Stake Five

Looks like there are folks getting things done in the privacy space, especially with regards to standardizing privacy policies, something that I think would be a great enabler for business on the Net. My 2c: better, and more easily, informed consumers are happier consumers.

So I fired up my feed reader and started poring over posts from days gone by that I’d missed, and what do I find? Via Tim Bray, IBM suing Amazon over patent infringement. And what might the infringed patents be?

• Presenting Applications in an Interactive Service
• Storing Data in an Interactive Network
• Presenting Advertising in an Interactive Service
• Adjusting Hypertext Links with Weighted User Goals and Activities
• Ordering Items Using an Electronic Catalogue

WTF???

If this isn’t an argument for patent reform, I don’t know what is.

So eBay’s partnered with Google to provide Google adwords results for the non-US market; eBay has exactly the same deal with Yahoo for the domestic US market. Odd moves indeed, but definitely safe ones for eBay.

The business behind the partnership is obviously sound; as the Search Engine Journal notes, Google has a greater search engine market share outside the US, which eBay is moving to capitalize on.

However, what worries me (a vague, insubstantial ghost of a worry for the moment), is what happens to our user data. Does eBay really share just search keywords with Yahoo/Google? Or does more user data get moved around? eBay’s privacy policy indicates that personal information may be shared with “members of our corporate family to help detect and prevent potentially illegal acts and provide joint services; (Our corporate affiliates will market only to users who request these services.)”. What exactly that means with regards to the partnerships with Yahoogle (pardon my French) remains unclear - does redirection of user-provided search keywords qualify as a “joint service”? Will users get to opt in to this service (we don’t seem to right now)?

Continue Reading »