if we were serious about the social benefit to having a failsafe black box that we can sometimes under extraordinary conditions retrieve intelligence from, then companies should be required to operate these programs (send data to that black box) without benefit, and over their protests, by law. they shouldn't be paid for it. it should be a burden.

It should be like taxes - companies should hate the burden, and try to avoid it, but in the end do what it takes because society has said that it's necessary. companies should certainly not receive transfer payments from the public in exchange for spying on them. I mean think about it, this means you are LITERALLY paying taxes, to be transferred over to a company and returned to shareholders of a company, where that company has received the transfer... so that it can operate a special level of secrecy... in order not to tell you... that they are spying on you. Which you paid for. I mean I get that you're covering the cost of the equipment, but this is about EXTRA payment.

I mean that is a level of absurdity that is beyond the pale. It is like handing a waitress a tip and saying, "this is for not telling me that you were spying on me." I mean, regardless of whether this creates a puzzled or a guilty look on her face, it is a pretty absurd transfer payment!! "Wait, what...you're paying me extra...NOT to tell you...that I'm spying on you?" - "Yep!! In my book, that's how you earn the big profit." Pretty absurd. You don't give companies profit for these programs. It's some burden they do out of civil responsibility and legal obligation, if at all.

It's also why a for-profit police force is a pretty bad idea. Some things are best left to a minimal government mandate, and not these artificial market forces.