Dave's Mobile Blog

If you had asked someone back in the 90's if they would be ok sharing their location with other people, or if they would be happy sharing pages from their diary online, I am certain you would have been met with a look of disbelief. What has changed from then to now? Social networking?

Lets first be clear, no one forces online users to give up their information. Yes, there are people out there who will always try and steal that information, or "trick" you into giving it up. But the truth of it is, your information is yours and you do with it what you like. So with that in mind, why do people give it up? Are people being selective where they give it up or who they give it up to? I realise I have already asked many questions and yet no answers have been given. Well let me put my perspective on this and try to answer them

Why do people give it up?

I have looked back over the past few years and asked myself this very question; Why do I give up my information. For me it comes down to the shear number of online services that offer great features, each requiring another small section of your information. Take for instance Google Latitude. A great service which allows close friends and family to share their location with each other. A small part of my information is being shared here, which only three years ago was not.

Another great service that has arrived recently is Google Now. Anyone who has used this service knows the power of it, but look closely and you realise just how much information about your life it analyses to deliver this wonderful service. Location tracking, web search history, calendar appointments, email indexing etc. All information about you, used to deliver a service which you get benefit from.

Social networking has had their hand to play. It is no coincidence personal information starting being shared when Facebook arrived on the scene. Facebook, over the years, have tried to introduce new services which rely on user data which have been met with anger, and subsequently were removed. Years later they will introduce these services again, maybe under a different banner and they are successful. It appears over time users want these services as they can see the benefit of them in their life, and are therefore more willing to give up the necessary information to use them.

Are people being selective about where they give it up or who they give it up to?

I would like to think that I only give it my information to services or people who I believe will be responsible with that information. I can almost hear you asking; "How do you know the service provider is being responsible with my information?". Well honestly, I don't and frankly I don't think anyone can. It is a game of probabilities and a lot of trust. Most of the time I tend to stick with one service provider such as Google, who provider a number of services which I consume. I do however on occasion branch out, but I stick with those providers that are well known and have a global presence. I suppose when it comes to online services, if you are going to scammed, being scammed with millions of others is more appealing than being on your own.

As for giving my information up to individuals, this is really a social networking question. Going back to Google Latitude, I only share my location with very close friends and family. People who I want to know their location and want them to know mine. I once had a request to share my location from a work colleague. I draw the line with people outside of my close nit friend and family group.

Summary

It is easy to blame Social Networking for the liberal transferring of personal information, but you have to look further than this. Sure, people share their every thought on a daily basis on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. You can find out what school they went to, when they graduated from University, when they bought their first car, their age, political views etc, but I don't see this as the key issue. For me it is the new services that come online every day offering unique features that people are getting hooked into and are sharing more and more sensitive information. The key is to be selective and cautious about where this information goes and who is using it.

Today really brought home the fact that people don't really understand what a mobile phone contract actually is. Now I'm not talking about the legal fine print of a contract, but instead the top level view of what a contract represents between you and the phone company.

I was sitting in a coffee shop today when I overheard a conversation between a couple, where the man was trying to convince the women to renew her mobile phone contract. A scenario most of us go through at least once every two years. What really made me sit up and listen (don't judge, we all eavesdrop  was the man was giving false information to the women. Now this could well have been because the man wanted to accomplish his apparent goal of convincing his girlfriend to renew her phone contract, or (the more likely explanation) he believed what he was saying to be true. His justification to her for renewing seemed to be entirely based on the fact that, in his words;

"You get a free phone".

When she replied,

"But what if I don't want a new phone?"

His reply was;

"Why wouldn't you? You could sell it if you didn't want it".

Just in that small exchange of words, there is one main false statement, and one major fact that was not addressed by the man (thankfully she would be made of aware of this fact when renewing her contract).

  "You get a free phone"

I would like to think that most people know that the majority of a phone contract's monthly payment is for the phone and not actually for the service received by the phone companies. But this statement proves to me that there are still people (even if they are a minority) that still think that your phone is free. This misconception is probably down to the wording of tariff information from the phone companies, but even so, people should realise, in life there are no freebies.

I'll give a fairly average example to represent this. Say you wanted a phone that cost £500 and you took out a 2 year contract. Simple maths would show that;

£500 / 24 (months) = £20.83 (per month)

So you can see, that for a modern phone at least, £20 of your phone contract is just paying back the price of the phone itself. Phone companies may decide to subsidise some of phone cost and reduce their service charge etc. to win business, but the facts still remain, the phone is the most expensive part of the contract.

To reinforce this point, take the phone out of the equation and look at what some phone companies call; Sim only contracts. These are contracts that tend to last 30 days and roll over from month to month, meaning you can exit them on any month you want. Most of these contracts start at £10. All you are paying for here is service, nothing more, giving you an idea of what service costs are.

  What was the fact that was not addressed?

During their conversation, the man did not once mention that by renewing her contract the women would be again tied into another contract term, whether that is 12/18/24 months. In my mind this is one of the most important factors to consider before deciding to renew or not. As the women was not even bothered about a new phone, is signing up for another 24 months worth it? It is true that she could sell the phone, but lets consider the possibility that at some point through her contract she wishes to cancel. Termination fees plus the months she had already been paying for the new contract, could out weigh any gain from selling the phone.