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Comment by huhtenberg | Hacker News Reader

I've got some karma points to burn, so here comes something.

A list of your clients would be nice to see. So that I'd know to never install any of their apps.

I hate apps that phone home. I hate apps that phone to some random analytics companies even more. I don't like companies that enable, entice and profit from this sort of behavior, a behavior that every single user would opt out from if they were asked upfront. So, unfortunately, the only thing I can wish you at this point is a speedy demise so that you'd be free to focus on projects that are less ethically questionable.

/rant

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How does the anonymous gathering of statistics harm you? As an app developer, this data allows me to measurably improve my apps.

I have several free (no ads either) apps in the Android market, and even in the most trivial of apps I will include Google Analytics to receive crash reports, see what screens are most popular (so I can improve my apps where it matters most), where the app is being used (for some reason one of my apps was really popular in France, I then added a French translation and the adoption really took off), what devices are most/least popular etc. If I add a new feature, I want to know if its being used or if I wasted my time, if I need to improve the discoverability of the feature etc.

Last but not least, the usage data is really motivating to me as a developer of free apps. If I release an app, and I see it being used daily, that makes me happy and motives me to keep updating it.

As far as I know, the GA data is anonymous and only shown to the developer in aggregates.

I agree with you 100%. What it ultimately boils down to is the need for feedback.

Publishing an app is a conversation with your users instead of throwing a message in a bottle into the ocean. You need all kinds of data and metrics not only to see how well your business is doing, but also how you can help users have a better experience with your app. For better or worse, until telepathic feedback is invented, phone-home is all we have.

If he is using your app, it implies that he somewhat trusts you. I think it's Google that he doesn't trust. Using an app shouldn't require trusting a third party with personal behavior data.

You're more than likely using the Android Marketplace, with a Google account, with credit card details associated. What don't you trust?

In general, apps that "phone home" suck, but let's not lump GA or crash reporting (like BugSense, etc) in that same group.

Asking permission to record a crash is very different than silently sending user-identifiable data to Google (or elsewhere).

> As an app developer, this data allows me to measurably improve my apps.

I don't give a flying f#ck about that, sorry. This is my device and I don't like my device connecting god knows where at a whim.

As I said, if you were to tell your app users upfront that you will be tracking their usage, anonymous or not, and gave them an option to opt out, very few would not opt out. This is the exact same inherent need for privacy that is fueling current NSA debacle. It may be irrational, but it pretty damn real. People don't like to be tracked or watched.

You may want to consider a flip phone but even that has a GPS for 911... A/B testing is the least of your problems. If you are that concerned about privacy get off the cell network, root your phone with AOSP or your own OS and most importantly do not install any apps that you have not built. At that point consider A/B testing as it could greatly improve your user experience ;-).

Joke aside I understand your concern but this is really not the right place to start.

I think that frankly you are roundly wrong. Most users just don't care that they are anonymously being tracked or monitored. Most users what good, ease to use, reliable apps that do something interesting. If it phones home to google most people just don't care. The NSA scandal was mostly met with a loud "meh?" from most people. The media is pushing it as a story but really only techies give a shit about it. I'm not saying it's right but I'm pretty sure that's the general feeling about it with the general public. Anon analytics make better apps. It's a good thing for users all the way around. Better apps == a better user experience, that doesn't happen without better data.

> Most users just don't care that they are anonymously being tracked or monitored.

Most users don't know, because you didn't tell them.

> Anon analytics make better apps.

Highly debatable.

>> Anon analytics make better apps.

> Highly debatable.

How can that be debatable? If you see 45% of crashes happen on the photo-upload screen, isn't that some kind of clue where to look? I really don't think anyone can argue that analytics are not helpful in improving app quality. Please, if anyone can even play devil's advocate on that... please do. But you better make a throwaway account 'cuz I suspect you'll be buried into oblivion and ghost-banned.

The crash report backtrace can be gathered on-demand, after asking the user's permission.

On-demand user-approved crash reporting is not usually what people mean by phone-home 'analytics'.

> But you better make a throwaway account 'cuz I suspect you'll be buried into oblivion and ghost-banned.

That's pretty rude.

The data as sent to Google (or any other analytics system) contains more than enough personally identifiable meta-data as to serve as a hugely useful database for the mining information on specific individuals.

Even just an IP address and device identifier is very useful metadata for assembling sweeping user profiles.

This creates a centralized data trove of hugely valuable data (why else do you think services collect it for free?) that is useful to both commercial and government interests.

This is why personal privacy matters, and why silently 'phoning home' without first getting explicit user permission is wrong.

Seriously? How do you feel about A/B testing on websites?

He may have simply blocked all third party cookies and javascripts so it may not be a big deal to him.

Sending a request to a server is explicitly and inescapably part of requesting a web page; users explicitly grant permission for that request to be made obvious to you simply by making the request in the first place.

On the other hand, there's still an open question of what you do with that request data. Sending it to Google without permission is wrong, as it contains a slew of personally identifiable data that allows Google to build a massive profile of a specific user's behavior both across the internet, and in the real world.

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