Airbnb is a for-profit company with a controversial record, not a credible research institution. If they wanted to do this with no controversy, they would have a) had an institution send out the email to provide credibility, b) provide clear opt-ins, c) not hide behind a "We know your privacy is important" cliché instead of actually acting that way.
but taking a big public stand against an organization for actually trying to improve things for minorities in 2020 is pretty tone deaf
From the email: "we’ll use first names and profile photos from hosts and guests to help us understand the perceived race someone might associate with them...We’ll use this information to help us understand when and where racial discrimination is happening on our platform."
So if I get rejected for trying to book a room, my brown face will be labeled "minority" and be used as a datapoint to help improve the company. I have every right to disagree with how Airbnb is going about this especially from a privacy perspective, and do so vocally.
Yep you have every right, you just come across as an entitled white dude who doesn’t give a fuck about the problems in this country. You’re still arguing it should be opt-in which misses the obvious point that something like this could never get enough opt-ins to work because people are lazy and aren’t even going to bother to read it.
you just come across as an entitled white dude who doesn’t give a fuck about the problems in this country
Oh wow, first time a guy on the internet calls me a white dude. If you saw me in real life, or made any inferences based on my HN username, you would know better.
Didn’t say you were. Said it’s how you come across. It’s sadly true that it’s become a meme especially amongst many white males to hate every attempt to identify or prevent discrimination. The standard playbook is to say it’s an invasion of privacy, it’s a liberal company being too PC, and let’s start some right-wing version of the site where we can all be “free” which usually means a bunch of skinhead wannabes.
I apologize for being rude but to be honest it’s pretty frustrating that people would be so selfish as to make a big stink about it instead of just opting out. Do you know how many times Facebook or LinkedIn has opted me into research and sharing that I didn’t opt in to and no one even bats an eye most the time. Now that the research is about discrimination instead of advertising profits it’s some big invasion of privacy that we need to delete our accounts over. Not to mention that Facebook and LinkedIn typically don’t let you opt out at all.
Comments
Airbnb is a for-profit company with a controversial record, not a credible research institution. If they wanted to do this with no controversy, they would have a) had an institution send out the email to provide credibility, b) provide clear opt-ins, c) not hide behind a "We know your privacy is important" cliché instead of actually acting that way.
From the email: "we’ll use first names and profile photos from hosts and guests to help us understand the perceived race someone might associate with them...We’ll use this information to help us understand when and where racial discrimination is happening on our platform."
So if I get rejected for trying to book a room, my brown face will be labeled "minority" and be used as a datapoint to help improve the company. I have every right to disagree with how Airbnb is going about this especially from a privacy perspective, and do so vocally.
Yep you have every right, you just come across as an entitled white dude who doesn’t give a fuck about the problems in this country. You’re still arguing it should be opt-in which misses the obvious point that something like this could never get enough opt-ins to work because people are lazy and aren’t even going to bother to read it.
Oh wow, first time a guy on the internet calls me a white dude. If you saw me in real life, or made any inferences based on my HN username, you would know better.
Didn’t say you were. Said it’s how you come across. It’s sadly true that it’s become a meme especially amongst many white males to hate every attempt to identify or prevent discrimination. The standard playbook is to say it’s an invasion of privacy, it’s a liberal company being too PC, and let’s start some right-wing version of the site where we can all be “free” which usually means a bunch of skinhead wannabes.
I apologize for being rude but to be honest it’s pretty frustrating that people would be so selfish as to make a big stink about it instead of just opting out. Do you know how many times Facebook or LinkedIn has opted me into research and sharing that I didn’t opt in to and no one even bats an eye most the time. Now that the research is about discrimination instead of advertising profits it’s some big invasion of privacy that we need to delete our accounts over. Not to mention that Facebook and LinkedIn typically don’t let you opt out at all.
You're one of those people actively driving away otherwise decent people from a worthy cause. Congratulations.