Gonna come out with a controvertial take here, but I am actually fine with anonymised usage stats/telemetry if they are solely designed to improve the product, and as long as there is an opt-out. Many people are get furious about telemetry in firefox or distros, but when i ask what their precise issue is with it, can give no answer.
Sending these stats is also a contribution to the projects that help improve software.
Many people are get furious about telemetry in firefox or distros, but when i ask what their precise issue is with it, can give no answer.
They already gave you their answer. They don’t think collecting data without very deliberate opt in is acceptable. There is no need for anything more precise than that. It’s a perfectly complete answer on its own.
Agree, but make it opt in.
I think a lot of the arguing people are doing here is about the usefulness of opt-in vs opt-out. And personally I tend to agree with the side of the opt-out group; telemetry that users opt-in to is just less useful overall for figuring the average needs of your users. Opt-in is way too self-selecting and shows you very little about what actually needs to be worked on for everyone. However, if the telemetry is not privacy-respecting then opt-out is not a good thing at all. But I think I trust the endless OS system that fedora is trying to use.
I would say opt-out is fine as long as the option is presented to the user early on in the UX. Like for example during installation. If it’s opt-out but the option to do so is hidden then that’s not good.
How is this corporate shilling? Telemetry isn’t inherently bad and can be very useful to projects, it’s only when it goes against the users wishes or collects excessive amounts of data that it becomes bad.
Have you been keeping up with the story? Few people are saying there is absolutely zero value in telemetry as a concept. Most people have an issue with it being on by default. For a FOSS community, especially one who tries to act as if privacy matters, the very nature of the concept “telemetry that’s on by default” is the problem. I wouldn’t personally use the phrase corporate shilling because I think it’s not the most precise descriptor of the situation, but it’s not entirely innacurate either. I think all of their talk about “it’s anonymized” or “it’s not excessive” or what have you is just distraction: the real issue is that it’s on by default.
