific products on their website, I was on a different website and noticed that the ads being delivered were from Staples and that the products displayed was the same ones that I had been viewing.

This last type of currency to me is the most dangerous and nefarious. We’re not necessarily aware of how we are tracked, and how the information is used – or possibly sold to third parties. This may seem like it’s not a big deal, but many times the marketing data that is gleaned isn’t anonymous – it could be – and probably is – stored in a database. Since many of us use the same user ids for websites, it wouldn’t be that difficult for an organization to start putting together a profile of what products you like, where you shop, and how much money you make and where you bank. In any of these cases, there’s nothing wrong with trading off your “currency” to access their site and services but as long as you’re aware of how you fit into the revenue stream and you’re making a conscious decision to do so, then that’s all part of being an educated consumer.